Disavow the Disavow Process

Do NOT give up on the benefits of directories. Fashion directories such as Apparel Search play an important role on the internet, and this article — first published in October 2013, with the argument kept as it was made then — explains why the rush to remove directory listings through Google's disavow tool was a mistake.

The disavow file, and the steps leading up to it, present little more than trouble for many online directories. If "paid links" equals "bad links" in the mind of Google, it is reasonable to declare that the disavow process may be unfairly punishing directories that charge for services rendered.

How the Disavow Process Works

The disavow process has multiple stages. First, companies are told to remove inbound links of poor quality by contacting website owners. If that does not meet their satisfaction, they can move on to the disavow file submission through Google Webmaster Tools — the Disavow Tool discussion at Moz covers the possible dangers and benefits of that step.

Google's stated reason is that, in some circumstances, incoming links can affect its opinion of a page or site: a site owner, or an SEO the owner hired, may have built bad links to the site via paid links or other link schemes that violate Google's quality guidelines. A "paid link" can mean buying or selling links that pass PageRank — exchanging money for links or posts that contain links, exchanging goods or services for links, or sending someone a free product in exchange for them writing about it and including a link.

Why Directories Are Caught in the Middle

Directories that charge money for the service they provide are essentially creating paid links. Hence, they are possibly categorized as the opposite of good. But is Google really suggesting website owners should remove themselves from business-to-business directories? If so, it is an unfair recommendation. If a directory owner decides it is appropriate to charge companies for the time and effort to create, edit and maintain a directory, why would Google find that to be black hat? Google decided its own business model would allow companies to be listed in its search engine at no cost. That should not give it the right to dictate that every other internet resource must also offer free services.

The reality is that directories are not easy to maintain. They take a great deal of time to develop and manage. Why shouldn't the owner of a directory get paid for that effort? Not all "paid links" should be considered equal. Directories are not evil, and they are not black hat.

Two Ways to Find Information

Online directories are created for very legitimate reasons. There are essentially two primary ways to locate information on the internet: search engines, and directories. With only two primary methods, it is a rather unfair business practice for one method — the search engine — to inform people that using a competing service, a paid directory, will negatively impact their standing in search results.

Pretend for a moment that there is no such thing as an algorithm or a search engine. Wouldn't inbound links from multiple locations, paid or non-paid, be beneficial to your own website? Certainly they would. Without the algorithm, how could they possibly hurt your traffic? Which means that if you are removing your business from paid directories, you are doing so simply to alter your PageRank — and isn't playing around with links precisely the kind of scheme Google's policies are supposed to discourage? The scenario created by the disavow hysteria is unfair to both the directory and the companies being pushed into removing their listings.

What This Did to a Working Directory

Apparel Search is a directory for the fashion industry that contains both paid and non-paid listings. A very large majority of its directory listings are actually non-paid, but over the years many listings have also been created for a small service fee. The intention was never to manipulate search engines or pass along link juice — the directory existed long before SEO was popular. The fee was for the time and effort required to build, edit and maintain the listing: company profiles, designer bios and the rest are created manually for every company listed.

The effects of the disavow advice were concrete: time spent communicating back and forth with companies asking to be removed, sometimes trying to talk them out of it; time and effort to remove the data and re-upload the revised pages; a shrinking directory that is less helpful to its viewers; and new companies paying for listings significantly reduced. And beyond removals, when the disavow file itself is used, what negative signals are sent about the websites named in it? A website can be entirely legitimate and still be listed because people were scared into disavowing. A directory carries tens of thousands of listings; if even a small percentage of those companies add it to a disavow file, that can cripple the business — and competitors can manipulate the tool to hurt a rival.

Questions Worth Asking

The argument comes down to a few questions. Is it appropriate for a search engine to directly or indirectly suggest that businesses remove their listings from paid directory websites? Is it fair to publicly insinuate that paid directories are "black hat," reducing the likelihood directories will receive new submissions? And if you have been contacting websites you do not own asking them to remove links, are you really building or cleaning your own website — or are you doing that work on behalf of the search engine rather than your visitors?

It is understandable why Google prefers fewer links on the net, and in theory the disavow process reduces the overall number of links and the noise among them. The question is whether that method is a fair process for online directories that receive compensation for listings. The conclusion reached here in 2013 still stands as this site's position: it is better to disavow the disavow process. Search engine optimization is certainly not easy — Apparel Search has often been lost in regard to making its own website rank well, as our SEO article from May 2013 describes.