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  1. #1
    Casino-Matt is offline Private Member
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    Default Forum wierd $#it with backlinks

    In the last 2 weeks we have seen a rapid spike when checking ahrefs for backlinks. When checking the details the links are pointing to people's forum profiles.
    In their profile they have their homepage filled in.

    Anyone seen this happen to them with their forum? Anyone know why people are doing this? Why go to so much effort?

    I have taken the decision to close registrations on our forum as I am not sure these fake backlinks are going to damage our site.

    So anyway is this some new seo black hat trick? And what should we do about it?

  2. #2
    baldidiot is online now Private Member
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    Default

    It's spam - they're creating profiles with links to their websites, and then creating a second tier of links to the profile pages to make the links stronger. They may also be creating links to the links to the profiles and so on... It's all done with software so easy for them to automate so people may even be doing 10+ tiers these days (and not a new thing either, been going on for years).

    In fact the websites the profiles are linking to probably aren't even the main 'money site', just a link in a very long chain...

    Anyway, I would delete the spammy profiles for starters. You could dissavow the links coming in if you wanted to be extra safe. Other things to look at include installing some anti-spam plug ins that work on a variety of methods (including spam db lookups through stopforumspam, challenge questions, recaptcha etc..).

    You may also want to restrict registrations based on IP either limiting countries to your target market or blocking those that are known for being the source of a lot of spam (assuming that you're not also targeting those countries). Whilst this may stop some legit registrations, you could always put a contact form for people to use who think they're being blocked unfairly for you to manually approve.

    Forum spam is annoying but there's a heck of a lot of it and you're going to need to get a handle on it, otherwise it'll quickly turn into a cesspool of fake handbags and pills.
    onlinegamblingwebsites.com - Formally known as goodbonusguide.

    Gambling Domains: Small clear out of some of the domains we've been hoarding on Dan - see the list here. Prices negotiable, and willing to swap for decent links.

  3. #3
    Casino-Matt is offline Private Member
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    Thanks Baldy.
    Well I have decided to pull the forum altogether. More hasstle than it is worth. Think I am better off spending my time building the website itself than policing a dead forum.

    Thanks mate!

  4. #4
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    maxpower is offline Private Member
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    Yes, unfortunately x-tier sites are a necessity in these "post G animal" times

  5. #5
    Casino-Matt is offline Private Member
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    Quote Originally Posted by Anita View Post
    also occurred this problem
    How did it affect your site and what did you do about it?

  6. #6
    ndbl is offline Public Member
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    It's spam, agree with baldidiot. There are a lot of SEO gurus out there offering thousands of backlinks for peanuts. Google doesn't like a sudden increase of backlinks, so it would be wise to manually remove asap those profiles. Some open source forums like SMF or BB seems a bit more vulnerable than vbulletin though.

  7. #7
    peternorsk is offline Private Member
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    I promote websites for the past 6 years, never used tier2 for my backlinks.
    Just make sure your tier1 link is a strong link, thats all you need i think.

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