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I would personally re-write the articles again so they are unique, but don't try to spin them. Once content starts to get duplicated, it is hard to try and be seen as the author of that.

Perhaps there could be some benefit in using Google+ to set yourself as the author, but I honestly don't know how Google would view this seeing as it has been reproduced elsewhere and potentially appear somewhere new. My gut feel is that if they see 3 or 4 copies of the same article, rather than try and determine who is the author, they might just not give the article the time of day.

Start again is my view.

Andy

Hi Armin,

First of all, try not to focus on quantity. Look only for quality and don't worry just about do-followed links.

Google now likes to see sites with a very natural looking link profile, so don't bother with the likes of blog commenting or article marketing. Instead, focus on what you have to offer a potential link partner, and if this is nothing, perhaps look to create an article or study that is specific to your industry / specialism.

Link building changed a little while ago, so please be careful, otherwise you will end up with a penalty in the shape of a Penguin!

EDIT-----

Adding a few links that should provide you with additional information:

• Google: Link Schemes
• MOZ: Link Building ideas to get more customers
• MOZ: Scalable Link Building tactics

-Andy

Hi Sandi,

It will be almost impossible to see who has done this, but you have two options.

1. Contact the sites in question and request that the links are removed, or
2. Just disavow them

Disavowing is the solution most will take because it can be a lot quicker than trying to get hold of people at sites like these.

It is something you will have to stay on top of though - keep a check in Search Console for any new ones that pop up that shouldn't.

-Andy

Hi Arno,

Your sub-domains automatically gain the exact same DA as the primary domain. This is why there is so much discussion about them. I have had sub-domains rank after a few days because they are seen as the same as being a part of the main site.

I personally find it better to have them as a part of the main site (/blog) but not because I get a better guaranteed rank from doing it this way.

A lot of the decision is whatever seems to make the most sense within your own site.

-Andy

Hi Oscar,

Are you noticing anything negative in terms of your phrases slipping? The reason I ask, is that Google is pretty smart when it comes to links, and someone just building spammy links isn't usually enough to draw a penalty on its own. If Google sees a few hundred spammy links appear overnight (figuratively speaking) then they are likely to just ignore them.

By all means disavow these bad links, but focus more on getting new links - be careful how you do this though. I have clients who have thousands upon thousands of low quality / spammy links, but the fact that I keep the link profiles topped up with high quality links, keeps penalties away.

-Andy

Hi Pete,

I think it's important to remember that Google doesn't penalise duplicate internal content...

John Mueller - Google
John clearly states  “We don’t have a duplicate content penalty. It’s not that we would demote a site for having a lot of duplicate content.” and “You don’t get penalized for having this kind of duplicate content” in which he was talking about very similar pages. John says to “provide… real unique value” on your pages.

There is no direct guidance on just how similar 'similar' needs to be before it is picked up as duplicate - if it were all on one site, it would be less of an issue, but as you have these crossovers on 3 sites, this might cause problems.

Try and avoid templated copy with a few changes because this can be seen as 'boilerplate' which Google doesn't like either.

I'll be honest, carrying the same products on different sites is a bit of a dangerous game in most cases, but there are exceptions.

Lets say you have 3 sites that are Football, Cricket & Tennis. One product that might be the same could be socks. If you differentiate here and write about socks for each sport (and each site), then you will be OK, even if it is the same product.

I hope this makes sense?

-Andy

Hi Carla,

As a website gets larger, it makes sense to have a tiered structure rather than place everything one 'click' from the root. Yes, PA will diminish as you get deeper into a site, but a carefully planned internal linking plan will put paid to that - as will building links to internal pages.

As for filters vs levels, it depends hugely on the site, niche, users and what other competitors are also doing ('follow the winners' type of thing), as well as what makes the most sense for the site structure. There is no definitive answer to this one.

As for a 4th level, if a common sense structure calls for a 4th level, then don't try and bypass it and ruin usability for the sake of one less click. I have worked with many sites that have more than 4 tiers and never encountered an issue.

I hope this helps?

-Andy

To be honest, with your 'tone' through here, telling people they are not experts and general manner, I would be surprised if anyone else would want to chip in. If they do, please try to keep this in mind.

Remember, that everyone in here does it for their love of SEO and the MOZ community. Noone (other than MOZ employees) are paid to be on here, so perhaps don't call levels of proficiency in to question, because anyone answering is trying to help.

-Andy

Hi,

While backlinks are a big factor, they are far from the only factor. It is as much about your content and usability as it is about links.

With the links, you could get just 1 really strong link that is much better than everything they have, and that might be enough - but I doubt it. It's just not that straight forward.

Best bet is to have a read though this MOZ guide on link building to get a bit of an intro into best practices and a more in-depth explanation.

-Andy

OK, so the results are in

• Google AU - Position 5
• Google IN - Position 8
• Google UK - Position 7
• Google US - Position 5

A lot of the time, search results are messed up when trying to search from your own machine as there can be cache, location, IP and all other kinds of issues.

I hope this has helped.

Andy

Hi Dana,

I can certainly understand your problem, and whilst I have no data to give you, you should certainly be looking at this not only as a lost opportunity from and SEO perspective, but also as the inability to report back just how well the site is converting traffic. Without this data, no site can see where changes can be made and where improvements will result to an increase in revenue.

I would also look at the fact that anything that is broken on a site might not be having an observable negative issue right now, but what happens with the next algorithm update? Will something be spotted at some point? Do you want to wait for Google to penalise the site before realising it should have been corrected?

Also, does it make for a poor user experience? If someone comes to the site and then bookmarks of of these pages, how are they going to get back again? Are they then likely to just navigate away because they didn't land where they intended.

I am sure there will be a loss in revenue from this - quantifying it will be difficult for an outsider though. There is no doubt that this should be resolved, and I would say ASAP as well.

-Andy

Google has said in the past that the odd outage shouldn't be a problem, but if it is like you are saying, then yes, this could be very harmful. Matt Cutts said that if every time someone comes to your site it is down, then it will have a negative impact.

Recovery is a very open-ended question though. It could be a week, a month or 3 months - there is no way to determine this sadly and anything here is going to be guesswork.

I would say to move the site as soon as you can.

-Andy

Hi,

I just want to address a point that has been missed here because duplicate content across domains is one of the Panda signals to Google and can end up resulting in an algorithm hit. Remember that how Google treats your own internal duplicate content and that on an external site are very different.

A good rule of thumb is do NOT expect to rank high in Google with content found on other, more trusted sites, and don’t expect to rank at all if all you are using is automatically generated pages with no ‘value add’.

Have a read of this article as it runs through lots of information regarding duplicate content. Here is another excerpt to be mindful of...

…in some cases, content is deliberately duplicated across domains in an attempt to manipulate search engine rankings or win more traffic. Deceptive practices like this can result in a poor user experience, when a visitor sees substantially the same content repeated within a set of search results. Google tries hard to index and show pages with distinct information. This filtering means, for instance, that if your site has a “regular” and “printer” version of each article, and neither of these is blocked with a noindex meta tag, we’ll choose one of them to list. In the rare cases in which Google perceives that duplicate content may be shown with intent to manipulate our rankings and deceive our users, we’ll also make appropriate adjustments in the indexing and ranking of the sites involved. As a result, the ranking of the site may suffer, or the site might be removed entirely from the Google index, in which case it will no longer appear in search results. GOOGLE.

I would never advise duplicating content to be used across different domains - this is a very bad practice and one that should be avoided at all costs.

CleverPhD has advised the best way to handle this and re-write the content for the Bios.

-Andy

It's a suggestion, and just indicates to Googlebot how often they should come along. It won't do anything in terms of telling them more about the site hierarchy really, but will give them an idea about which pages are most important.

That said, you should try and follow the following structure:

Homepage: 100%
Internal Pages: 60%
Blog Pages: 30%

Or something very similar.

I hope this helps.

-Andy

Hi Bejan,

Your chosen language should be sat at the primary domain.

For example, if your are a Saudi based site that wants Arabic as the primary language, this shouldn't be sat in an identifier. Ideally, you want to have a primary site language as this is how most will do it.

www.example.com (Arabic Language)
www.example.com/en/ (English Version)

Or...

www.example.com (English Language)
www.example.com/ae/ (Arabic Version)

You need to also remember to set these correctly by using HREFLANG. This is what will tell Google which languages should be associated to which pages. Moz have a couple of very useful pages on this here and here.

I hope this helps a little.

-Andy

Do update the thread when you have more data Nikola. I would be interested to see what else is found.

-Andy

Hi Peter,

I would certainly walk away from this, but that is just my opinion. Some people are OK with it, but it makes me very nervous when these types of post are a) being paid for and b) against Google's TOS.

A real guest blogging article should have a link / citation to the author, rather than to a site. For me, these articles always look spammy, sometimes content spun, but never really beneficial. Opening up the link as a 'do-follow' is also passing page rank from you to their client, something they are clearly doing for their own personal gain.

I hope this helps.

-Andy

Hi Robert,

Just to add to David's answer, to really help with local SEO, here are a few pointers which I always have great success with. And yes, keep everything on one site rather than splitting it up.

• Create your pages
• On each page ensure the NAP (Name, address, phone) follow the same format
• Add local information such as "how to get here via bus" - "How to get here via car", etc
• Add a local landmark for those travelling on foot or car to look out for
• Add a local map
• Will people need to use a taxi to get to you? Add a link to a local company

These will all help with local results and the more informative the page the better. Remember that each local site can have its own Google Local listing. Here is the information specific to that.

• Make sure that your page is created at your actual, real-world location.

  • Use the precise address for the business rather than broad city names or cross-streets. P.O. Boxes are not considered accurate physical locations.
  • If you need to specify a mailbox or suite number within your physical location, please list your physical address in Address Line 1, and put your mailbox or suite number in Address Line 2.
  • If your business rents a temporary, "virtual" office at a different address from your primary business, do not create a page for that location unless it is staffed during your normal business hours.

• Do not include information in address lines that does not pertain to your business’s physical location (e.g. URLs or keywords).

• Do not create more than one page for each location of your business, either in a single account or multiple accounts.

• Individual practitioners and departments within businesses, universities, hospitals, and government buildings may have separate pages. See specific guidelines about individual practitioners and departments for more information.

I hope this helps.

-Andy

Hi Chris,

I always advise every client to remove the Meta Keywords. Although Google doesn't make any use of them, if they are over-used, they can easily be seen as a way to keyword-spam. If memory serves, the MOZ page score gives this a negative if found, or it used to.

At best, they will do nothing for you - at worst, they can cause you issues.

-Andy

Hi Mark,

First of all, have you tested your sites to see how they are in terms of speed? I would suggest checking with...

• Google Page Speed Insights
• GTMetrix
• Pingdom

My own personal experience is that it can cause real issues in terms of page load times - to the point I have had clients drop it altogether. Out side of that, I can't advise on the best way to utilise it.

Are you finding that your experience is a good or bad one so far?

-Andy