Why can this site rank top for a keyword with no exact anchor text in ahrefs anchor cloud?

coin666

Guys, I was analysis my top 3 competitors for a keyword that had 33k ms, and i found this no 3 guy had strange anchor cloud and backlink profile however still able to sit on no 3. 

There is a URL anchor which mixed with porn word (2%), I almost fall down from my chair when see this anchor distribution! Anyone had any ideas? 

bangkoklad

negative SEO attack

coin666

Do you think it is negative SEO attack? Here is his ranking trend

Not sure if this is a negative attack but his ranking are stable.. 

bangkoklad

My guess is his site is so well established for a long time and then someone just started sending links with fucked up anchor texts to his site but he might already have so powerful, relevant backlinks from the beginning so all these shitty new links haven't had much effect on his site's ranking. But that's just my guess.

coin666

Possible, but the top 1 & 2 guys had similar anchor, one with all casino related. Really wonder how they can still rank on top with this kind of anchor

bangkoklad

Well if all these shitty links come from low authority sources even though they're in large numbers, they might not have as much SEO weight as a handful of legitimate high authority sources with proper anchor texts.

JudderMan

What niche is it? Might be a strong site that's been hacked and has outbound links going to porn/viagra sites to inflate their rankings. Happens a lot in casino/porn/pills niches. Legit sites get slammed with spam and injected links. Usually when Google notices and you search for the casino kws, there will be a .edu/high auth site have a 'this site has been hacked' notice on it. 

coin666

this is social media service niche, the site is not so strong, I do suspect that it might got hacked because my site once was hacked as well, having a lot of fake pages that redirect to casino site, took me weeks to clear and applied tight security, change all password, look through whole wordpress database, remove those malicious codes and then resubmit my sitemap in GWMT. 

But since they are my competitors, I just hope their ranking dropped .... 

coin666

This URL had CF40 TF9, with PA 37 DA 26, PR n/a, domain registered on 2013-03-17. Does this indicate it is a stronger site?

Brandon

Probably negative SEO...this is a great example of why I never recommend my clients engage in negative SEO. The target sites remain the same and often move up in the rankings.

dwwwb

Agree with @Brandon totally. It seems Google often filters out obvious negative anchors. We did an "experiment" a ways back on a site and only helped them. Then tried an almost identical approach to one of our own test sites and it still ranks from only the neg link projects. Other tests have confirmed negative blasts on a local level aren't so negative. 

bangkoklad

Yep, it's almost certainly negative SEO, you can see on the first screenshot the number of referring domains went up from a handful in mid February to around 17k in early March so you can clearly see those shitty links with fucked up anchor texts have only been built only very recently.

coin666

How long do you think this site will last if the negative SEO kept pouring in at this rate? 

dwwwb

@coin66 To many variables to be even close to accurate. Our negative "experiment" started on a site ranking #5- and we hit it with 3-5k links per day for months. It moved to back and forth #2 & #3, we stopped and it sits at #3. This is with 90% neg links. If it appears deliberate from a possible competitor, or party crasher, it really only helps them.

Negative campaigns are a pure waste of time, never do them at all now, would rather develop good footprints,scrapes and links that can be built upon. There are dozens of other ways to solve problems with unruly competitors more effective than negative seo....

coin666

@dwwwb I agreed with that, you can use your knowledge to help this world become a better place rather than having war...