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Does Your AcitveRain Outside Blog Have Any Authority in Google?

I have to be honest, I haven’t really been following ActiveRain’s Outside blog service. Mainly because we have been so busy refining our own real estate blogging product called the SwiftBlog (based on WordPress). But a few of my real estate clients kept asking me to look into AR's outside blog so I took a few minutes to dig in a little more. Below is my initial assessment.

A Quick Message to the AR gods (a.k.a. Disclaimer)

The information below is from my quick assessment of AR’s Outside Blog. If I have anything wrong or didn’t interpret something correctly, feel free to chime in and set the record straight. The intention of this blog post is to help educate, not to slam your service.

The Duplicate Content Issue

From the moment that AR’s Outside blog was released, everyone had questions about the issue of duplicate content. Now, we already know that simply having a few syndicated articles on your blog isn’t going to condemn you to "Google hell" but unoriginal content isn’t going to do anything to help your Search Engine Optimization.

I thought Bob Stewart did a good job of clearing this issue up in his post about Outside Blogs and duplicate content. The only problem is I don't see that ActiveRain is actually doing what he said they were. Let’s break this down a little more.

Bob states…

If you syndicate your post to your outside blog and you do not geo-target it, your outside blog will show up as the originating source. (since the post is not geo-targeted, it will not appear on Localism). Your syndication partner (your ActiveRain blog) will have a link back to your original content (outside blog)

Great! The only problem is that I haven’t been able to find this "link" to the outside blog.

Let’s use one of Missy Caulk’s posts as an example…

Missy has an ActiveRain Outside Blog at http://www.annarborundressed.com. She recently wrote a post titled Declaring the Value of What you are Worth? I checked and didn’t see this article on Localism so I am assuming that it's not geo-targeted.

According to the quote above, there should be a link at the bottom of her post on AR pointing to her AR Outside Blog. However, when I visit her post on ActiveRain I do not see any link that references her AR Outside Blog. In fact, when I search for that post title in Google, I see ActiveRain as the top result not her AR Outside Blog. To make matters worse, the direct link to the article on Missy’s Outside Blog doesn’t even appear in Google!

Like I said at the beginning of this post, I have not extensively dug through all of AR’s post about Outside blogs. And perhaps I am just totally off base. But to me, it doesn’t look like AR’s Outside Blog has any authority. Combine that with the fact that you don’t have the option of posting only to your "AR Outside blog" and I have to ask - What’s the point of even having AR’s Outside Blog?

To Your Success,
Brad Carroll

**Update** I thought about this a little more and came up with what may be a workaround. You can actually write a post, send the post to your Outside Blog, then go in an immediately edit your post to include a link to your Outside Blog. Something as simple as "This article was originally posted on *Outside Blog Domain*" This may be enough to show Google that your Outside Blog should get the credit.

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Posted by Brad Carroll - Real Estate Web Designer on 07/30/2008 03:24 PM

Comments (55)

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55 Comments on Does Your AcitveRain Outside Blog Have Any Authority in Google?

JUL

2008

Interesting information. I have not been following it that much. But I certainly would like search engine results so thanks for your research.

Thank you Brad, I too have only seen my AR blog on google, never my outside yet, I will be following this with interest...

I have 3 sites on Google Analytics. The performance of my outside blog is the worst of the three. I don't know how to "fix" it.

I'm sure all of this will straighten out in time. Since I'm not much of a poster I don't worry to much but I guess if I decide to do this full time I'll wish I had paid more attention.

Brad,

You are correct, we aren't using that link structure yet. It will be implemented shortly once the plumbing for Localism is all straightened out and the ability to post only to your outside blog is there.

Matt's first goal after next week will be to allow the posting to outside blogs independant of posting to AR. The programmer responsible for OB has one little (actually very huge) thing he is finishing up then will fix that link work around.......

Thanks for the assesment and keeping our feet to the fire........sometimes even we need it :-)

Brad, My AR outside blog sellingpoincianproperties.com is actually showing up very well on Google. I wrote a post last week titled "foreclosures, swimming pools and thieves". If you were to google that phrase my outside blog is in the #1 position and my AR blog is in the 11th spot. In fact if you just use "foreclosures and swimming pools" my outside blog is #12. That's a pretty good result for a long tail search.

So the AR outside blogs are without a doubt being found by Google.

Brad,

The outside blog is not performing as well yet. But there are other things I would like to see fixed - primarily the RSS feeds.

I would like to use the outside blog as my website blog.

Richard

Bob: Thanks for the prompt response. That's great news about being able to push post only to Outside Blogs! And thanks for continuing to make AR even better. I know you guys have your hands full with Localism!

Bryant: That's great news about your Outside Blog. Glad to see it's working out so well. My guess is that Google is seeing your outside blog as the authority site (perhaps because your linking to it?) Let me know. I would love to dig in a little more as to why your Outside Blog seems to be "working" while so many others are taking a backseat to AR. Are you promoting (or linking) it in any way?

Brad. I have found the outside blog to very powerful. Google doesn't crawl it as often as the AR or my own sites, last crawl was on the 20th. But, they do well in Google SERP.

I have targeted certain markets and selected only posts in those categories.

I want more.

Brad, I do have a link to my outside blog on my AR sidebar and I also link to it from my main blog brokerbryant.com. Other than that I'm not sure what I do.

Brad, If I Google "Poinciana Foreclosures for sale"

1. brokerbryant.com
2. my ActiveRain blog
8. my AR outside blog
9. my Localism blog

Oh my, I read this but I am not sure I understand all of it. I am learning more and more about the power of the blog.

Brad, you rock...Thank you for posting this information, I will be making sure that my outside blog is getting the results that it deserves...Jason

Brad, as always, you provide great information. By the time I get "to" my AR outside blog, all of the kinks will be worked out:-)

This is all very confusing to me. Brad, you sound like you know what you are talking about so thanks for the info.

THanks for this, Brad, I was wondering. And thanks to Bob for the follow-up regarding the missing link. Too bad it was not implemented to start with but it sounds like the fix is coming. I was curious about not being able to just post to the Outside Blog since that was, as I recall, one of the options we were told about.

In the meantime it sounds like your suggestion, Brad, is the way to go. Or is it better to simply not put anything else on the Outside blog until things are sorted out?

Jeff

Brad, I got this on my Google Alert. First let me say so nice to meet you and your dad at Inman.

I think once we see the ablility to post there separately we will get more SERP, at least I hope so. I am posting many posts first on AnnArborRealEstateTalk the site you designed for me, waiting for it to get indexed by a Google Alert and then posting it here on ActiveRain. I need to see which is showing up first.

You said: You can actually write a post, send the post to your Outside Blog, then go in an immediately edit your post to include a link to your Outside Blog. Something as simple as "This article was originally posted on *Outside Blog Domain*" This may be enough to show Google that your Outside Blog should get the credit.

Sounds like a good plan.

I believe that agents and brokers in Maryland and Virginia should not bother with the Outside Blog, except, of course, for me.

LOL Lenn, same for me in Ann Arbor and localism. Just forget IT.

Lenn and Missy -- you guys are a hoot. I have to admit I was one of the Beta testers for the OBs but I'm am the stereotypical non-techy, non-graphical blogger/Realtor. I'm also almost ashamed to admit that I'm not too up on the whole Localism thing and how that is different from posting to AR. I ahve two other OBs not connected to AR through TypePad but neither one of them gets much Google juice.

I'm waiting for a settlement at the end of August. If all goes well I'll be a knock-knock-knockin' ant Danko.

Lenn: That's a great strategy to keep the theme of your outside blog on target.

Bryant: I think the link to your outside blog on your sidebar is key. This helps tell Google that the Outside blog is the authority.

Jeff: I don't see any harm in continuing to push info to your outside blog.

Hi Missy: It was great to meet you as well. I figured you would be here once you got the Google Alert. I hope you don't mind being used as an example (and all the backlinks!)

Lenn: You are too funny!

This has confused me more than I already am. Young minds work faster than us "seasoned" ones.

Since I made a webpage, active rain and I are not in sync. Going to try and find an answer to this mess. keep us posted.

Brad, Thank you for pointing this out. At very least, we have an update from AR. I personally have not had time to focus on the outside blog. AJ

OH man. Brad's starting a whole heap of trouble.

JUL

2008

THANKS FOR THE TIP. Always appreciated.

Do you know how much impact (If any) it has when you frame a child window into your main website to include your "outide Blog" info?

Katrina

Hi Brad, great information. I have a Tomato blog so don't have an AR outside blog, but imagine it's all the same more or less. Working to get a site full of good, fresh content.

Brad - Super job staying on top of the SEO side of AR with their outside blogs. I know Bob and the rest of the AR gang appreciate it. I love how you take what many (Kev) might view as a negative and turn it into a positive so the Active Rain members can secure the most SEO value out of their free tools provided by AR.

On a different topic, I'm surprised no one has mentioned your new "widgets" at the bottom of your post. Plus, some how these cool new widgets have "magically" appeared on all of your old post too. When are you going to "share the wealth" with the rest of us and offer these widgets to the AR masses?

Tahnks for sharing your insghts. Have to re-examine the outside blog.

Brad like some of the others I have seen my outside blog get indexed by google. It is being picked up many times by a long tail phrase or even as a tag on from the AR site.

Brad, can I use those buttons like you and Kevin since I'm your client?

OOPS! The cats out of the bag now! Wait a minute Missy. I'm at the front of the widget line!

AUG

2008

Wow OK Brad, now I am calling a time out. I yet have to master the AR blog, please advise the point of starting another "out side blog"

There's always more to learn! Yikes! :)

Thank you for hellping me clarify several questions about outside blogs, I read all of the posts by the AR builders but sometimes some of the info vlicks when related laymen!

AUG

2008

So if I understand correctly, I will be punished for posting to AR and then it's duplicated to the Outside Blog?

I have not paid much attention to outside blogs and have not yet done anything with it.

AUG

2008

Well just when I think I'm understanding this, a wrench it thrown into the mix. Googled one of my recent posts and sure enough, no sign of the OS blog. I'll try your updated tip and see what happens on my next post. Thanks for the heads up.

I never thought of this -- will have to look at and see how my outside blog ranks and take steps to utilize my content better

When this is all figured out, (and fixed) I hope someone will post the instructions in newbie language! Thanks for the information, I think.

AUG

2008

Rich: No. You will not be punished. It's only that your outside blog will not give you more credit.

great blog, a little extra exposure will never hurt.

Brad, I did what yous said on adding the ending sentence for Google, on my last 3 posts giving that outside AR blog the authority. But,the Google Alerts came through from activerain.com/blogs/missycaulk.

Any clues, I put the link to my outside post on the bottom of each post.

AUG

2008

I need to use my sidebar more - thanks for the info in the post and the comments!

Thanks this is useful as we are just now exploring "outside blogs"

AUG

2008

I'm glad you posted this. My OB sucks for google juice. I'm waiting til it's a smooth running machine before I pimp it out.

AUG

2008

Wow! This was a great resource of information for my outside blog. I have much "editing" to do...thanks for the tip!

SEP

2008

I have learned to check in with you, I actually subscribe to your blog because of the great content, when I need great info about blogs. Thanks for sharing your knowledge with the rest of us!!!!!!!!!

It is amazing how quickly my activerain blogs have moved up on Google rankings. They haven't made a difference yet, but I know soon enough they will.

How long does it take for page ranking to go up? I have seen it can take months but I didnt know how it worked. I just wonder how fast its working. I do see the results its crazy.