Will linking to very similar (or duplicate content) hurt SEO
-
One of my clients started working with a traditional PR company to get media placements and they've placed articles on some very excellent and relevant sites. However, the article's content is nearly identical on each site. We would like to link my client's site to these articles, but will the duplicate content hurt SEO? Because there are some very minor variations within these articles, will that be enough of a difference where we don't need to be concerned if we did link our site to each article?
-
Yea, sorry I misspoke there. What I meant is that I was thinking of reaching out to these various sources and asking them to link to our site where it was mentioned in the article. I was just concerned whether links from many very similar (or duplicate) articles would do more harm than good. I think I go my answer, which is that it probably won't build much positive benefit, and there is a risk of negative effects, so I will avoid this tactic.
-
This could get you in trouble, even if the articles are not identical, but fairly identical. It's like those crappy spun articles people were (or still are) using for building contextual links. Most of the won't get indexed and if you have too many of them. The main problem is if those similar articles are also posted on your website. If yes, it could hurt you, if not, there's no risk but just as max pointed out, the backlinks will have no value.
-
Yes, linking from duplicate content means potentially loosing SEO value.
google could detect those articles as duplicate and do not include some in the index, result the backlink will bring no value to you.
if google do not detect those articles as duplicate you should still ask yourself if it's really what you want to be linked from extremely similar articles. Because that's a signal, the content of the article where the link is placed, google will use to choose the keywords you will be ranked for. Same article content same keywords you are feeding google.
-
you say "We would like to link my client's site to these articles"
How do you mean? Please explain a little more
-
I guess if it really is duplicated content its not recommended. If its very similar content but not duplicated it shouldn't hurt your SEO
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
-
Link Building where link building is dead. Latest tactics in a land of content.
Hello, What is your latest link building techniques considering manual link building is basically dead, and you should really build good content to drive results. Link building has really become less important. It seems to be much more 10X content now. What would you recommend for basic link building considering this besides the 50 first Links video by Rand, which is excellent. Thanks, Bob
Link Building | | BobGW0 -
Effects of a bad link linking to a image
i am getting a lot of links from wallpapers sites.. One person has created 1000's of similar sites that are linking back to my images. My guess is images do not pass link value positive or negative. But I am not sure what the potential effects would be. Does anyone know who linking to images might effect SEO especially when there coming from horribly low quality auto generated sites.
Link Building | | KentH0 -
Can affiliate links benefit or hurt my seo?
I have just signed up with a company to do affiliate marketing for my site. I am now in the process of reaching out to publishers and seeing who will publish my link on their site. Is there any benefit in terms of seo for having these links, and can there be any potential downside to these links as well?
Link Building | | whiteonlySEO0 -
Who's going to Pubcon Las Vegas in October 2015? I'm looking to connect with programmers, seo and link building providers.
Hi Moz Members, We are heading to PubCon next month. We are a marketing agency looking to connect with providers that can help us service our clients with website development and seo. Please drop me a line at cwjteng@hotmail.com with your contact information and blurb about your company/services. Thanks! K
Link Building | | kjseo0 -
Internal Linking - Post links vs Side Bar Links behaving differently
Hi, I have a question regarding the internal linking behavior. My website is www.hindimeaning.com which is approx 3 years old. I have approx 450 posts. Now i have a widget on right sidebar "Popular posts". A widget below my posts "Related Posts". And a simple html CSS menu above the posts (I removed menu around 6 month before so currently it will not show.) I crawled my site with moz crawler (same are the result from google crawler as well) and it shows menus links as internal links. While sidebar widget "Popular posts" and "Related Posts" are not showing as internal links. If we talk theoretically what i learn till now is "every link on a page behaves as internal link". Then why the widget links are not showing as internal links. Thanks, Mahesh Kumar
Link Building | | chaudhary04890 -
Link Relevance vs Link Authority ?
Hi guys, I have a quick question regarding some low quality links my site is getting. From the information in Open Site Explorer, the website Im talking about has a page authority of 16 while the domain authority is 11\. These are very low quality scores in my oppinion and Im thinking of removing them with Google Disavow Tool. The thing is that, although the domain is low quality, the links have relevance as they're in the same business sector as us. More exactly, the name of the domain is taxisavona and the company I work for is also a taxi company. So, now I`m thinking, should I disavow the link because of it's low scores or should I leave it because it is relevant to our business ? Thank you in advance! Best regards, Tiberiu Iavorenciuc
Link Building | | Tiberiu0 -
Press Releases - duplicate content
Does anybody know if Google makes allowances for duplicate content from press releases? If you submit a press release to a press release distribution service, does it have to be different? Any help would be much appreciated.
Link Building | | AAttias0 -
Free link on a Paid Link Blog
Hi there, I have been doing some outreaching, and managed to have a blog post accepted on a authority blog. They included links to my website, and I was very pleased with the placement. However, having browsed through the site, I was worried to see that they openly admit they allow 'reviews' of websites, with backlinks included, for $50 per review. I am worried I might be penalised without actually doing anything wrong. I did not pay for my link, but the link has been placed on a site which openly admits they accept payment for links. Should I be worried? Should I ask them to take it down? To date I have been told countless times by bloggers I am outreaching that if I pay $10, $50, $100 etc I can write a blog post. I have never accepted because of the risk of penalization. Now, unwittingly, I am linked to from a paid link site with a blog post that would look like I have paid for it because of the placement and style of back link. What do you think? Thanks,
Link Building | | giveacar0