--- title: 'Warning: Google''s Site Reputation Abuse Policy Update and Forbes Advisor''s Recovery' source: 'https://youtube.com/watch?v=_BE_FR-GgrI' video_id: '_BE_FR-GgrI' date: 2026-07-14 duration_sec: 0 --- # Warning: Google's Site Reputation Abuse Policy Update and Forbes Advisor's Recovery > Source: [Warning: Google's Site Reputation Abuse Policy Update and Forbes Advisor's Recovery](https://youtube.com/watch?v=_BE_FR-GgrI) ## Summary This video discusses a recent unofficial update to Google's site reputation abuse policy, focusing on how Forbes Advisor regained significant traffic after being penalized. The creator explains that Forbes Advisor was hit hard by the policy in November 2024 but recovered by making minor changes to their content, such as updating author credits and rewriting a small portion of the text. ### Key Points - **Forbes Advisor's Traffic Recovery** [00:00] — Forbes Advisor lost nearly all traffic after Google's site reputation abuse policy update in November 2024, but regained millions of visits per month by February 2025. - **How Forbes Advisor Evaded the Penalty** [01:30] — The site changed author credits from external writers to internal editors and rewrote about 5% of the content, while keeping the rest identical, which allowed them to rank again. - **Comparison of Old and New Articles** [03:00] — The old article had a loans writer and lead editor, while the new version lists a deputy editor and lead editor as authors, with the content largely unchanged. - **Glenn Gabe's Analysis** [04:30] — SEO expert Glenn Gabe outlined four methods to comply with the policy: noindex, canonicalize, block via robots.txt, or remove content. A fifth method now appears to be minor rewrites and author changes. - **Implications for SEO Industry** [05:30] — This case suggests that Google's enforcement may be inconsistent, allowing some sites to skirt the policy with minimal changes, raising questions about fairness. ### Conclusion Forbes Advisor's recovery shows that Google's site reputation abuse policy may be circumvented by superficial changes, potentially undermining the policy's intent. The SEO community should watch for further clarifications from Google. ## Transcript hey guys what's up it's Charles float here and I'm just going to be uploading this quick little video to give everybody in the eso industry some serious serious warning about a bit of an update or an unofficial update that is to the site reputation abuse policy so most of you in the esto industry are going to know that Forbes advisor got absolutely smashed last year after going up to around 25 million organic visitors a month according to Industry insiders the business made well over $100 million in affiliate Commissions in 2024 more like several hundred million in affiliate commissions and Google actually updated its site reputation abuse policy in November and then nuked this site all the way down to just a handful of a few thousand visits per month however if we change this view to the last month you'll see on around the February 25th that this site had exploded and regained almost a few million visits per month in traffic trffic worth according to ahf's nearly $8 million per month so how did they do this well it is an extremely interesting case let's go and have a look at the article from the best personal loans for 2024 from last year you will notice several things that are almost the exact same as this article on their now updated piece of content the main difference is are a that if you actually look at who it is officially written by it is somebody who's a deputy editor then you have a lead editor editing yet previously it was a loans writer and then the lead editor was just the editing and then you had a loans and saving ex but making it actually having two official authors and one editor the editor being an in-house person at Forbes and the two writers being external third parties for the third party company Marketplace which actually set up Ford revisor in the first place the second thing you'll notice is that the content at the top of the page has changed however once you go under this everything else is the same so you can go here the above personal R are accurate and you'll go into all of these different pieces I'll scroll down to here the above postal Lo details are accurate as of this date and then it compares the best personal loans and then it has the details here with all the information it is the exact same article all that has changed is the content at the top and the right now being more predominantly internal writers and editors from Forbes over being external Marketplace writers so all that has happened realistically here is that around 5% of the content on page per page has changed the lead writers have changed even though the content itself mostly has not changed which shows that the original writer which is no longer credited is still the original writer however this has resulted in them being having their penalty reversed and fores advisor reinstating millions and millions of dollars potentially tens of millions of dollars per month worth of traffic back do you think this is fair do you think other websites would have had this same reaction I'm not 100% sure however it also changes another thing which is a big shout out to Glenn Gabe Glenn actually came out with this article a few weeks ago in February it's talked about the four methods and two AC correct to actually remove or allow this type of site reputation abuse policy content into the subs those four methods were essentially you could no index you could um block the content via no uh no index tag you could canonicalize it you can no index the content which is valid or you can nuke the content completely there is now actually a fifth option which turns out you slightly re rewrite 5% of the content you changed the authors and your content is now allowed to rank and still kind of skirted the sight reputation abuse policy so love to hear what you guys think in the comments I'll see you in the next one peace