Duplicate Content - Video

[poolguy]

I recently noticed a drop in rankings for my site shortly after the new algorithm update.  I'm not sure exactly why rankings went down, but would like to know if it has to do with having videos on our site that do not belong to us.

We have a few videos on product pages that the manufacturer of the product had created.  I was wondering if Google maybe thinks we are maliciously stealing these videos or something and penalizing us for it.  And if stuff like this has anything to do with the recent algorithm update.

We make our own videos, but some of our manufacturer's videos are just better... and they work with us and are glad for us to have their videos listed.

Thanks in advance

[DavidBoozer57]

I wold like to agree with Syed, plus add a little to the video marketing side of your site. I am new to SEOMOZ, and although I have many things to work on and learn, video marketing, even within my site, has been a major factor for traffic. Using videos from the manufacturer is fine, and I believe the other three comments are correct, this should really have nothing to do with a drop in rank or traffic. I do suggest however, to continue to put your own original videos on your site...trust me, your own personal view and brand on things plays a major role for not only trust from the search engines, but what we should really be concerned with, trust from prospective clients and or purchasers of our products and services.

It has amazed me at how more people preferred my own take of a particular product or service than that of the creator of the product I was promoting. I tried it both ways several times and always noticed a higher percentage in the conversion rate than that of the other...just the facts I have seen and still do. The hardest part about this whole venture is getting it down to a fine art. While the manufacturer's videos may seem more professional than your own, don't worry, practice makes perfect. Besides, when it comes to video, people really are attracted to other "real" people and how they feel about a specific product or service... Thanks-

[Syed1]

HIGHLY unlikely that your website got pandalized due to "duplicate video" content hosted on your server.

If the videos were embeds (youtube, etc) and the creator of the video  has higher authority website and has the videos embedded too, then yes, your site might throw off 'thin' content trait but even then it shouldn't be enough to attract the Panda to its door.

If I were you, I'd look at all the pages for the text content they have and if any are duplicates or close to duplicates, and if I find any I would have original content written for each . I would also look the title and meta tags and check for duplicates also analyze see the # of backlinks to all the pages.If 1% of your websites pages have all the backlinks and rest have no links or social activity at all, that could throw off a thin content profile as well. I would also get lot of social signals (retweets, etc) - get those pages on Twitter and other social networks including Digg, Stumbleupon, etc to show Google that these pages don't simply exist for the sake of it but they are shared (liked) by people as well.
Take a look at other metrics as well - time on site, bounce rate, etc as they are getting more important.

[Netboost]

the google bot cannot watch and understand videos so just alter the filename and title and description - look at youtube for example

[AnthonyMangia]

I doubt the drop is a result of the videos.  As far as Panda is concerned, I would focus my rehabilitation efforts on:

• Fixing Duplicate Content (ESPECIALLY on your own website!  get well acquainted with how to use rel="canonical")
• Cleaning Up Your Site (focus on making a cleaner experience for your visitors and simpler code for the search engines)
• Fix Your Technical Issues (fix any problems that SEOmoz is telling you about, any crawl errors in Google Webmaster Tools, any page speed problems in Google's Online Page Speed Tool, and potentially any HTML validation problems from W3C)
• Content, Content, Content (create more original content and refresh your evergreen content)

Be warned that there haven't been a ton of verifiable Panda recoveries to date, which may be in part due to the fact that (as Matt Cutts verified) Google isn't updating the "Panda factor" very often.  Recovery may take weeks to months.  The best article available on the subject, in my opinion, came out last week: http://www.pocket-lint.com/news/40851/10-tips-for-beating-google-panda

[poolguy]

No