Google has released a new tool called Disavow Links. The primary purpose is to help bloggers who have been notified by Google about “unnatural links” that have been pointing to their website.

As you may know, Google uses something called PageRank to determine how reputable and important a particular website is. Part of what they use to make that decision is the type of links that are connected to the site. The Disavow Links tool is one way to clean up the spammy “unnatural” links that are messing with your blog’s PageRank.

Keep in mind, though, that Disavow Links is not the first thing you should do to clean up your website. Google suggests that you do several other forms of clean up before you resort to Disavow Links.

For example, you should attempt to contact the person who has attached an “unnatural” or unwanted link to your website, and ask them to remove it. See if you are able to remove the links yourself. Do not presume that Disavow Links is “the answer for all of your ills”.

It is important to realize that Disavow Links is something Google is describing as a tool for “power users”. It isn’t something everyone should use because there is potential that you could “shoot yourself in the foot” by using this tool incorrectly or in ways that you weren’t really intending to. To quote Matt Cutts, from the video below:

“If you are a Mom and Pop, you haven’t used your own SEO, if you haven’t used random link networks that you found on SEO forums, this is probably not something that you should be using.”