Google Help – User Generated Spam

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Google Help – User Generated Spam

YouTube video

This video talks about the user generated Spams usually found in unmaintained sites. Matt Cutts had enumerated guidelines on how to get rid and avoid such user generated spams. Several examples of user generated spam are also cited by Matt Cutts and the first thing to do after being a victim of user generated spam is discussed.

The video highlights the following:

  1. User generated Spams occurred in sites wherein there are comment sections or forums that allow other users to drop bad links that might deface the site in the future. Poor maintenance of the website allows these user generated spams on the site and the common victims are webmasters who haven’t checked their sites for years.
  2. Google does not usually take down the whole domain but rather prevent users from accessing certain parts of the site which are defaced by these user generated spams.
  3. Webmasters can check their forums or comment section sites if it was infected with spam by checking the list of the users with odd names like “Carinsurancediscount”.
  4. After cleaning the site from spammy posts, it is important that it is maintained and keep the spammers from coming back the sites. Preventive measures such as Captcha or other sort verification should be added on the site. Comment moderation is also important
  5. If the threads on forums are clean, it does not necessarily mean that there are no spammy users on your sites so it is equally important to check those than to clean the threads.
  6. Reconsideration requests explaining the situation to Google is also helpful in these kind of situations so as to not get lower rankings.

To get better SEO rankings for your online marketing you should:

  1. Occasionally check your sites’ comment section or forums for spammy comments, posts, and threads. However, it is equally important to remove spammy user profiles to get rid of the root of the problems. Failure to do this will eventually lead to another user generated spams.
  2. Equip your sites with spam proof features like Captcha that cannot be solved by spam tools. Keep in mind that easier Captchas can be easily solved so it is advisable to use more complicated forms. Another essential feature to avoid user generated spams is the comment moderation wherein only trusted members of the site are allowed to post on the site that will be included on page rank.
  3. Submit a reconsideration request on Google, document the event and provide evidences that it will not happen again.