Reconsideration request denied yet manual action disappeared from WMT?

[asusplay]

6 reconsideration requests after being applied the "unnatural links to your site" back in March (so we are talking 7 months) today I got yet another notice of "Links to your site violate Google's quality guidelines".

When I go to the Manual Actions sections on WMT to start writing my 7th RR, I see that I can't submit one because it says "No manual webspam actions found." ? <Confused />

Has this happened to anyone else? Does this mean that I've run out of chances and can no longer submit RR's? Why would I be told that the site still violates Google's quality guidelines and yet have the manual actions disappear from WMT so I can't submit another RR? It doesn't make sense.

[Shai]

Just another example of some strange behaviour on WMT recently. Has traffic increased yet at all? Rankings all the same?

[rish3]

That's actually good news for you. Most manual actions expire at some point. Sounds like yours did.

The traffic doesn't immediately return. Wait a bit and see if it comes back.

[asusplay]

Well I hope it means that the penalty expired. I'm just a bit stumped as to why I would get a notice stating the penalty was still on, and disappear from WMT on the same day. No recovery of rankings or traffic as yet though.

[Shai]

And unfortunately, no way of refilling another reconsideration request now as far as I know. That was one good thing about the old system. You could file a reconsideration request again and sometimes, that helped. Maybe try the Google product forums?

[asusplay]

@Shai - completely agree. I've followed your suggestion and posted in Google product forums. Hopefully I'll get a reply, I'll let you know.

[Shai]

Any update? I could not find your thread on the Google product forum.

[asusplay]

The answer i got was

<quote>So your manual penalty such as it was was removed.

At this point your site either ranks where it should or the algorithm is taking a further whack at it.

There is no reconsideration request for algorithmic penalties.
All you can do is work like mad to improve your site (mindful of all Webmaster guidelines) and remove any and all backlinks you have ever created. Just using the disavow tool is not enough, you must remove the vast majority of spammy backlinks you have created and only use the disavow tools for those which you cannot remove because the sites don't respond (and document your efforts in the disavow file).


None of this means your site will rise in ranking, it will only mean there will no longer be a penalty associated with it.

Once your site starts having some really good, original, unique and compelling content it might naturally attract some better backlinks - without any intervention from you or anybody working for you.
</quote>
I know penguin is probably at play here too....still doesnt quite explain whats happened though.