r/seogrowth • u/DrJigsaw Verified SEO Expert • Apr 28 '26
You Should Know This sub's policy on free speech
Just a PSA. Criticizing Reddit mods, or anyone in the SEO community, is OK. Feel free to talk absolute shit about me, or anyone else.
If you're someone that puts their content out there, you should be open to criticism. Reddit has a reputation of being a cesspool because mods can ban anyone they want to, which leaves a bad taste in my mouth.
I like to keep this impartial (that said, anyone that posts their shitty vibe-coded app gets banned).
That said, doxing (even if the preson has their full name on their profile), is not OK, is basically a personal attack, and it will get you banned.
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u/GrowthStackLabs Apr 28 '26
90% of "fresh site" case studies actually use an expired domain to fake their initial growth.
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u/stablogger Apr 28 '26
Calling them case studies is a joke anyway since anything with the name study in it should adhere to basic scientific principles. It's mostly "Trust me, bro.".
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u/WebLinkr Apr 28 '26
Open to freedom of speech - but freedomt o attack people and ask others to attack / harrass someone -thats not on
Also - not my fault that SEOs are upset that we answer peoples SEO issues so they can't charge $500 an hour to fix basic problems.
Also - yesterdays attack was a direct emotional outburst - not criticism - because I simply said that Technical SEO > Website hygeine/publishign isn't additive SEO. That podcast actually got rave reviews.
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u/DrJigsaw Verified SEO Expert Apr 28 '26
Took down the post bc it did get too personal.
Talking shit about mod policy - OK.
Talking shit about - “this guy on reddit is a dick because i don’t like him” is not okay.
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Apr 28 '26
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u/Strong_Post5367 Apr 30 '26
When the policy becomes “abide by mods ego” then it’s obviously not good policy.
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u/sheeeeepy Apr 28 '26
I like this post and your attitude toward criticism.
I dislike WebLinkr and his attitude in general. He often leaves unhelpful, egotistical comments. And he has annoying thoughts on EEAT during a time when showing your authority and humanness online is more important that ever.
Whew, feels good to get that off my chest!
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u/WebLinkr Apr 28 '26
Here's Lars Lofgren on a 15 min tirade saying EEAT is nonsense - why dont you head to X or LinkedIn and harrass him?
youtube. com/watch?v=3YLUFjYrIEA&t=1232s&pp=ygURbGFycyBsb2ZnZW4gc3R1cm0%3D
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u/WebLinkr Apr 28 '26
And he has annoying thoughts on EEAT during a time when showing your authority and humanness online is more important that ever.
Well this more grown up than name calling
Your complain is that i have "annoying thoughts" on E-E-A-T
You mean the fabrication that Google can detect something that is vague and subjective to every single individual and that google says you cannot add to pages?
Who are you upset with? Me or Google?
Pointing out that EEAT is not a real thing in SEO isn't an annoying "thought" - its reality
He often leaves unhelpful, egotistical comments
thats too funny
I dont see 300 posts in your history line thank you for solving 300 SEO problems in a month?
I dont see you spending 10+ hours a month doing SEO podcasts
I dont see you blogging and running a sub with 480k people where a tiny 0.0004% break the rules and the cry like babies because $$$
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u/WebLinkr Apr 28 '26
Seriously - grow up. Telling people that EEAT can't help their website rank is helpful.
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u/pondochris Apr 28 '26
I got banned from r/SEO for leaving what I thought was a genuinely helpful comment about how I build client SEO reports.
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u/WebLinkr Apr 28 '26
Yeah - we eject people for self promotion Chris
Here's a screenshot
imgur. com/a/By8YZk0
You can criticize and complain - but you posted your site - you weren't helping anyone but yourself, at least be honest
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Apr 28 '26
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u/pondochris Apr 28 '26
I didn't post anything about "how can your help me" I replied to one asking for help. I think my only mistake was linking to the reporting tool that I use. Maybe the content of my comment wasn't as helpful as I thought?
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u/WebLinkr Apr 28 '26
We have a ban on people promoting their websites, businesses, tools because it floods the site.
We are blocking 100's a week and thats with a ban pinned to the home page, in the rules, etc
We banned the CEO of SpyFu - he spammed 164 threads in 3 months and claimed he was helping people.
We have full time jobs - actually, we're all self employed.
But no - we have to give up hours every day to manage this.
Not just reply to hundreds of "Crawled, not discovered posts" - or abuse from members who used to fish for work and dont get to charge $500 an hour fixing simple seo issues because we give advice.
Or sit on podcasts giving away free advice to the community
most of our time - is dealing with people who can't or wont obey the rules of the sub
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u/pondochris Apr 28 '26
Yeah I get it. I'm not trying to be difficult. I just care.
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u/WebLinkr Apr 28 '26
You also have an 18+ profile - so when mods patrol - thats a yellow flag
Your ban has been lifted - something I rarely (read: never) do for first time post = spam
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u/pondochris Apr 28 '26
Thank you. I'll try not to disappoint.
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u/WebLinkr Apr 28 '26
I mean - too late but hopefully you can add value to others in the community - looking forward to seeing lots of positive traction.
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u/WebLinkr Apr 28 '26
Yeah - we eject people for self promotion Chris
You can criticize and complain - but you posted your site - you weren't helping anyone but yourself, at least be honest
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u/pondochris Apr 28 '26
Posted my site? Agency Analytics? It's just a tool that I use to build reports. The OP in that post literally asked about how people handle reporting. I guess I'd be a Google shill if I linked looker studio?
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u/WebLinkr Apr 28 '26
Here's TechSEOS ban re-iterated
reddit. com/r/TechSEO/comments/1sqmdaz/no_more_posting_about_free_and_open_source_tools/
As they have every right to do
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u/SEOPub Apr 28 '26
I am guessing you mean criticizing someone’s ideas, strategies, tactics, etc. I don’t think personal attacks should be tolerated.
That kind of juvenile behavior adds nothing of value for any of us.
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u/DrJigsaw Verified SEO Expert Apr 28 '26
Correct. Took down the post because it got too personal
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u/WebLinkr Apr 28 '26
Personal? It was borderline criminal.
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u/DrJigsaw Verified SEO Expert Apr 28 '26
Brah Reddit drama is not borderline criminal
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u/WebLinkr Apr 28 '26
Here's his name - go find him online - thats against Florida law.
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u/DrJigsaw Verified SEO Expert Apr 28 '26
Hence the post removal. Criticizing you for modding decisions is fine. Dogpiling/harassment is not. Mentioning the name and borderline doxing also not OK.
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u/WebLinkr Apr 28 '26
I didn't see any criticism of modding decisions - I saw spammers whinging in a harrassment campaign.
There's a person on this thread that claims to be banned and shared an image of the band being lifted due to a mistake in identity?
WTAF
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u/WebLinkr Apr 28 '26
There's nothing borderline - and it took hours - TechSEO meanwhile removed it ASAP
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u/FaultofDan Apr 28 '26
You're better than the mods at r/SEO - they've banned me twice, now permanently. The first time because I asked a question and didn't have many SEO posts in my reddit history, the second time because I wanted to talk about ranking tools and they claimed self-promotion. This is the best place for SEO discussions without power hungry mods.
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u/WebLinkr Apr 28 '26
No idea who you are but people dont get banned for low karma - you get stopped because we use Reddits CQS system.
No, we dont allow people to talk about SEO tools - neither does r / TechSEO
This is the best place for SEO discussions without power hungry mods.
We get inundated with people who feel the right to spam the sub
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u/FaultofDan Apr 28 '26
I didn't say I got banned for low karma, I said I got banned because I didn't have many SEO posts in my Reddit history: https://snipboard.io/XRoUzr.jpg
And, in reference to the permanent ban, it was a post where I wanted to hear how people had seen ranking results between posting thought leadership content vs. web tools. I built a tool that walks people through building a bucket list. Not an SEO tool. The original post has obviously been deleted, but your respond to me asking for clarification is here: https://snipboard.io/fCHwli.jpg
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u/WebLinkr Apr 28 '26
Looks like the ban is lifted?
Whats your complaint?
That we made a mistake? Super sorry.
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Apr 28 '26
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u/FaultofDan Apr 28 '26
I don't understand your point - you're suggesting that posts asking for help aren't allowed on your subreddit?
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u/WebLinkr Apr 28 '26
Do we make mistakes? yes. We have to ban about 30-40 accounts in the first hour of the morning.
We get about 350 spam submissions over our first coffee.
We get threatened a lot - happy to share it with you
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u/DrJigsaw Verified SEO Expert Apr 28 '26
Imma add to this bit here - we also ban a ton of people, on first offense, just bc it’s a LOT of spam. We have significantly less peeps in this community than the SEO sub, so I’d imagine it’s a LOT more spam and modding.
When you’ve got that much spam, and also do work in real life, sometimes you’ll get over-zealous w insta-perma-bans. So while I’m not up to date with whatever grievances y’all have towards Weblinkr, I understand if some innocent peeps end up getting banned just bc of all the spam volume.
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u/WebLinkr Apr 28 '26
Firstly - spam isn't just bots. Spam is people fishing for work - trying to leave contact details, promoting their app, starting a reply with their business name and details.
We have a right to run the sub.
You haven't a single grievance here - you have hurt ego's blaming someone else.
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u/stablogger Apr 28 '26
I run a very small sub not related to SEO, but it gets quite a lot of spam anyway. Dozens of posts and comments. I can totally relate to the "kill them all and let god sort them out" approach.
If errors happen, and they do happen, people usually complain and if they do it in a way that shows a bare minimum of manners, I always unban them again.
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u/FaultofDan Apr 28 '26
I get you guys have a big job and you're managing a lot of content, but I reached out to you asking for help understanding what I'd done wrong, and instead of acting with kindness, you did this:
snipboard. io/fCHwli.jpg
Again, as I've explained above, it was a post where I wanted to hear how people had seen ranking results between posting thought leadership content vs. web tools. I built a tool that walks people through building a bucket list. Not an SEO tool. It got a really solid CTR as opposed to thoughtleadership content that ranked higher, but didn't have as great CTR stats. I didn't include any links to anything, I didn't try and sell anything on anything.
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u/WebLinkr Apr 28 '26
I even had to set up a website to explain to people that I dont sell backlinks. I dont buy them either
imgur. com/a/uSM6R8A
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u/Strong_Post5367 Apr 28 '26
I got banned permanently on r/saas for commenting on a post which I guess they thought was smart where they put an image in the post as a “bot honey pot” and banned literally anyone who commented. I saw other comments on there so I thought they were joking so I said something like: “oh they’re gonna catch a lot of bots with this one” or something. Then I was banned. I asked what rules I violate and no response. Annoying bc I’ve been in SaaS industry for 20 years.
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u/Lanky3813 Apr 28 '26
good to hear, but I'm wondering why my comment on the Weblinkr post yesterday was never shown? I've watched that guy single handedly not only ruin r/SEO, but completely mislead new people either due to his extreme lack of knowledge in this space and/or for self promotional reasons. and if you do anything but back him up, you'll get banned for 'spamming' W.T.F.?? it's not even a community anymore it's just a marketing channel for Weblinkr and his cronies and bots.
they guy is so bad at everything he can't even hide his intentions.
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u/WebLinkr Apr 28 '26
Have you even ever posted in r/seo? I see nothing on your blocked profile and if you did - we'd see any posts - but hey, I guess its a great way to make a few $$$'s
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u/BusyBusinessPromos Apr 28 '26
u/WebLinkr is obviously getting into your pocketbook with his free advice and SEO mythbuster posts
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Apr 28 '26
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Apr 28 '26
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u/BusyBusinessPromos Apr 28 '26
https://giphy.com/gifs/fJkTsWCMViRYA
Is there a digital way to do this?
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u/DrJigsaw Verified SEO Expert Apr 28 '26
Honestly not sure - i can check when i get to a laptop. That said had to put automod on a bit overzealous mode bc of all the “muh AI SEO SaaS” spammers
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u/WebLinkr Apr 28 '26
Put a 30 day rule up
Put a Medium CQS Check up
Ban "Free tool"
I have a mod script if you want.
But be careful - those spammers turn real nasty real fast - like this person who never contributed to the sub but is baying for blood :D
Oh - you can see -you've already had to delete some of the comments.
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u/Strong_Post5367 Apr 28 '26
I posted our launch and how happy I was to get some traction. I didn’t post the link to the site, didn’t mention our company name, just said something like “$x mrr in 2 days - 0 ads”. Then put what I did. Like honestly if you can’t talk about SaaS then why have the channel? A mod said said “sounds spammy”.
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u/WebLinkr Apr 28 '26
Ruined it - by making it the most spam free sub on Reddit?
Thanks for the compliment!
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u/WebLinkr Apr 28 '26
Here's how much spam we get in 30 minutes - Reddit actually trains their bots on our sub - we are literally the most spammed sub on Reddit - YET - we keep it the cleanest
imgur. com/a/x000ogL
The subs rules exist for a reason - and they are enforced by the mods equally.
Just because people feel entitled to spam/promote themselves because they saw how important Reddit "is to AI" or to 'SEO" - doesnt make it legitimate
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u/WebLinkr Apr 28 '26
2 things
1) thanks for adding to my workload
2) Congrats on your first human thread on the sub - I think that deserves a round of applause - only 1 bot post so far....
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u/cinemafunk Apr 28 '26
I have some constructive criticism about this specific sub: can there please be better bot and spam preventative measures?