One more question about rel=canonical

[cedriklizotte]

I'm still trying to wrap my head around rel=canonical and its importance. Thanks to the community, I've been able to understand most of it. Still, I have a couple of very specific questions:

• I share certain blog posts on the Huffington Post. Here's an example: http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/cedric-lizotte/munich-travel-guide_b_13438956.html - Of course I post these on my blog as well. Here: http://www.continentscondiments.com/things-munich-classics/ - Obviously the HuffPo has a huge DA, and I'll never match it. However the original post is mine, on my blog, and not on the HuffPo. They wont - obviously - add a rel=canonical just for me and for the sake of it, they have a million other things to do.

QUESTION: Should I add a rel=canonical to my own site pointing to the post on the HuffPost? What would be the advantage? Should I just leave this alone?

• I share blog posts on Go4TravelBlog too. Example: http://www.go4travelblog.com/dallmayr-restaurant-munich/ - but, once again, the original post is on one of my blogs. In this case, it's on another blog of mine: http://www.thefinediningblog.com/dallmayr-restaurant-in-munich/

QUESTION: Well it's pretty much the same! Should I beg Go4TravelBlog to add a rel=canonical pointing to mine? If they refuse, what do I do? Would it be better to add a rel=canonical from my site to theirs, or do I fight it out and have a rel=canonical pointing to my own post? Why?

Thanks a million for your help!

[Adriaan.Multiply]

Placing a rel=canonical on your own blogposts to HuffPost is essentially telling Google that you're not unique enough to be indexed and that you want all ranking juice to flow to HP. Which isn't the case I guess. I would leave it alone. Nevertheless it will be very hard to outrank HP in this case.

This is what Yoast tells us about cross domain canonicals: _"You might have the same piece of content on several domains. For instance, SearchEngineJournal regularly republishes articles from Yoast.com (with explicit permission). Look at every one of those articles, and you’ll see a rel=canonical link point right back at our original article. This means all the links pointing at their version of the article count towards the ranking of our canonical version. They get to use our content to please their audience; we get a clear benefit from it too. Everybody wins." _(https://yoast.com/rel-canonical/#cross-domain-canonical)

So IF you can get HP to put a canonical to your own blog, this would be highly favorable for your own ranking. You could use the 'everybody wins' argument to try to get this working.

[cedriklizotte]

Thanks for this answer.

Of course I can't go play around in HuffPost's headers. What I can do, though, is change the body, which includes the code and the href's. Would a rel=canonical in the body still work? How would I go about implementing it?

[Adriaan.Multiply]

I'm afraid not, Google is very clear on this matter: _When we encounter a rel=canonical designation in the , it’s disregarded. _https://webmasters.googleblog.com/2013/04/5-common-mistakes-with-relcanonical.html

[EGOL]

I totally agree with Adriaan's comments.

I'll add a few thoughts about publishing philosophy....

Keep in mind the amount of time that you spent on creating content that you give away AND the value that the content can bring if it is unique to your website and not available anywhere else on the web.

If your goal is to "get your message out" then by all means get it published in as many places as you can.  If your goal is to "build value for your business" then you have to think about things carefully.

If you can write an article in a short amount of time and give it to HP and in return get a link and a brand mention then it might be worth letting them use it.  If I was going to do this, I would publish it first on my own site and make sure that it is indexed and then give it to HP for publication there.

Pay attention to where you copy of the article ranks in the search engines.  If HP is always outranking you for your own content that makes them a much less attractive place to publish your content.  If that is happening and they will not give you rel=canonical, then I would probably stop giving them my content.  Giving them my content under those conditions is not "building value for my business".

Try to get them to give you rel=canonical.  If they will do that then publishing on their site is building value for your business.  If they will not do that then it tells you something important about them.  They are 100% for themselves and are all about having other people carry them around in a sedan chair.

All of the above was written about content that you can generate easily and with minimal cost.  In situations where you have a real masterpiece, then there is a stronger case for keeping it only on your own site and spending your efforts on "promoting" it in other locations but not giving the content away.

So, before you give away content, think about the many options that you have and choose the one that "gets your word out" or "builds your business" to a maximum degree.  There is no "one size fits all".

[cedriklizotte]

Hm. So that probably means that I don't have any sort of possibility towards modifying the rel=canonical on the HuffPost. Right? Can you think of any other way? I only have access to the body.

This means that I should simply ignore and keep going. Right?

And if I can get go4TravelBlog (or any other place where my content is published) to add a rel=canonical pointing towards my version of it, I'd be golden. Right?

Thanks again!

[cedriklizotte]

EGOL, thanks for your thoughts.

I'm a freelance writer. I've never made a penny with my blog and probably never will. It's a business card more than anything.

Try to get them to give you rel=canonical.  If they will do that then publishing on their site is building value for your business.  If they will not do that then it tells you something important about them.  They are 100% for themselves and are all about having other people carry them around in a sedan chair.

Yes, I agree with you fully that they want free content to carry their brand. That's the whole premise of their business and that's why they have so many problems with disgruntled employees. That being said, if you take a look at the link I shared, you can see that every paragraph or so links directly to one of my blog posts. What I shared on their website is more or less a recap of all of my own blog posts for this specific city.

On top of that, well, there's no better business card, as a writer, than a series of posts of the Huff Post linking towards my stuff!

Thanks again for your thoughts, I'll keep everything in mind, of course.

[Adriaan.Multiply]

Yes, and yes. And also consider Egol's comments.

[EGOL]

It is important not to get carried away with "publishing articles on other sites for links' especially if those links are in highly optimized anchor text.  A couple posts on HP with a link or two is OK, but if you are doing this alot and Google is still doing the old style Penguin penalties, it can kill the value of your domain permanently.

In the topic area of my business, I don't publish anything on other websites.  I want to spend all of my writing time building the value of my brand.  I feel that if I am a worthy author, my readers will share my work for me and my need to promote it will be zero to minimal.  This has always worked well with the audiences that I write form.

[cedriklizotte]

Unfortunately I don't do very mainstream stuff, which means that my content isn't very shareable. On top of that, I don't write provocative pieces, which means that they aren't commented on a lot. I know how to do those things and I did them for past employers, but I've chosen personally not to do so because I find them toxic. This also means that my readership, at least on my blog, is very low. Of course I could go back to my old ways - I did here with a lot of success: http://www.thefinediningblog.com/food-bloggers-post-negative-reviews-comped-meals-thoughts-strange-industry/ - but I don't like the vicious arguments that ensue on social media.

Can I take a look at your blog? Maybe I could pick up a few ideas!

And, once again, I haven't made any money from having a blog. I got, what, $15 from Google once? That's about it!