The etiquette of reproducing someone else's content
-
Hello -
Here is a scenario, representative of something that I just saw play out.
- Site A is a new blog about travel (as an example topic)
- Site B is an older, established blog about travel
- Site C is a new blog launched and owned by Site B that focuses on a particular travel niche (luxury travel, for example)
Here is what happens next
- Site A writes an original piece of content
- Site C then republishes Site A's content, paraphrasing all of the text, but giving Site A credit with a link
- Site B (the established site) publishes a blurb about the article, directing readers with a link to "read more" on Site C. It credits Site A as the original author, but does not link to it.
If you were able to follow that, here is what I would like to know.
Did Site C do anything wrong by republishing a paraphrased version of Site A's content, even though it gave credit with a link?
Did Site B do anything wrong by linking to Site C (which is for all intents and purposes the same website), but not linking to Site A (the original source)?
My sense is that the established blog (Site B) is trying to get it's new publication (Site C) to outrank the original author (Site A) using its own content. In general though, I am curious to get some thoughts on this situation because it raises a few ethical questions that I am not sure about, namely:
Is there anything wrong with publishing "spun" content, if it is done well and links back to the source?
Is there anything wrong with linking to a republished version of an article on a sister website, rather than linking to the original article.
Thanks
-
We have this problem today. We publish a post, it gets picked up by another site that typically outranks because it is a great blog/site and they outrank us for our own story. They always link back to our original post, but very rarely do they use canonical which would be the preferred method.
Theoretically, Google is supposed to know who the original source for the content is and rank accordingly, but I have seen and continue to see the other sites rank higher. However, I do see as time goes by we eventually start to outrank these sites for our posts.
As a bonus though they are backlinks to the blog.
So in the end, if you are borrowing or syndicating someone else's post, always link back to them as the source, this is best practice and as an example of who does this, news agencies. They will syndicate content from the original on their blog and link back to it.
As for the B post linking to the C post, I would think this could backfire as the content on B is duplicate to both C and A but doesn't give the proper credit to A. It may outrank but over time could be penalized for thin or duplicate content.
-
Hi there,
Here are my thoughts, if what you have on site A is the same as site B, my thoughts are that only one of those pages will be ranking in the SERPs. If the two pages are about the exact same thing, with just paraphrasing, it is still duplicate content. The site C linking sounds ok to me, as it isn't duplicate content. Since site B owns it, and they are probably hosted in the same place, it would be better to link C to A if they are hosted separately. You will get better link juice that way.
As far as doing anything wrong, technically, no. It would be best practice to have original content where ever you could.
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
-
Duplicate Content for Non-SEO Purposes
Duplicate Content for Non-SEO Purposes There are a few layers to this question, but at the most basic level the question is... -Will having the same article (in the form of archived e-newsletter issues) on multiple different websites' newsletter archives HURT those sites? I'm fairly sure it won't HELP any of them in terms of SEO, but will having these back issues of their e-newsletters archived on their websites get them penalized? For the purpose of this question, these are not clients we are doing SEO for, just hosting and their e-newsletters. So it's fine if the archives provide no SEO benefit, we just don't want to leave them up if they will become LIABILITIES for the websites. -If having the same article in archived issues of e-newsletters on multiple different websites WOULD be harmful, would moving these archives to a sub-domain change anything or would it be best to simply take the archives down altogether? -Alternately, would spinning these articles make any difference in whether or not these sites get penalized? -Lastly, would spinning make the articles usable for archived e-newsletters for clients that ARE signed on for SEO services? I have a hunch about this, but I'd love to hear your expert opinions. Thanks!
Content Development | | BrianAlpert780 -
Duplicate Content In Webmaster Tools
In wordpress on some of our blogs when we have gone to publish them wordpress has shortened the url. In Google webmaster tools the orignal url is coming up as a 404 error. This url is not indexed in Google. Is this something to worry about and can this be avoided? Thank you in advance.
Content Development | | Palmbourne0 -
Does aggregating content hurt your moz / google rank?
I have a news section on my site that I aggregate from multiple RSS feeds. They are stored on my site and I have sitemap that links to them. Is this a negative thing to do? Since its overall duplicate content to another site, it may be a strike against me. Should I just leave it as an updating feed and not keep the articles visible on my site?
Content Development | | BrickPicker0 -
Free Duplicate Content Checker Tools ?
Hi Moz, I am really looking for free tools which can carry my content duplication issue, as i visited http://moz.com/community/q/are-there-tools-to-discover-duplicate-content-issues-with-the-other-websites suggested copyscape which is paid. I want FREE to handle my duplication issue.' Thanks in Advance. Best,
Content Development | | Futura
Teginder1 -
Duplicate content penalty
Hi there, I'd like to ensure I avoid a duplicate content penalty and could do with some advice. There is a popular blogger in my industry. I have agreed to add his blog to my website. He currently posts his blog on one of the popular free blogger platforms, and will continue to do this. The issue is that I will be posting duplicate content onto my site and I want to ensure that I do not trigger a google penalty. Is there a simple way form me to inform Google of the original source of the content. My intitial thoughts are: 1. Add a noindex to the Robots.txt file 2. Add a link at the beginning of the article pointing to the original source 3. Adding a rel=canonical tag in the header of each blog entry pointing to the original blog post which resides on a completely different domain. Thanks DBC
Content Development | | DBC011 -
Content Marketing - Car Space
Hey looking for cool content marketing examples in the car industry. Like major car companies leveraging their resources, in developing awesome, and viral content. Anyone aware of any cool campaigns? Cheers, Mark
Content Development | | MBASydney0 -
Does this count as Copied Content ?
Hi, we are publishing news on our website blog. In the news we use excerpts from other websites but do mention the source like "according to XYZ news source" etc. Does it count as copied content as sometime copyscape shows alsmot 30% duplicated content due to inclusion of references from different sources in our news stories ? Regards, shahzad
Content Development | | shaz_lhr0 -
Is it possible to over create/post content?
My company has signed up with a vendor to help write content. They are going to be supplying 50 articles per month so we'd basically be adding 2 or more articles per day. Is that too much or is that okay as long as it's quality content?
Content Development | | baudvilleweb0