How do you deal with a black hat competitor?

[styleiskeytobh]

Hi everyone

I am currently dealing with the issue of a competitor who is hiring an ad agency to push his page for a relatively low competition keyword.

The reason it is a problem is because we have multiple sites we want to rank for that term and we produce a lot of quality content that gets shared and read, commented on and so forth, but it is not enough to deal with the guys agency.

He has pushed past our sites and the sites of partner firms. It hurts to watch your own work go down the drain because somebody is using fake methods.

How do you deal with such a situation? I have already reported his site to Google multiple times as he bought around 100.000 backlinks recently.

 

[Jason Starkey]

Hire better people than he has. They are here

 

[validseo]

What makes you think it is black hat? Maybe they are paying more to promote their content and Google is noticing the demand that is being generated.

 

[styleiskeytobh]

I am a marketing professional and am observing their whole campaign, Print, Online, B2B and so forth.
So I can guarantee that the demand they are generating is not very high, they are not creating new content and they are not getting many organic backlinks, perhaps 2-3.

What they are getting is around 70.000 new bought backlinks which I can see via services like Ahrefs. Ever since those links came they just rose in the SERPS like crazy.

So my question is, how come Google is not reacting to that? Anybody can go and buy crappy backlinks and just rise in the SERPS nowadays it seems...

 

[MisterF]

I am a marketing professional and am observing their whole campaign, Print, Online, B2B and so forth.


So my question is, how come Google is not reacting to that? Anybody can go and buy crappy backlinks and just rise in the SERPS nowadays it seems...

Clearly the links they're buying aren't that crappy.

IF they really are crappy, then just how crap are yours ?

You need to step up your game and buy better.

 

[seohug]

Work smarter than he does and don't get side tracked into his methods. Besides, if they are really using blackhat, it will be short lived anyway.

 

[styleiskeytobh]

Interesting. Well thank you all for your input.

So here is my strategy then: I will keep building my own sites' content and backlink profiles while keeping on reporting the guy as long as he is mass buying backlinks.

He got 70.000+ backlinks from 3000+ different domains recently. Ih the previous 12 years his website has been online (before hiring that ad agency) he got around 140 backlinks.

So I am surprised Google is not noticing something strange. It is a low competition keyword though so maybe they don't care enough yet. Either way, it has been ruining our and some partner businesses' morale because we have been ranking sites for those kw's for years and are regularly producing content .

 

[seohug]

So I am surprised Google is not noticing something strange.

Google uses an algo that they constantly try to improve, hence the updates. Besides, the index is huge, that it takes time to see the effect of good/bad links, shaddy methods. So, they may get rewarded on the first filter and bitch slapped later by the next.

 

[Mr Go Figure]

Step up, use more tactics, thats the only way you beat your competitor, see if he is using PBN. Build your own you will sonn outrank him if you stay consistent , thats the key to success, if you give in and give up then you will always be 2 or 3rd.

 

[styleiskeytobh]

I already bought up around 20 domains related to that keyword.
I am currently Nr.1, Nr.2, Nr.4, Nr.5, Nr.9 So I am pretty much dominating page one. But I bothers me that his page has been pushed to rank 3 from literally NOT being ranked for that keyword.

 

[Warrenway]

I'd assume -- if he is doing what you say he is (buying massive amounts of links, etc.) -- then he's going to end up penalized fairly soon. Try not to worry about him and continue doing your own thing (i.e. creating great content, marketing it safely/smartly) and you'll be in the better position long term.

 

[styleiskeytobh]

Alright, thanks again for all your input.

Last thing: One thing he is doing is that his ad agency has created a replica site of his current one. For some reason that site appeared in SERPS right when their campaign started but has disappeared since.
I'm assuming that it is linking to his actual site and that he is somehow pumping link juice through that one domain on top of the other links.

Not sure how that is possible. I'm assuming it is built like a pyramid.

 

[Vladamir]

If he really is using blackhat methods and blasting the site with india style fiverr links he will get dealt with soon enough. I used to create some parasite sites which are basically sites that last you a few months you blast the living hell out of them with links and make it look like your content went viral helps to blast a few sape links aswell then they go #1 for a while and then get deindexed. I doubt though for a reputable company they would be blasting it that hard as a parasite. My advice would be seo harder, I sometimes get competitors push past me like last month someone beat me for my biggest money keyword 40k monthly, I just seod harder more links more tactics and got back to #1

Theres always going to be someone that works harder than you, i always remember that will smith quote, I may not be better than him but i will die before i give up its what sets me apart, while hes sleeping im working, while hes eating im working

 

[styleiskeytobh]

Thanks a lot for your input everybody!

 

[SkyrocketSEO]

while keeping on reporting the guy

Phaggot.

I am a marketing professional

Tell me more about it Mr Marketing Professional

 

[styleiskeytobh]

Phaggot.

Who the f are you?

Tell me more about it Mr Marketing Professional

I'll pass

There's always one person who just has to go full retard

 

[SkyrocketSEO]

I'll pass

There's always one person who just has to go full retard

Your first day at BH forum and you start with "I am reporting a guy that is doing BH".....what did you expect?

 

[styleiskeytobh]

I can relate to your comments in that context even though they're unnecessarily offensive but you don't know the situation I'm in.
First of all I appreciate BHW as a resource and I don't hate Black hatters at all.

I work for a company that has 60 employees and am doing their marketing. Family's depend on it. A competitor copied our name, there is currently a lawsuit under way and is trying to rank for kw's which drive business since many years.
It's like somebody using the name Ferrari even though he is selling Toyota.

I'll openly admit I'm no SEO pro I usually outsource that kind of business but I will get successful at it.

 

[Vladamir]

Your first day at BH forum and you start with "I am reporting a guy that is doing BH".....what did you expect?

hahaha this made me laugh, that does suck like first day on african american forum and you shout FCK NEHGRZ hahaha. But do sympathize with his situation if it was a complete name steal.

google has a DMCA report stolen content area, called google copywrite removal I have had a request in for a week now with no response and this article says they got 75 million request sin february so may take a while to get to your request haha.
http://www.theverge.com/2016/3/7/11172516/google-takedown-requests-75-million

Regardless good luck!

 

[SkyrocketSEO]

I can relate to your comments in that context even though they're unnecessarily offensive but you don't know the situation I'm in.
First of all I appreciate BHW as a resource and I don't hate Black hatters at all.

I work for a company that has 60 employees and am doing their marketing. Family's depend on it. A competitor copied our name, there is currently a lawsuit under way and is trying to rank for kw's which drive business since many years.
It's like somebody using the name Ferrari even though he is selling Toyota.

I'll openly admit I'm no SEO pro I usually outsource that kind of business but I will get successful at it.

OK ,well all the best, I guess