Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
Publishing testimonials on your site that are from your Google + (or other review sites page)
-
Ive got a site with some good Google + Reviews and some other good reviews on other sites that id like to be able to publish on a testimonials page on our website, but im worried about being penalised for duplicate content. Any idea of the best way to get these reviews on to our website, i was thinking about placing the text in as an image, but id prefer to do something semantic if at all possible.
(I know that some review sites have javascript widgets you can use to pull in your reviews but for most of the sites we are reviewed on they dont)
-
Hi Sam!
It might be helpful to start with a little clarification here - in Local SEO, the term 'testimonials' tends to indicate direct-to-business owner content while the term 'reviews' typically indicates content that exists on a third party platform. In researching this topic, it would likely be better to search for 'reviews' rather than 'testimonials' as you are talking about third party reviews.
Mike Blumenthal wrote a great little post about this earlier this year:
http://blumenthals.com/blog/2014/04/24/using-google-reviews-on-your-website/
Hope it helps!
-
I would agree with everyone here that duplicate content isn't really an issue here. And it's really not the concern it once was. I personally would take a screen shot though, just to show where the original is for your audience. I also heard somewhere that you can't republish Yelp testimonials elsewhere, or maybe it was Google+, and have them still featured on the original source. So you may want to double check the rules around testimonials for those two sites.
-
If you're really worried about content duplication, I would do as you suggest, placing them as an image. Personally, I wouldn't lose sleep at night if I copied and pasted some reviews from my G+ Local.
(Former?) Google employee, Matt Cutts once posted a video claiming that duplicate content won't hurt you unless it's spammy. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vi-wkEeOKxM&feature=youtu.be
If you're still on the fence, what I would also suggest is to try asking the same question at Google's Webmaster Central Help Forum. I think you'd get a fairly definitive answer possibly from a Google employee like John Mueller.
-
Differently from (as an example) facebook, google + API doesn't provide a mean of extracting customer reviews. So programmatically you can't, given you rule out scraping them.
Manually you can do whatever you want.
As for content duplication, is a risk, but there's no such thing as content duplication penalization, when facing duplicate content google just make a choice, indexing one or another.
And to have google consider your content duplicate, you really need to copy everything, and have you page share the vast majority of the html with another page.
-
Having a testimonials page on your website is a great idea. It shows the clients going to your website that you are a good provider. I would think you could just place "Review from Google+" or "Review from Yelp" at the bottom of a comment.
Here is our testimonial page: http://www.essentialpest.com/testimonials/
We don't place reviews from other websites. The testimonials we have posted came from emails, letters, etc. - However, I would think that if you linked the word "Google+" from "Review from Google+" with a link to that review, it would just be proof that review does exist.
This may be useful to you. http://moz.com/blog/getting-reviews-the-right-way-for-local-businesses
Good luck!
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
-
Any Success Getting Fake 5 Star Google My Business Reviews Removed From Competitors?
Hi, I am working on a competitor who is obviously building up fake reviews using a 3rd party service. I need to build more evidence. A majority of his reviews on Google My Business, they are done by reviewers with very few reviews (no profile pic), and that seem to review 3-4 companies in the Chicagoland area the exact same day. This happens again and again. It started about 1.5 years ago. Before that everything looks normal. Any idea how much proof I need to actually get those reviews and/or his company removed? I am working on getting access to a private group on Facebook where he talks about it. Thanks in advance!
Reviews and Ratings | | vetofunk1 -
3rd Party Approved Reviews - Widget or API Feed - Any thoughts ?
Hi Mozzers, We use a google approved 3rd party review company to collect reviews for our branches and now also for our products( this is about to be implemented). We currently use one of their widgets on our site (its javascript) to show the reviews. I don't think google can read this and I don't think we currently, therefore, get any direct seo benefit from it. My questions are as follows : I obviously want to get any SEO benefit from any review text which customers leave but as the data itself is housed on the review site with a widget on my site pointing to it,should I use an API feed as opposed to a widget. If google can read the review text on my page - then surely i should some benefit from it even though, it could technically be classed as duplicate content what are peoples thoughts ? . thanks Pete
Reviews and Ratings | | PeterCol120 -
Google Reviews & Third Party Reviews
Hi We have a third party review provider, but were also looking at increasing our Google reviews. However after more research, should Google reviews only be used on local listings? For organisations which don't have a physical location to buy from - is the solution to use organisation schema, which incorporates 'reviews on other sites' with the hope Google may show your Feefo review count? When checking similar companies - all seem to have the organisation knowledge card and not the local Google My Business listing. Is it worth pursuing extra reviews on Google My Business or not? Thanks!
Reviews and Ratings | | BeckyKey0 -
What's the best way to keep Google My Business reviews when the business changes names?
I work with an interior designer who is re-branding and changing her business name to focus specifically on windows. Can she keep her GMB reviews and just change the name of her business, then reverify with Google? She doesn't want to lose her current local pack ranking.
Reviews and Ratings | | obkommy1 -
How does decimal rounding of reviews to stars work in ios appstore? Starting from which average review score to get full 5 star rating?
How does decimal rounding of reviews to stars work in ios appstore?
Reviews and Ratings | | lcourse
Starting from which average review score to get full 5 star rating? Duolingo has a 5 star rating, but I doubt that they really have an all time review average larger than 4,75. In the google playstore their average of the android version is 4,6. Does anybody know how apple calculates the star ratings or has an URL reference where this is explained?0 -
How can I avoid duplicate content when building a review widget?
My website has a profile page for each of the home improvement contractors who signs up. They accumulate reviews on those pages. I want to build a review widget to display our reviews on our contractors' websites. How can I avoid duplicate content issues for the reviews? Example of a profile page with a few reviews: http://www.thehomefixers.com/members/425/waterheaters-plus-llc.php
Reviews and Ratings | | menachemp0 -
Blocking Reviews by Blocking Words?
A client sent me an email this week, stating that you could block bad reviews on social media sites by "blocking" certain words from comments such as "I", "you", "them", "they"......she heard it at a conference from some other CEO's that had some problems with bad reviews. Essentially these CEO's blocked these words making the pages read only pages so no one could leave a review on social media sites. Now, I have never heard this tactic, nor think this is a good idea in any way shape or form. And I know that you can't block bad reviews from happening (without looking at the bigger picture and encouraging some look at internal processes and customer service). Has any one heard of this tactic? Or better, know of anywhere online that documents this idea of blocking words? I have to get back to her, but I have beaten the drum about how to acquire good reviews so much, I feel I am not getting through! Help! Thanks
Reviews and Ratings | | cschwartzel0 -
Yelp Review From My Customer Removed
Hi, A customer of mine told me she created a yelp account just to give me a review. She's a good customer and wanted to show me her appreciation. I thanked her for taking the trouble. About a week later, I see that her review was marked as "not recommended." This was a legitimate review made by a real customer. I'm angry that it was removed for no reason. I noticed a competitor of mine has 18 yelp reviews and all of them show up just fine. I also noticed that this same competitor is paying for ads from Yelp. A couple of years ago, another customer reviewed me on yelp and it was also labeled as "not recommended." So I now have 2 "not recommended" reviews on Yelp that, if you ask me, imply that my reviews are fake. After Yelp and Yahoo merged, I lost the 14 Yahoo reviews I had obtained from customers over the last six years. I have also noticed over the years, that whenever I need to sign into my Yelp business account to update the data, it's locked until some pushy sales person calls and asks to speak to me in order to try to sell me ads on Yelp. Anyone else hate Yelp? They're obviously not really interested in making sure reviews are "real," they're just interested in selling expensive ads.
Reviews and Ratings | | Ophelia6191