Had an idea for a domain name, went over to godaddy, and it was available so I registered it - no biggie.

I put up a coming soon graphic and had my SEO toolbar loaded, turns out the domain had 400 backlinks - WOW! I took a look at them and they are all shady, spammy, black hat type links.

My guess is the owner dropped the domain because thought trashy links weren't bringing results...

I'm not sure what to do?

Do I hang on to this domain name, build links, and see what happens or just drop it - it has a PR0 and hasn't been indexed yet (just bought it yesterday)...

hmmmm.... 2 options. Monetize it if it's in a niche, or do some more SEO and flip it to a newbie (Show all the backlinks)

Originally Posted by blazen

When a domain expires it lost all benefits or/and penalties from google that occurred during the ownership of the previous owner. So it starts with a new slate in the eyes of google when registered again. So develope it just like any other domain or whatever you plan to do with it.

Thanks, that's what I figured but can anyone else confirm this?

I'd hate to build links for a banned domain name...

I would not waste my time those links will get reindexed and the same penalty will happen again.

it does lose all of the backlink juice, not sure about penalties

all the penalties also go AWAY

Add it to your google webmaster tools and there is an option to get your site reconsidered. Try that!

I'm not sure where to stand on this issue but it's obvious the backlinks do count for something as well as the domain age.

I registered a domain a few months ago that had only just become available to register. The domain is 8 years old.

I added it to google webmaster tools and through that it does show the backlinks. Why would webmaster tools show them to me if google just disregards all the old stuff once someone new grabs the domain.

My thinking on this is because i grabbed the domain quickly, googlebot didn't get the chance to try to crawl the site while it was available. Perhaps it crawled the site while it was still up and then crawled it again when i added it to google webmaster tools.

On the topic of why people let good domains expire, sometimes the owners die and their family has no idea that their loved one owned any domains or have no idea how to keep them going.

those shady links will still count. i would just get a refund for the domain name.

Originally Posted by macromj88

Thanks, that's what I figured but can anyone else confirm this?

I'd hate to build links for a banned domain name...

That may be true for the search engine, but definitely not for AdSense and AdWords.