Backlinks truly are a necessary evil. Yeah, they are!
If you earn high-quality backlinks, you will knock the socks of your competition by achieving the top SERP positions. On the contrary, low-quality backlinks will kill your site as well.
That’s why you should always go for high-quality links. But what if you find out some bad backlinks to your site? How can you remove them without affecting its organic performance?
Stop racking your brain! I have got a solution.
How to Remove Bad Backlinks using Google Disavow Links Tool?
Fortunately, Google has a native tool for disavowing backlinks inside Webmaster Tools. We are going to utilize the same here.
I have divided this tutorial into different steps for your convenience.
Step 1: Finding Bad Backlinks and Asking Owners to Remove Them
The very first step is finding the bad backlinks. You can use SEMRush or any other backlink checking tools to do the same.
What if you don’t have any premium tools? Well, you can get the list of linking domains from Webmaster Tools itself.
First, you have to sign into Google Webmaster Tools and choose your domain name. Then go to Search Traffic » Links to your site. There you will have the list of domains.
You can even download the links as a CSV files.
Next, you will have to contact the site owners with a request to remove the link to your site. I know the response rate will not be that great. Still, you should do this given that this is the safest way than disavowing links.
Step 2: Creating a Disavow Links Text File
We need a text file of all bad links to be uploaded on Webmaster Tools. Google prefers it in a specific format.
Don’t worry! I have got a shortcut method for you to create disavow file.
During my research for writing this article, I have come across an awesome disavow file creator. All you have to do is copying the URL of the bad backlinks your site has.
Once you paste all the links, you can press Create Disavow File button. There you have it! You can see your browser downloads a TXT file.
Step 3: Submitting the TXT File on Webmaster Tools
The final step is submitting the file we downloaded on Webmaster Tools.
Disavow Links
This is an advanced feature and should only be used with caution. If used incorrectly, this feature can potentially harm your site’s performance in Google’s search results. We recommend that you only disavow backlinks if you believe that there are a considerable number of spammy, artificial, or low-quality links pointing to your site, and if you are confident that the links are causing issues for you.
Visit disavow links tool page. Then, you need to select your domain name. After doing so, you need to hit Disavow links.
The page that comes up asks you to browse and upload the TXT file. I don’t think you would find it difficult as you have already prepared such a file.
That’s it! Google will gradually start avoiding those links when ranking your website.
A very informative video on Google’s Disavow Links feature by Matt Cutts, I suggest you all to must watch it before proceeding with Disavow links.
Also Read: How To File DMCA and Request Removal of Your Copyrighted Content From Google
Wrapping Up
So, you know how to disavow links, don’t you?
In case you encounter any issues, feel free to drop a comment below. I will reach out to you with a working solution at the earliest.
In the meantime, you can check out our complete guide to creating a WordPress blog. Keep visiting for more blogging updates and don’t forget to share it.