First, there are various types of penalties.

In some cases, a penalty can result in the complete removal from the index and the consequent “organic death” of a site. Other times it is a penalization by Google for violations of its guidelines, committed in order to obtain benefits in terms of visibility in an incorrect way. From this point of view, Google’s policy is very clear and violating it means paying a very high price.

There are two types of Google penalties:

• Manual Actions: this means that some Human Testers verify that websites comply with the rules and do not use unfair practices. If this occurs, a report is initiated which could result in a penalty.
• Algorithmic Penalties: they are the most difficult as they depend on the changes within the underlying logic of the algorithm. Therefore, if the changing conditions of the algorithm are not considered in time, this can lead to a heavy downgrade of the site in terms of visibility.

How do you recover?

In the case of Manual Penalties, it is necessary to understand the reasons that caused the penalty. This takes place following careful analysis and study, identifying the exact aspects on which to intervene with rigour and timeliness, and in full compliance with Google’s policies.

Very often it is necessary to intervene with targeted remediation activities before submitting a request for reconsideration to Google

Algorithmic penalties occur when Google releases an update of its algorithm by modifying the attribution of value with respect to the individual factors considered for the calculation of the overall “Trust” associated with the domain name. Some sites may see visibility in SERPs change against them: the greater the adherence of a site to the evolution of search engine policies, the more this will increase its position with respect to the context, in correspondence with updates.

It is always important to examine every update of an algorithm, its mutations and to check promptly if the website adheres to the new “best practices” and “policies”.

Natural Index boasts a solid track record in helping websites recover from manual and algorithmic penalties, with a success rate of 100%. However, these penalties are nothing more than the result of actions that should never be taken. Only the execution of practices exclusively aimed at increasing the trust linked to the domain name, in full compliance with the rules imposed by the search engine, allows the development of a project that is not subject to penalties. Among the projects managed by Natural Index in over 10 years of SEO experience, none have ever been downgraded or penalised, confirming our profound knowledge and respect for the ecology of the web.