How To Disavow Links & Cleanup Your SEO

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Disavowing links might be the most misunderstood maintenance task in SEO. Everyone’s heard of it, everyone has an opinion, and almost everyone uses it wrong. It’s the digital PR equivalent of an emergency exit: you hope you never need it, but when the building’s on fire, you’d better know how to find the handle.

But here’s the uncomfortable truth you rarely hear in the industry:

Most SEOs disavow links for the wrong reasons — and not disavowing the right links can tank a site just as quickly.

If you’ve ever stared at your backlink profile after a core update and wondered whether something in there is poisoning your site… you’re not alone. Disavowing links raises questions even senior operators debate:

  • *Should I disavow this?

  • Should I disavow anything at all?

  • Does disavowing links still work?

  • Is Google even paying attention?*

And the correct answer is still:

It depends — but the margin for error is small, and the stakes are high.

Today’s SERPs reward clean trust signals. Not perfect. Not manicured. Clean.
Because in the age of retailer spam, hacked domains, mass-produced parasite SEO, and algorithmic volatility, your backlink profile is more than a ranking factor. It’s a risk factor.

So let’s break down the actual, operator-first, PressWhizz-level process for disavowing links:

  • When to do it

  • When not to do it

  • How to do it without self-sabotage

  • How to avoid the common pitfalls that ruin websites

  • And how to build a link profile that never needs disavowal in the first place

This is the version of the guide nobody else writes — because they either don’t have the experience, or they’re too scared to be direct.

Let’s get into it.

Google’s official definition is clinical:

“Tell Google not to take certain links into account when assessing your site.”

But that’s the diplomatic, PR-friendly version.
Here’s the real one:

Disavowing links is you telling Google:
“These links are sketchy. They’re not ours. Don’t associate them with us.”

You’re basically cutting off a digital liability.

Think of it like risk management:

  • The link still exists.

  • It still gets crawled.

  • People can still click it.

  • It just stops counting as a signal in ranking evaluation.

This matters because external links aren’t simply “votes.” They’re trust indicators, and trust indicators can help you rank — or get you slapped with a manual action.

Google ignores a ton of junk automatically. But sometimes it doesn’t. Sometimes that junk piles up. Sometimes you inherit someone else’s junk. And sometimes your competitors manufacture junk for you.

That’s when disavowing becomes a strategic tool instead of an SEO superstition.

There are three camps in the SEO world:

Camp 1: The Trigger-Happy Disavowers

These are the folks who see a DR9 domain linking to them and immediately panic.

  • “Low authority = spam”

  • “Foreign language = risky”

  • “No organic traffic = disavow it”

Wrong, wrong, wrong.

That thinking destroys equity more than it saves your site.

Camp 2: The Anti-Disavow Purists

This group believes Google ignores all spam automatically.

They’ll excitedly tweet:

“Google says you should never disavow unless you get a manual action!”

Cool.
Should.
Not always does.

Google ignores a lot.
Not everything.

If you’ve ever dealt with impacted sites in casino, supplements, gambling, crypto, medical, real estate, or other high-money verticals… you know better.

Camp 3: The Operators (Where You’re Going to Live After This Guide)

Operators understand:

  • Disavow is a scalpel, not a sledgehammer.

  • You don’t use it lightly.

  • You use it when the algorithm is confused or compromised.

  • You use it when trust signals matter more than link count.

This guide is written for Camp 3 — the ones who want decision-making rooted in logic, data, and actual SERP behaviour.

Let’s cut right to the chase.

There are three — and only three — legitimate reasons to disavow links today.

Everything else is theatre.

Let’s make this simple.

Here are the only real reasons to use the disavow tool:

You’ve Got a Manual Action from Google

If Google has already hit you with a manual penalty, you’re no longer in theory-land. You’re in survival mode.

A manual action is Google saying:

“Your link profile violates our trust standards enough that we are taking action by hand.”

This is the one scenario where disavowal is not optional.

You need to:

  • Attempt link removals

  • Document the attempts

  • Disavow what you can’t remove

  • Submit a reconsideration request

Skipping disavow in this situation? That’s a traffic death sentence.

This is far more common than people admit.

You acquired a site.
Or a client hired you.
Or you’re cleaning up after an agency that built “50 high-DA links for $200.”

Red flags include:

  • Old forum blasts

  • PBN networks built on expired domains

  • Blog comments from the 2010–2014 era

  • Web 2.0 spam

  • Auto-generated foreign anchors

  • Directory blasts

  • Article spinning syndication

  • Tiered link pyramids gone wrong

  • GSA/SENuke footprints

You don’t fix that manually. You clean it with a structured disavow file.

You Were Attacked by Negative SEO

Negative SEO isn’t the boogeyman it was in 2014, but it hasn’t disappeared.

If you’re in high-value SERPs, someone is eventually going to test your vulnerability.

Signs include:

  • 2,000+ new backlinks overnight

  • Spam TLDs (.xyz, .monster, .club, .top, .click)

  • Adult/pharma/porn anchors

  • Russian, Indonesian, Vietnamese or Arabic spam networks

  • Thousands of random landing pages linked at once

Google sometimes catches it. Sometimes they don’t. If those link spikes correlate with ranking slides, you need to act.

This is exactly what disavowing links is designed for.

Do NOT disavow just because:

  • A tool says a link is “toxic”

  • A domain is low DR

  • The content is low-quality but not manipulative

  • The link is nofollow

  • The link is foreign-language

  • The linking site “feels weird”

  • You simply don’t like the look of it

  • You’re trying to “clean up” a natural profile

  • You want your link profile to look perfect

  • You’re disavowing to increase your DR (that’s not how DR works)

This is SEO 301:

Bad ≠ harmful.
Irrelevant ≠ dangerous.
Low authority ≠ toxic.
Nofollow ≠ a threat.

This is the part where most guides give you a generic list of “copy this format and upload it.” Most sites have unique cases, so let’s do this right.

Use Ahrefs, Majestic, or GSC to pull your full backlink profile. I recommend using Ahrefs + Google Search Console for the most complete view.

Pro Tip: Focus on referring domains, not individual links. You care more about the source site than each URL.

Export your full backlink list and dump it into Google Sheets, it should look like this:

You’re now looking for links that meet these criteria:

  • Spammy TLDs (.xyz, .loan, .click, etc.)

  • Anchor text is pure exact match, pharma, porn, casino, etc.

  • Domains with zero organic traffic + no content

  • Obvious PBN footprints (tons of outbound links, no structure)

  • Blog comments, forum spam, web 2.0 garbage

Sort and filter.

If you wouldn’t link to it yourself?
If it makes you feel dirty looking at it? Disavow.

Step 3: Create Your Disavow File

Open a plain text editor (Notepad works great). Format your disavow file like this:

# Disavow file for domain.com
# Created: 2025-04-11

Domain:spammydomain1.com
Domain:seo-pbn-network.net
Domain:clickforyou.biz

You can disavow specific URLs too, but generally you want to disavow by domain — otherwise you’re playing whack-a-mole.

Step 4: Upload to Google Disavow Tool

Go to:
https://search.google.com/search-console/disavow-links

  • Select your domain (must be verified in GSC).
  • Upload the .txt file.
  • Hit submit.
  • Done.

It can take 4–12 weeks for the disavow to fully process and reflect in search signals.

You’ve got the basics down! If you want to take things even further, then here’s a few expert level tips to make your system even better:

Check if any pages have been losing rankings. Compare that with links pointing to those pages. If a bunch of trash links show up pointing to one of your pages and rankings tanked?

That’s your signal.

Use Ahrefs → Site Explorer → “Best by links” and then “Lost links” to see trends.

Avoid Disavowal Trigger Loops

If you’re working with client sites and they’ve disavowed links previously, check the existing disavow file first. Multiple SEOs editing the same file without coordination = chaos.

Every time you reupload a disavow file, it overwrites the previous one.

Always merge old + new.

Use Comments in Your Files

Disavow files can include lines that start with # for comments. Use them.

# Spammy links from old directory blast
Domain:freedirectorysubmitter.biz

# PBN links pointing to blog post /how-to-cure-baldness
Domain:cheapseo.club

It’ll help you (and your team) remember what the hell you did six months later when rankings drop and the blame game begins.

Re-check Every Quarter

The web is dynamic. That domain you disavowed in 2022? It might’ve been bought, rebranded, and cleaned up in 2024.

Re-run your audits and trim your disavow list if necessary.
Keeping unnecessary links disavowed = leaving potential link equity on the table.

Always remove links if you can.

Removing a link (e.g., emailing the webmaster or editing a guest post) is cleaner. You’re not relying on Google to trust your file — the link just disappears.

But disavow exists because removal isn’t always possible.

Use removal when:

  • You control the source (old sites, PBNs, etc.)

  • The site owner is contactable and responsive

  • The link is recent and editable

Use disavow when:

  • The link is buried in a long-dead blog

  • It’s on a domain no longer maintained

  • It was built by someone else (bad agency, old SEO)

Here’s the cadence operators use:

  • Quarterly for high-risk niches

  • Bi-annually for moderate-risk niches

  • Annually for stable, low-risk niches

SEO agencies rarely do this proactively. Operators do.

Disavow is not an SEO growth tactic.
It’s a risk management play.

  • You use it to clean up after dodgy agencies, prevent algorithmic distrust, and recover from penalties.
  • It doesn’t replace link building.
  • It supports it, by removing the friction holding your site back.

And if you’re in a high competition niche?

Disavow might be the reason you outrank that competitor with 500 more links than you, because your site’s clean, and theirs isn’t.

So go ahead. Audit your links. Clean them up.
And when you’re ready to build links that don’t need disavowing in the first place, you know where to find me.

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