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[BobP]

Today I received the third request for listings to be deleted from my directory. Each time the request is from a gmail account done in poor quality english like the example below. I am wondering if some kind of negative seo is going on, this happening to anyone else?

"Respected Moderator,

We recently came across to your website and saw that approved link of our website is having objectionable information and creating problem for us and really need to be removed. If you could guide us how to remove our all links from your site or if it is possible to be removed this from your end, we would be highly thankful to you. Here we have mentioned essential information of our listing which would be easier for you to do the needful. We humbly request you to remove our site links (including inner page links) from all of your websites group.

I further declare that I am authorized to act as a copyright holder and that the information in this letter is accurate."

For what it is worth the listing is a correct description of the site pretty much a cleaner version of their title and description nothing objectionable nor is the the site itself a problem being a car rental agency.

BobP

[Dan]

Yes, this is the climate in which we now live. There is now a very real situation where fake users will attempt to take out their competition by removing back links.

They'll state that it is their site, it isn't, and request you remove their link based on Penguin, or Google changes, or something else.

Meanwhile, you as the site owner believe you are doing the right thing in adhering to a submitter's request, when in actuality you are negatively impacting someone else who hasn't actually requested to be removed.

So how do you identify if the submitter is real or not?

Sadly, poor English probably won't cut it. Since that could constitute the majority of the web.

So... Does the email match with the one used for the listing in your database?

If not, can you email the address that is associated with the listing in your database and ask them to confirm?

Otherwise, it could be someone conducting negative SEO on a competitor.

My suggestion would also be this. If they are deadly serious about getting rid of the link, and you don't remove it, they'll come back and ask again. Whereas I think someone conducting negative SEO would just do a blanket email like that, and treat it as a hit 'n' hope kind of situation (they'd waste enough time to email everyone once but that is about as much trouble as they would go to).

Remember at the end of the day it is your content. You are the one to decide what happens with it. As I stated in another post regarding people wanting to be removed from this site (check out the Jenett Blog Post). I did that because I saw no point in people clicking the link and being re-directed back to our site, so I removed Jenett.

If they weren't doing that I wouldn't have removed them, even if they asked me to. Because the content belongs to this site. I'm providing content for my users. What Jenett does with the traffic is up to them.

[BobP]

Thanks Dan, I am now more convinced then ever this is negative seo. They are tricky using the domain at gmail, so what I've done so far is reply asking they submit their request from their site's domain email like contact at domain. So far no replies. BobP

[mimika]

And that's where "email address must match Domain" policy pays off.

Every time someone is requesting our Editors to remove site, they're sending email to owner asking owner to confirm request and so far no one came back with confirmation.

mimika

[Catfish]

I got the first one of these today. I think it's related to the negative publicity over directories and Penguin lately, so obviously Dan's firefighting hasn't reached all the right ears. Shame.

I think it's insulting, because what they're saying is essentially my directory isn't a good enough resource to link to them. Well, there's the small matter of my freedom of speech, so I will link to who I like and I don't care who makes the request, site owner or dodgy competitor. I put time and energy into creating a resource, so I need a good reason to go to the trouble of ripping it up.

However if you do care and want to comply you can always insist the website confirms the request by putting a small file or confirmation message on their website at a specific url, or an exclusion in robots.txt.

[Dan]

Originally Posted by Catfish

I got the first one of these today. I think it's related to the negative publicity over directories and Penguin lately, so obviously Dan's firefighting hasn't reached all the right ears. Shame.

Was the request real? As in was it the site's real owner...

I took to SERoundtable and SEOMoz to dispel the myths being circulated. The only other person putting out the flames of disinformation was TheGypsy who I really only know from the SEO Bullsh!t website.

Anyone whose been in webmaster/SEO circles for any length of time knows the dis-information that can be put in an authoritative tone and basically it spreads like wildfire and becomes bible. Not for any short amount of time either. Years.

Of late I've seen people legitimately reviving discussion threads on webmaster forums I frequent, that are literally 7 years old, and their questions are basically along the lines of "I heard this was true? etc etc".

It's a shame, but what can you do except wait for it all to die down. Go check out the SEOMoz blog post. It's ridiculous. The amount of sheep responding on their blog, shows me how poorly represented the SEO industry really is. It also shows how sites like that who have such a strong influence in the SEO community can breed massive disinformation and basically send the industry in the wrong direction --- the funny thing is these are the same people complaining about the industry being full of shonks! (glass houses much?)

I can reassure you that some of the bigger and known names in the SEO industry, still use directories heavily in their SEO backlink profiles for clients, because they know they work --- they just don't want everyone else to know that --- you know... smoke and mirrors. Tell them all it doesn't work and then your job just got a whole lot easier

I can reassure you, for a fact, that is the case. I know a good handful of these SEOs who are doing directory link building as a strong part of their SEO methodology --- (Let's skip semantics. I'm referring to "SEO" very broadly. What I am referring to is off-page marketing. Many people would consider SEO to be on-site only, and SEM to be the off-site stuff. Heck you'll find experts who only think of useability itself as the purest form of making a site rank, and really that creating the access to the content and the content itself is the artform. No one's wrong, it's just the perspective from which we all speak.)

Originally Posted by Catfish

I think it's insulting, because what they're saying is essentially my directory isn't a good enough resource to link to them. Well, there's the small matter of my freedom of speech, so I will link to who I like and I don't care who makes the request, site owner or dodgy competitor. I put time and energy into creating a resource, so I need a good reason to go to the trouble of ripping it up.

It is insulting.

The content is yours.

The decision of what to do with listings is yours.

Always remember that. It makes for a better directory owner.

[YMC]

I've had a few of these through the years. They've turned out to be legitimate - the site owner was not going to continue their website.

What I've done in the past is look up the listing in question and send an email to the address they provided during submission. I think most people use several emails and the folks who responded laughed and said that they had forgotten which one they had submitted with.

I think email must match domain is a bit short-sighted. It means no shared hosting blogs (WP, Blogger, etc.) and no shops like Etsy.

[BobP]

I also do not believe a directory should question who submits the link, only whether the link is of good enough quality to be listed.

However, when reviewing a request for a link to be removed, it damn well better be from the person who owns it. Not really a problem to check with whois or betterwhois and if they block their email and the request is from a domain not connected to the requested delete, I'm keeping the link until I find out more.

This assumes the directory in question is not a bad neighborhood.

BobP

[Dan]

Originally Posted by YMC

What I've done in the past is look up the listing in question and send an email to the address they provided during submission. I think most people use several emails and the folks who responded laughed and said that they had forgotten which one they had submitted with.

Only thing youcan do really.

Originally Posted by YMC

I think email must match domain is a bit short-sighted. It means no shared hosting blogs (WP, Blogger, etc.) and no shops like Etsy.

I think this is a personal preference. I can see upsides and downsides to both.

Originally Posted by BobP

I also do not believe a directory should question who submits the link, only whether the link is of good enough quality to be listed.

Agree.

Originally Posted by BobP

However, when reviewing a request for a link to be removed, it damn well better be from the person who owns it. Not really a problem to check with whois or betterwhois and if they block their email and the request is from a domain not connected to the requested delete, I'm keeping the link until I find out more.

This assumes the directory in question is not a bad neighborhood.

I like that you would do this too. It's the only way a real directory can operate and be fair.

[YMC]

A bit off topic but the issue has been brought up....

I've always hesitated on the not worrying who submitted the link aspect. Some legal minds believe screenshots of a website can be copyrighted. Using a screenshot could open you up for a claim of copyright infringement if the submission did not come from a true representative of the site.

In my directories, I use product and animal photos rather than screenshots. Those pictures are definitely copyright protected.

Fair use is perhaps one of the murkiest aspects of copyright law and while one could argue the use of screen shots on a directory is fair use, you would still have to fight off someone determined to sue you first.