Reconsideration Requests - How Long Should You Wait?

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The clock is ticking...or is it?

There is no set time that you should wait between being penalized and the submission of your reconsideration request. Some people have waited as little as a week, while others have waited months. This being said we would recommend waiting at least 30 days between receiving a notice of a penalty and the submission of your reconsideration request.

The idea is that a month will give you plenty of time to not only clear the "bad" links / content / etc from your website and link profile but to also create new links and content to help show Google that you are serious about making positive changes all around.

A little known fact about manual penalties

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Did you know that manual penalties eventually expire?

There is little else known about these penalties except that at some unknown date in the future they will cease to be.

So should you just weather the storm and wait for your manual penalty to drop off?

No, probably not. For one thing you can't know how long it will be until this happens; can your business afford to wait? With many manual penalties comes a dramatic loss in rankings, resulting in a loss of traffic, leading to a loss in revenues.

You can also be jumping from the frying pan into the fire if the issues that caused your site to receive a penalty are still present when the manual penalty expires. Either algorithm updates, filters, or another manual penalty can follow right behind the first one. And then you're stuck right back in the position you were in before!

Reconsideration requests and the road to recovery

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The thing with reconsideration requests is that you are deliberately inviting someone (or something, such as an automated process) to take a second, harder look at your website. This might seem a bit scary, but there are things that you can do to make sure that your website is in the best possible shape to endure the scrutiny of Google:

    
• If you received any sort of specifics in your penalty notification, make sure that you have addressed these things to the fullest. If you were told that you had low-quality or unnatural links, not only should you get rid of as many of these as possible but you should also get to work building links that are more in keeping with Google's guidelines. Make a gesture of good faith as well as trying to clean up any mess that might have been made in the past.

    
• Wait until you have had time to send out your requests for link removal, see the results of using disavowal tools, and so on. Give your website time to recover instead of trying to rush the process.

    
• Make sure that you are comfortable with the timing of your reconsideration request  - regardless of what anyone says, you are the one who ultimately makes the decisions regarding your website.

 

Video: What should be included in a proper reconsideration request?

Google can also be a bit fickle when it comes to reconsideration requests. You might only get one chance to be looked over again. Some people get a second chance and are able to submit a second reconsideration request in the future after their first one has been denied, but many do not. So choose your course of action wisely!

Looking ahead focus on real marketing tactics.  SEO has evolved into something of creating brand awareness and getting in front of your potential customers.  Check out RankPop for more info on this type of digital marketing.

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Author Bio: 
Kris Dietz - I love creating something amazing then spreading the word about it!  My mission is to develop and mold SEO into an amazing outlet of sharing valuable resources.   I enjoy networking and meeting like minded individuals.