Link building with AddThis URL
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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!
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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
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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).
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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.
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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!).
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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.
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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!
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Quick correction here. ? indicates a URL parameter, # indicates a subsection of the same document.
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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.
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