There is a lot of confusion on whether or not to send reconsideration requests to sites affected by Google penalties. Only a manual action from Google needs a reconsideration request. If you never had a manual action from Google, disavowing the bad links is sufficient. This article explains in detail on Manual vs Algorithmic penalties and who, why and how to send a re-consideration request.
My Site is hit? Is it a Manual action by Google webspam team?
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The first place you have to look into is the webmaster tools. If you have not configured the Google WMT account yet, here is a step by step guide.
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On the webmaster tools left side menu, under the “Search Traffic” section you will find “Manual Spam”. If you see something similar then it is disaster. YES, YOUR SITE HAS A MANUAL PENALTY
I do not have any messages on the manual action section. Should I send a reconsideration request still?
If you see as below then there is no manual action taken and you need not send a re-consideration request.
So does it mean I have an algorithmic penalty from Google?
That depends on various factors. If your traffic had been hit hard on any of this period, then you have got an algorithmic penalty
Oct 1st week 2013 – Penguin 2.1 Algorithmic Penalty
August 4th Week 2013. – Hummingbird update
June 2nd Week 2013 – Panda Refresh
May 4th Week 2013- Penguin 2.0 Penalty
May 2nd Week 2013 – The Phantom update
March 3rd Week 2013 – Another Panda Update
Jan 4th week 2013- The Panda Penalty
Find out the different types of Algorithmic penalties and Recovery Methods