Many small business owners without much SEO experience worry about their website slipping in rankings if they duplicate content or post outside content. The myth that content should only be posted on your own website is pervasive and rooted in misconceptions about how search engines work.
Non-Original Content Won’t Ruin Your Ranking
Re-posting content onto other websites in the form of blogs, press releases or blurbs will not hurt your SEO ranking unless you violate three core rules: volume, timing and context. Volume refers to the amount of times the exact same text on your website appears in other places. Timing refers to the period of time in which the content appeared. If your blog is suddenly reposted hundreds of times on different sites within an hour, it would be a violation of this principle. Reposting a blog on several partner websites and social media will not hurt your ranking. The third rule is context, or where it is appearing. If all of the content being reposted is hosted on new domains, it will likely be written off as spam. If you are using content on established domains and sites, you won’t have an issue.
Guest Posts Won’t Hurt Your Site
Guest posts, whether posted on your site by another business or vice versa, will never hurt your SEO. Republishing guest posts you’ve written on other sites won’t ruin your search ranking, as search engines aren’t confused by this. Many times, bigger businesses with higher rankings will encourage you to repost content onto your site a few weeks later.
Sharing Grows Your Business
Finally, sharing helps to grow and promote your business. Videos, blogs and other pieces of content being reposted elsewhere will not hurt your bottom line as long as your name is attached. Many times, cases of websites getting enormous traffic and sales are directly as a result of someone else reposting content elsewhere. After all, sharing is caring.