Possible Negative SEO attack on meccabingo.com?

[Nibor]

Hi,

I have received an e-mail today allegedly from meccabingo.com saying that they have their site has been penalised in the wake of the Google penguin update. The e-mail goes on to say that they are cleaning up their backlinks, and that they want us to remove some of our links on one of our sites pointing to their homepage.

However, the site in question doesn't have any issue with it, and after doing some research; there appear to have been questions raised by other bingo portals after having received the same e-mails. These ask for the removal of all link including affiliate ones from their sites pointing to meccabingo.com. The suggestion going round is that these e-mails might be fraudulent, and that Mecca Bingo is being attacked by negative SEO to remove their good backlinks.

Can anyone shed some light on the situation? I have copied the e-mail below:

Hi,

I work for the company: MECCABINGO.COM

Our site has been penalized by Google because of a handful of back links
pointing to our site (we have lost 80% of our traffic). I have opened a
line of communication with their WebSpam team and am working to clear the
penalty.


HOW THIS AFFECTS YOU?

We have isolated the back links causing our penalty which we need to have
removed, ONE is from your site and I need to get that link taken down asap.


Heres the thing...

In order to get out of the penalty they have asked me to submit to them all
the paid or unnatural links which are currently pointing to our site and in
the next 5 days I will be submitting to them this list and unfortunately
your site is included.


HOW TO AVOID NEGATIVE ACTION FROM GOOGLE

If you can take the links down to WWW.MECCABINGO.COM then of course I will
be able to leave your site off that list.

I really don't want to be the cause of a penalty to you, nor report anyone
else's website to Google hence I'm reaching out to you now, and if you can
get that link taken down ASAP then of course I won't include your site when
I report back to them!


Where Exactly Are These Links Which Need Removing?

Specifically the links on the following page which link back to us are
located here

LINK REMOVED


I really hope you understand the position we find ourselves in, we truly
appreciate your assistance in the past for including the link to us and
would really appreciate it now if you can take the link down!


If you want to chat this through please get in touch.

Kindest Regards
Kelly Webber
http://www.MECCABINGO.COM
kazw1985@gmail.com

[DaveL]

Got these today. Spoke to Graham the affiliate manager at Mecca, and they're aware of it too, their search guys are looking in to it. Think we'll be seeing a lot of this now the blueprints for this sort of negative seo are very public.

[Nibor]

Right, thanks for the info! I gotta say I thought it was quite well written except for the opening paragraph, that didn't feel quite right.

[universal4]

And one of the many ironies in all of this, this campaign is being run and or co-oridnated by an seo.

I have not seen the emails myself, but I do not promote Mecca.

Mecca themselves (if they own a Trademark) might be able to get the private details of the user who set up that email address. I do not know how difficult Google makes it to get the details, but if someone is fraudulently pretending to represent Mecca, it sounds like they could use Trademark infringement against them if they feel it is warranted.

Exposing who is behind this could go a long way.

Rick
Universal4

[-Shay-]

Reply to them asking for a fee. I'd suggest asking them for 24 months * what you think those links will make.

[Nibor]

hahaha funny

[-Shay-]

hahaha funny

No, that is a serious response - ESPECIALLY to Mecca Bingo.

Not to long ago, they sent out a mass email to all "under performing affiliates" and the email had EVERY affiliate who received the email in the "cc" - claiming our accounts were going to be closed due to inactivity/underperformance. There were some pretty heavy hitters on that list who were surely not underperforming.

Anyway, that aside and assuming it is a legit email - considering it is an SEO company making the request, don't you think they will be getting a fee for doing all this "work"? I mean, they get money for going out and finding links for their "clients". Surely they're not working for charitable reasons. If they want you to quit advertising Mecca Bingo, then charge them a termination fee (make them pay you to go away). Then, you can ditch their program and replace the links/ads with programs who are more appreciative.

[universal4]

Ask them for recommendations on who to replace them with, take the sub-affiliate links to the programs and at least find out who is doing the asking.

Rick
Universal4

[-Shay-]

Interesting read on link removal requests.

[DaftDog]

lol - any email like that coming from a gmail account can only be a hoax.

[universal4]

Shay that was a great find, and should be a warning to everyone.

Rick
Universal4

[baldidiot]

I got a few of these right after reading this thread for the first time, weird.

My contact form grabbed the IP if anyone wants it - it comes from the domain linkaudit.linkaudit.co.uk.

[traffickitty]

If the domain is meccabingo.com, the email should also be sent by someone{at}meccabingo.com

Something sent on a @gmail.com account sounds quite weird.

I cant believe someone is doing something like that lol

[edgarf76]

That is shady, they could be using a spoof service like sharpmail dot uk dot co . In these spoof emails when you get them in gmail using says, Report Phishing? Or something to that effect.

[Nibor]

To be honest I'm surprised this doesn't happen more often. It is definitely the easiest way to negatively affect someones rankings, by getting all their links removed.

[Anthony-Coral]

Very interesting blog post, thanks for the link, Shay...

Another pointer, may be nothing, but Mecca Bingo is a very established UK brand. The second line features an 'americanism': penaliZed, a word that would be more likely written penaliSed by a native English person.

Agreed, its not exactly conclusive; there's no reason the Mecca Programme shouldn't be staffed by Americans, Spanish, Israelis etc but sometimes a combination of these things can all add up to something. For example, those emails I keep receiving from the Treasury official in the Burkino Faso Space programme who wants to know my bank details... he's a terrible speller!

[-Shay-]

Very interesting blog post, thanks for the link, Shay...

Another pointer, may be nothing, but Mecca Bingo is a very established UK brand. The second line features an 'americanism': penaliZed, a word that would be more likely written penaliSed by a native English person.

Agreed, its not exactly conclusive; there's no reason the Mecca Programme shouldn't be staffed by Americans, Spanish, Israelis etc but sometimes a combination of these things can all add up to something. For example, those emails I keep receiving from the Treasury official in the Burkino Faso Space programme who wants to know my bank details... he's a terrible speller!

Obviously you continue to provide banking detales upon request all day long.

[catchingsmoke]

Well sometimes we do it for other people from @ourseocompany.co.uk email addresses (if there's strict guidelines and agencies can't get @client.com emails).

But seeing as there's pretty much nobody piloting the plane at Rank at the moment. It's quite likely that it is a competitor or a disgruntled former SEO manager. Based on what went down with the whole relocation thing.