Link building with AddThis URL
-
We've begun using AddThis for tracking our social sharing. AddThis has been adding the snippet to the end of the URLs on our pages and we've been finding that people linking to us are linking to the URL with the snippet. AddThis says this isn't a problem for SEO. Is this correct?
Here is an example:
I want to make sure this is not affecting our SEO in any way, particularly that Google would see this as an affiliate or paid link since it has the "#". I may be crazy but I just want to make sure!
-
Mike, this comment you made is correct:
"my understanding is that Google disregards everything after the "#" so there shouldn't be a duplicate content issue."
If you do somehow see one of these getting indexed in Google then you have an issue, but I have not seen this happen.
-
Quick correction here. ? indicates a URL parameter, # indicates a subsection of the same document.
-
These special codes after the URL are the parameters that are used to track the user’s information. I personally don’t think there should be a SEO problem with this and links that you received on the Add this version of URL will still be counted to the main domain.
Hope this helps!
-
I believe that Googlebot doesn't look at anything in the URL after a #, so you should be fine. Check out this from trusted Google engineer John Mu, or this. You should be fine in terms of duplicate content, and I don't see why Google would associate this as an affiliate or paid link or anything like that.
-
In Google webmaster Tools there is a "Structured Data Testing Tool", which, although the purpose of it is for rich snippets and microdata, it looks like it can be used to see if Google recognizes the url with the ADDTHIS snippet as still being valid with authorship linked to a Google Plus account.
I pasted your extended url with snippets into the test window, clicked Preview, and it seems to show up fine in their test results.
This may indicate that as as long as Google recognizes the url as being connected to authorship with a Google Plus account, then they would not penalize it because of the added AddThis snippet. Also, AddThis has a 100 domain authority in open site explorer, and there is a tracking link in the script to their site.
<script type="<a class="attribute-value">text/javascript</a>" src="//s7.addthis.com/js/300/addthis_widget.js#pubid=ra-52b47a3152487f9b">script>
I would guess that there is a possibility that if Google's algorhithm recognized their domain as a trusted domain with strong authority, then that would also be helpful to avoid any SEO penalties. (Open Site Explorer shows addthis.com having a 100 domain authority!).
-
Eric, I'm really confused. AddThis automatically adds a tracking code each time the page is loaded. If you click refresh you'll notice that the code changes.
What do you mean the URL isn't being indexed? Google is ranking that page for the keyword. And I might be mistaken but my understanding is that Google disregards everything after the "#" so there shouldn't be a duplicate content issue.
-
Mike, the only way that you can be certain that it's not affecting SEO in any way is to not use it. That said, you have to look at the potential drawbacks from using it. Is the article being shared enough via addthis to get natural links without those extra characters in the URL? Probably not.
I also looked at the URL and see that Google isn't indexing that URL. Therefore, I don't recommend using addthis just for that reason. You should be building links and social shares to the main URL, not another URL. If that other URL (the one you posted above) actually redirected to the main URL, that would be one thing: but it doesn't. You're just feeding and creating duplicate content (not a good thing).
-
Not familiar with AddThis, but as long as your URL's remain the same if you stop using AddThis, you should be okay! If your URLs change, it could be an issue
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
International URL Structures
Hi everyone! I've read a bunch of articles on the topic, but I can't seem to be able to figure out a solution that works for the specific case. We are creating a site for a service agency, this agency has offices around the world - the site has a global version (in English/French & Spanish) and some country specific versions. Here is where it gets tricky: in some countries, each office has a different version of the site and since we have Canada for example we have a French and an English version of the site. For cost and maintenance reason, we want to have a single domain : www.example.com We want to be able to indicate via Search Console that each subdomain is attached to a different country, but how should we go about it. I've seen some examples with subfolders like this: Global FR : www.example.com/fr-GL Canada FR: www.example.com/fr-ca France: www.example.com/fr-fr Does this work? It seems to make more sense to use : **Subdirectories with gTLDs, **but I'm not sure how that would work to indicate the difference between my French Global version vs. France site. Global FR : www.example.com/fr France : www.example.com/fr/fr Am I going about this the right way, I feel the more I dig into the issue, the less it seems there is a good solution available to indicate to Google which version of my site is geo-targeted to each country. Thanks in advance!
Technical SEO | | sarahcoutu150 -
Will Google Recrawl an Indexed URL Which is No Longer Internally Linked?
We accidentally introduced Google to our incomplete site. The end result: thousands of pages indexed which return nothing but a "Sorry, no results" page. I know there are many ways to go about this, but the sheer number of pages makes it frustrating. Ideally, in the interim, I'd love to 404 the offending pages and allow Google to recrawl them, realize they're dead, and begin removing them from the index. Unfortunately, we've removed the initial internal links that lead to this premature indexation from our site. So my question is, will Google revisit these pages based on their own records (as in, this page is indexed, let's go check it out again!), or will they only revisit them by following along a current site structure? We are signed up with WMT if that helps.
Technical SEO | | kirmeliux0 -
Does Google differentiate between a site with spammy link building practices from a victim of a negative SEO attack?
I've be tasked with figuring out how to recover our rankings as we are likely being hurt by an algorithmic penalty. I have no idea if this was the workings of a previously hired SEO or the result of negative SEO, **how does Google differentiate between a site with bad/spammy link building practices from a victim of a negative SEO attack? **
Technical SEO | | Syed_Raza0 -
How to fix broken links?
Hi, I use WordPress CMS with Yoast SEO plugin. I have just found out that my 403 errors increased dramatically. It seems that all my tags below of each post are being broken for some reason. When i click on the tags i get the following massage: **403 Forbidden Request forbidden by administrative rules. ** I assume it has something to do with the configuration within Yoast SEO plugin. Dose anyone know how should i fix that? Thanks, Raviv evsGujA
Technical SEO | | Indiatravelz0 -
Do I need a link to my sitemap?
I have a very large sitemap. I submit it to both Google and Bing, but do I need a link to it? If someone went there it would probably lock their browser. Is there any danger of not having a link if I submit it to Google and Bing?
Technical SEO | | EcommerceSite0 -
Why are my links not being counted?
I have a site that has over 400 links going to it. When I use Moz open site explorer or any other SEO tool its says I have only 12 links. Does anyone know why this could be happening?
Technical SEO | | Goopping0 -
301s and Link Juice
So I know that a 301 will pass the majority of link juice to the new site, but if that 301 is taken away what happens?
Technical SEO | | kylesuss0