This is a somewhat funny conversation between an SEO and John Mueller from Google. The SEO wants a quick and automated way (maybe via the API) to check 1.5 million domains for any manual actions specific to links. John said "our systems aren't designed for that, sorry." But the story does not end there.
Here are the first set of tweets:
Our systems aren't designed for that, sorry.
— 🍌 John 🍌 (@JohnMu) September 3, 2018
John then asked him why and he basically wants to redirect the links if the domains are not penalized.
There a links going to those domains, I don't know about their history so just want to make sure about the quality of the link profiles before redirecting and harming other websites. Just redirecting and waiting until the rankings collapse / skyrocket is another tactic...
— Jan-Willem Bobbink (@jbobbink) September 3, 2018
Because that's what the client has available to start with. Why improve content or start building links if there is plenty link value available already :)
— Jan-Willem Bobbink (@jbobbink) September 3, 2018
Yes, I think 99% could be categorised as soft 404s. But those redirects still pass link value which can be analysed, categorized per theme and pointed to somewhere relevant.
— Jan-Willem Bobbink (@jbobbink) September 3, 2018
The conversation ended there.
Google's computers say no.
Pretty funny conversation, I think.
Forum discussion at Twitter.
Note: This story was pre-written and scheduled to be posted now, I am currently offline for a holiday.
