18 strategies for successfully recovering from an SEO penalty

Recovering from an SEO penalty can feel like an uphill battle, but with the right approach, it’s entirely possible to regain lost rankings. In this expert roundup, 18 SEO professionals share the key strategies that helped them bounce back from penalties — whether due to algorithm updates, manual actions, or technical missteps. 

How to recover from an SEO penalty

From disavowing harmful backlinks to refining content strategies, these insights offer a roadmap to recovery. If your site has taken a hit, this guide will help you navigate the process and restore your online visibility.

1. Conduct a thorough backlink audit

Recovering from an SEO penalty is like rebuilding trust—you have to start with a clean slate. One time, I dealt with a manual penalty caused by low-quality backlinks. The first step was conducting a thorough backlink audit, identifying toxic links using tools like Ahrefs and Google Search Console. 

Disavowing the harmful links and reaching out to webmasters to remove them was tedious but effective. The real game-changer, though, was focusing on creating genuinely helpful content that matched search intent and naturally attracted high-quality links.

Meanwhile, shift your focus to creating value—whether that's through blogs, tools, or interactive content. Consistency in quality over time is your best ally for regaining rankings and trust.

Komron Rahmonbek, SEO Manager, StrongDM

2. Run a quick penalty audit

I helped a finance niche website recover from an unnatural links penalty and regain relevant Google traffic in just 2 months.

When I started working on the website, I noticed the website traffic was going down rapidly, which alarmed me to run a quick penalty audit.

Here is what I did.

1. Before finalizing my decision on the SEO strategy, I quickly checked Google Search Console for any manual penalty. I found the site was affected with unnatural links. In your case, go to “Security and Manual Actions,” then “Manual Actions.” If there's a penalty, you'll see the warning.
2. I analyzed recent Google algorithm updates, specifically Penguin, and compared the historic traffic drop. This helped me identify how the website was being affected by the update. You can find this information using a keyword tracker tool that tracks historical keyword ranking data alongside recent Google updates. Alternatively, you can use the Website Penalty Indicator from Fe International or tools like SEMrush for this.
3. Then, I conducted a backlinks analysis. I pulled a list of all backlinks pointing to my project website and compiled it in a Google Sheet. This helped me to check link relevance and trustworthiness to identify low-quality links. The process was quite lengthy because I had to do it manually.
4. I created a text file following Google's recommended format. I added all the low-quality and spammy domains I decided to remove using the Google Disavow Tool and by sending link removal requests to the admins of these websites.

A Google penalty can be disastrous, but if you're in the same situation, don't panic. Follow the procedure, and it will be resolved. Make sure you always follow the best link-building practices to avoid such issues.

Tips: Google can easily identify low-quality links or backlink attacks that were not created by you. This means you don't have to worry about every low-quality link. Just focus on maintaining a healthy link profile and following best SEO practices.

Sumit Pandey, SEO Consultant, SERP Bloom

3. Build your E-E-A-T score

In 2019, I worked with a client selling a hyperhidrosis cream who had been hit hard by Google's helpful content update. Despite offering a great product and valuable content, they struggled because their site lacked proper citations for medical claims and didn't display author credentials, which meant Google couldn't assess the credibility of their educational content. 

Additionally, I helped the client secure placements on other reputable websites in their niche, boosting their overall trust signals. 

Over time, these efforts resulted in improved keyword visibility and organic traffic recovery. It was a clear example of how addressing content credibility can turn a content devaluation into an opportunity for growth.

Tim Pelletier, Owner/SEO Consultant, Tim Pelletier Consulting, LLC

4. Remove suspicious backlinks immediately

I have helped a client recover from an SEO penalty, and one thing I learned was that it requires patience and a lot of it. From the penalty that appeared in Google Search Console and until it was lifted we waited 8 months. They're usually quite specific about what the penalty is about, and you have to prioritize to fix it immediately. Often, it's a suspicious backlink, but other times, it's not a fair penalty. You just have to solve it. 

With my client, it was a super old backlink, which was a genuine backlink, but Google found it suspicious, so all we did was reach out to the website owner linking to my client's website and tell them to remove the link. 

As soon as it was removed, we went to Google Search Console to tell them we had fixed the issue and that they could recheck, and this is where it took around 8 months before we got the positive feedback that the manual penalty was removed.

Phillip Stemann, SEO Consultant, Phillip Stemann

5. Focus on high-quality, helpful content

I've worked with a bunch of clients dealing with SEO penalties, but one case really stuck with me. It involved a home services company that suddenly saw its organic traffic tank. Turned out, they got hit with a manual penalty from Google for "thin content." Their site was full of duplicated, low-quality pages—mostly auto-generated ones that didn't offer much real value.

The first thing I did was dive into a thorough content audit. We sorted through the site to figure out which pages were actually useful and which ones were just clutter. Instead of scrapping everything, we decided to consolidate the information. 

We created a detailed guide that outlined the types of problems they fix, packed with helpful insights and practical tips. Each section in the guide linked to more fleshed-out individual pages that were designed to actually help users. 

If you're dealing with something similar, here's some advice: focus on what your audience actually needs. Look at your content and ask if it's genuinely helping visitors or just filling up space. If it's not useful, it's time to rethink. 

Tools like heatmaps and user surveys can show you what people really want. Then, invest in creating high-quality, helpful content that people can use.

In this case, not only did the site bounce back, but it ended up performing better than ever. The new structure turned the company into a reliable resource for their audience. Honestly, penalties can be a wake-up call—they force you to rethink your strategy and build a stronger foundation for your site.

Will Wright, Lead SEO Strategist, Direct Online Marketing

6. Thorough site audit and cleanup

Yes, I have successfully recovered from a manual action penalty related to spammy and hidden content on one of my test websites. The penalty was flagged in Google Search Console, and the site saw a significant drop in rankings and organic traffic as a result.

The key strategy that helped was a thorough site audit and cleanup, followed by a reconsideration request. Here's how I tackled the issue:

• Identified the problem: Using Google Search Console, I reviewed the manual action report, which highlighted hidden text and cloaking issues
• Removed hidden content: I thoroughly audited the website's code and CSS to remove any invisible text, or unintentional cloaking that may have triggered the penalty.
• Checked for plugin or theme issues: In some cases, CMS themes or plugins can inject hidden content unintentionally. I reviewed and removed any problematic elements.
• Reviewed and updated content: I rewrote and reformatted affected pages to ensure they provided genuine, high-quality content.
• Submitted a reconsideration request: Once all issues were resolved, I submitted a detailed reconsideration request to Google, outlining the steps taken to fix the problem and prevent it from recurring.

Advice for others facing a similar issue:

• Regularly audit your site: Use tools like Google Search Console and Screaming Frog to detect any hidden content, spammy practices, or unintentional cloaking.
• Avoid manipulative SEO tactics: Focus on transparent, user-first content ensure that your website text appears the same on all devices and screen widths, as this was the issue with mine!
• Monitor website changes: If you work with multiple developers or third-party plugins, keep track of changes that could introduce spammy elements without your knowledge.
• Submit a well-documented reconsideration request: Be clear and honest about the actions taken to resolve the issue when requesting Google to lift the penalty.

By following these steps, I successfully lifted the manual action within 6 months, and rankings began to recover steadily.

Nigel Adams, Search Marketing Consultant, Nigel Adams Digital

7. Disavow toxic links immediately

We once worked with a client whose website had been hit with a manual action for unnatural backlinks. This was a number of years ago, and I'm talking serious PBN backlink volumes. I would be fairly confident today that Google would simply ignore these. 

Their organic traffic had plummeted, and rankings for key terms had disappeared almost overnight. It took a little digging before we established that the client had been on a backlink buying spree, after reading that “backlinks help rankings.”

The first step we took was a thorough backlink audit to identify the toxic links that triggered the penalty. Using Ahrefs and Search Console data combined, we compiled a list of several thousand domains. Each backlink was the typical nonsensical blog post with anchor text scattered throughout.

We created a disavow file and submitted it to Google, effectively asking them to disregard those links. After about a week, we requested the manual action be reviewed and it was successful.

We kept an eye on newly found spammy backlinks for a few months, while focusing on building high-quality backlinks by reaching out to reputable sites within the client's niche.

Although a situation like this will be almost impossible to replicate today, it's worth reminding site owners that nothing good can come from buying bulk backlinks or participating in any other unnatural link schemes. Take the time to reach out to secure legitimate links to your site, and you will be rewarded in the long run.

Andrew Witts, Director, Studio 36 Digital

8. Build high-quality backlinks

I helped a SaaS project recover from an SEO penalty in 8 months—without using the disavow tool (which I don't recommend anymore). Instead, I focused on building high-quality backlinks to create a healthy link profile. The domain had a legacy penalty because of its past use in the adult industry, but the owner was determined to keep it since it was a perfect match for their brand.

Here's what worked:

• Rewrote most of the articles with human writers, keeping the original URLs intact.
• Removed 20 outdated and irrelevant articles.
• Published 50 fresh, well-optimized articles with a thoughtful interlinking strategy.
• Changed the hosting location and re-registered the domain in Google Search Console.

I started seeing recovery signs within 4 months, and the site fully regained its rankings in 6 months. If you're dealing with a penalty, my advice is to thoroughly audit your site—look for thin or ineffective content, bad backlinks, or technical issues—and tackle those step by step.

But nowadays, if a domain has a deeply entrenched penalty, starting fresh might actually save time and effort in the long run.

Sanjit Sarker, SEO Head, SEO Agency Boston

9. Reassess keyword targeting

I've dealt with an SEO penalty before, and reassessing keyword targeting was one of the key strategies that helped me recover my rankings. In my case, I realized I had been unknowingly over-optimizing some pages with the same keywords, causing them to compete with each other. This keyword cannibalization confused Google about which page to rank, diluting their visibility.

To fix it, I conducted a thorough content audit, mapped out each page's primary keyword, and ensured no two pages targeted the same one. I also refined the content to better match user intent, focusing on long-tail keywords and more specific phrases. For instance, instead of just targeting "SEO tools," I shifted one page to focus on "best SEO tools for small businesses."

If you're facing a similar issue, I suggest starting with a keyword mapping exercise. Use tools like SEMrush or Ahrefs to identify overlaps and assign unique keywords to each page. Always prioritize user intent and avoid stuffing keywords, it's more about relevance and quality now. Regularly reviewing your content strategy can prevent this from happening again.

Callum Gracie, Founder and SEO Expert, DJ Callum Gracie

10. Optimize user engagement metrics

For one client, I used user engagement metrics from Google Search Console and heatmaps to recover from a Google core update hit. While most people optimize content and backlinks, I dug deeper into how users interacted with the site after landing on it.

Here's what I did: From Console, I identified pages with high impressions but low CTR. Instead of just tweaking meta titles, I redesigned the above-the-fold content layout based on heatmap data to make key information and CTAs immediately visible. For example, we moved the FAQ section higher up and added anchor links for faster navigation.

This not only improved time-on-page and bounce rates but also sent stronger engagement signals to Google. So gradually we regained lost rankings.

When you are hit by a penalty, don't just fix the surface-level things after a penalty. Dig into user behavior, make the content user-friendly and prioritize the user engagement.

Harsh Pathak, Digital Marketing Manager, WPWeb Infotech

11. Analyze competitors and create better content

When working with an Amazon seller SaaS company, we faced significant declines in non-branded clicks during the August-November 2023 algorithm updates, including core and helpful content updates. To address this, I first identified the pages most impacted by the decline in non-branded clicks. Using this data, I compiled a list of the top keywords each page was targeting. 

Next, I manually analyzed the search results for those keywords, carefully reviewing the content of top-ranking pages. I compared their content against ours, taking detailed notes on differences in structure, depth, and relevance. Based on this analysis, I collaborated with our copywriters to create entirely new content. 

This approach led to a complete recovery of the site's performance. For anyone in a similar situation, I recommend thoroughly auditing your affected pages, analyzing top-performing competitors, and focusing on creating content that is both user-centric and exceeds the value offered by others in your niche.

Mark Howser, Enterprise SEO Consultant, Digital Snowstorm

12. Conduct a comprehensive content audit

Yes, I successfully recovered from an SEO penalty—a challenging yet insightful journey that underscored the critical role of high-quality, user-focused content. Here's an overview of the strategies I implemented and actionable tips for anyone facing similar challenges.

1. Content analysis

The recovery process began with a comprehensive audit of all website content. Using tools like Google Search Console and SEO analytics platforms, I identified pages with declining rankings and pinpointed the causes. The focus was on relevance, accuracy, and adherence to current SEO best practices.

2. Content cleanup

Outdated and irrelevant articles were removed to eliminate clutter and improve the overall site quality. For content with potential, we updated facts, statistics, and examples to ensure relevance and accuracy. This helped align the content with both user needs and search engine requirements.

3. Content enhancement:

We improved the quality of remaining content by:

4. Enhancing accessibility

To improve readability and usability:

5. Addressing user intent

Understanding and addressing user intent became a priority. We analyzed search queries and ensured each piece of content provided direct, concise answers to common user questions. Key insights were placed prominently to meet user expectations immediately.

6. Incorporating NLP optimization

Natural Language Processing (NLP) techniques were employed to make content more conversational and relatable. Synonyms, related terms, and user-centric language enhanced the content's context and relevance, helping search engines understand and rank it more effectively.

Recovering from an SEO penalty requires a strategic and user-first approach:

• Regular audits: Continuously assess and refine content to maintain relevance.
• User-centric updates: Prioritize clarity, accuracy, and user intent.
• Proactive content management: Prevent penalties by consistently providing value to your audience.

Arjunsinh Chandravat, Director of SEO, Whirlwind

13. Remove scraped content immediately

One more recent example I've seen of a site recovering from a manual Google penalty occurred with an e-commerce business that came to us after suffering a massive drop in traffic and organic visibility. The website sold branded accessories which we later discovered comprised a mixture of products with the correct licensing agreements with rights-holders in place, and some products where those agreements weren't in place.

To be fair to the client, their mistake seemed to be a result of haphazardness rather than anything more nefarious, as the licensing for all of the products they sold belonged to the same umbrella company. They had incorrectly assumed that their license covered every one of their products, rather than a smaller selection.

In terms of reparations, we ran a report of all the affected pages and manually worked our way through, removing pages, products, and internal links from the site as we did. We also ensured that those products unaffected by the manual action had unique content and images where possible to reduce the risk of those pages being the target of a penalty in the future.

Once that suite of work was complete, we submitted a reconsideration request to Google to ask them to review, then remove the manual action from the client's account—providing evidence that the offending products and any related pages had been deleted from the site. After about three or four working days, we received a message back from Google saying that the reconsideration request was successful. The client was very relieved to see the green “tick” and “no issues detected” under the Manual Actions report of their Search Console account once again.

The lesson for this one is definitely not to take things at face value, and always check your clients have the correct agreements and licenses in place if they are selling branded products.

Paul Friend, Head of SEO, The SEO Works

14. Identify and remove malicious links

Once, my client in the home care industry was hit with a content penalty back in 2019. I was shocked because we weren't churning out low-quality content on the website. Instead, we were publishing high-quality articles with expert insights directly from the actual home care providers (employees) of the business. At first, we couldn't pinpoint the issue. However, after deep diving and analyzing the content, we discovered that some links in the articles were redirecting to irrelevant websites. 

After discussing this with the developers, we found the website had been hacked. The hacker had inserted these links through an SQL injection, leading Google to interpret our content as spam. The toughest part was identifying these malicious links within the blogs, as the anchor text used was subtle and unnoticeable. While reading through a blog to find the issue, I hovered the cursor over each sentence to keep my attention focused. Eventually, I discovered that a word revealed a link at the bottom of the browser tab and the rest is history. 

After removing these SQL-injected links, we reindexed the website. Within 15 to 20 days, the website gradually began regaining its original traction.

Bilal Ahmed, Digital Marketing Manager, ConceptRecall

15. Prioritize content audit and link removal

We have only seen one SEO penalty over the years, on a site we had recently taken on. We recovered by totally auditing our content and links. This site had a lot of over-optimized and repetitive blog articles, and a lot of spammy links.

The site had very few internal links, especially to two important geo-landing pages. We reworked the internal links to help Google understand where the most important content was to be found. We also removed a great number of toxic external links and did some digital PR to gain a handful of select, high quality new links. I actually think that disavowing toxic links has little effect and tend to ignore them now. It was probably the new links that had the most positive effect.

Of all the actions we took I am convinced that the content audit was most effective. Every site is different and receives penalties for different reasons. But as Google's updates constantly focus on content quality, I'd say this is the best place to start recovering from a penalty.

Michelle Symonds, Founder and CEO, Ditto Digital

16. Fix schema markup issues

Yes, I successfully navigated the recovery process from a manual action applied to a previous employer's career site—a publicly traded company that is one of the region's largest employers. The issue stemmed from schema markup being automatically injected into pages but failing to match the on-page content. I collaborated closely with the development team to diagnose the problem, align the schema generation process with the content accurately, and ensure compliance with Google's guidelines. Through strategic updates and a well-written appeal, I not only resolved the penalty but restored the site's search visibility and credibility. It was a challenging yet rewarding experience that honed my technical SEO and problem-solving skills.

Ken Freel, Freelance SEO Consultant, Nuaveu

17. Consider rebranding and relaunching

Sometimes "penalties" come in the form of unknowns, without manual actions, and teams are left to try and figure out what issues may be causing a loss in rankings. As a last resort, one strategy I personally have had success with is rebranding, changing the website domain, and relaunching the website. The combination of the redesign of the website, the rebranding, and changing the domain has been successful on multiple occasions to gain a portion, or all, of the organic rankings back. This is never the ideal scenario, but it is something all teams need to consider when other recovery attempts are failing.

Max DesMarais, Director of Strategy, Vital Design

18. Update content templates and remove cloaked links

Overcoming the March Core and Spam Updates was a challenge, but patience and some strategic changes brought us back to SERPs after being demoted completely but not deindexed. It used to get almost 100K monthly pageviews and was crushed to 0.

We revived it and here's what worked:

1. Content audit and cleanup

Perform a complete content audit of the blog and remove or update your content.

Example: We deleted 60+ low-value blog posts, added 410 status codes to ensure proper removal from Google's index. We updated the remaining blog posts with custom-made content templates saved as Gutenberg patterns, making them easy to scan for readers. This not only improved the content quality and engagement but also our efficiency to create new content.

2. Affiliate link optimization

Removed cloaked affiliate links to avoid triggering spam filters.

Example: We disabled the link cloaking plugin and used raw URLs provided by affiliate networks. We removed the sponsored tag as well and added the no follow attribute to the affiliate links. We also used TechnicalSEO's Fetch and Render tool to check if the affiliate link crawl ability is set to 403. This ensured compliance with Google's guidelines.

3. Internal linking and navigation

Improve internal linking to your other articles to increase topic relevance and site structure.

Example: We added a related posts section below every blog post in addition to the internal links in the article. Surprisingly, this increased our session counts, verified using Microsoft Clarity's heatmap tool.

4. Replaced generic stock images

Remove stock images and use original visuals.

Example: We removed all stock and AI-generated images from our articles and replaced them with unique visuals that fit the content's context. If a featured image wasn't ready, we skipped it to add one later. Upload images in compressed WebP format to save your crawl budget.

5. Fixing technical issues

Perform your technical SEO audit at the end of your strategy.

Example: We completed the technical audit after implementing all the changes mentioned above to resolve any remaining issues like indexing or sitemap errors.

Shivam Sharma, Founder, Blogging Capital

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