Mat Release SEO Impact
-
How do Mat Releases affect SEO?
Does google recognize that your are syndicating duplicate content even if the content is being syndicated across top media outlets?
Do these back links still carry any authority or can we even be penalized for the duplicate content?
I came across mat releases here:
An example of article syndication outlets:
Guaranteed Placement on 800+ Media Sites. Generate guaranteed article placement on more than 800 respected online media outlets. Our digital distribution network includes: The LA Times; The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel (JS Online); Las Vegas Review Journal; Hearst media sites for the San Francisco Chronicle, Houston Chronicle and Connecticut Post and others; local TV news affiliate sites from ABC, CBS, FOX and others; and hundreds more trusted sites.
-
I think it depends a lot on quality, honestly - a "mat release" could just be glorified article marketing, if the sources are questionable. It's easy for someone to make big promises, but odds are you won't be on the LA Times, you'll be on the "hundreds more trusted sites", especially if the price-tag is too good to be true.
I disagree re: first-indexed always winning. Authority can overwhelm that, in some cases, and a major news outlet could get credit for your content. Google is still not great at this. Now, if it's linked back, as you said, that definitely helps a lot.
So, let's say you post something and it goes out to 800 sites. Typically, some of those sites will be flagged as duplicates and filtered out. Yours may not be, but if enough of them are, those links will lose value, too (a non-indexed page doesn't carry link equity). So, even if you get credit, the links could be of limited value.
Now, if you actually could get on 800 top media sites, that may be different, but if it's really syndicated it's not going to get top billing. So, it's not just a matter of the sites, but where on the sites you appear. Are you on CNN's home-page or buried on some citizen reporter opinion mini-blog?
I just tend to hear a lot of too-good-to-be-true in this, honestly.
-
A mat release is still going to get indexed and counted for. The first page it gets indexed on gets all the credit. Anything after that is duplicate if it does not trackback to the first piece of content.
Unless I am mistaken, I don't think the search engines are able to differentiate this type of content.
-
My understanding of a Mat Release is that it is an article (about our company) that we write and distribute to editors to release when they need a story to fill in the gaps. The story would include a link to our site, so there is no "original version". If this story is published by 100's of different media outlets, do we get the benefit of those 100s of back links? Or because they are all publishing the same story, do these back links not really count?
-
As long as the syndicated articles are tracking back (linking back) to the original version it will not count a duplicate.
The first page to get indexed will not suffer from syndication regardless of track backs. Only the site that syndicates needs to track back or it wil look like duplicate text.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Media Kit for SEO?
I am working with a company that gets a significant amount of press, but often we do not get links from these articles or the articles do not have the best anchor text. Any suggestion, tools, or articles that help optimize this exposure to for seo benefits?
Link Building | | jkosarek0 -
Is it SEO OK if i cloak internal links and put them in sidebar ?
Hi, I just want to know if i cloak internal link/url and put them in sidebar? Basically i am looking out to cloak below url which contains parameter http://example.com/?tag=tag1+tag2 TO http://example.com/someword/sometagtag Is it SEO acceptable ? Thanks, Raj
Link Building | | RajeshB0 -
Value of IMG links for SEO
Hello, I'm looking for some new ways to build links (IE, letitimate not spam), and I know sites featuring a site that I created would be an interesting way to do so. My question is this, the StudioPress Showcase pages http://www.studiopress.com/showcase/baltimore-print-studios link back to your site with an image, with some "Almost URL Alt text". How valuable would this link be, given that the DA is 97 and the PA is in the upper 40s Thanks Zach
Link Building | | Zachary_Russell0 -
Warrior Forum, Is it good for seo?
The Warrior Forum just changed there membership from free to paid. They have do follow attributes but I was wondering what peoples take is on joining them for both learning and seo purposes?
Link Building | | bronxpad0 -
Links built by previous SEO company are mostly 'dead' - will this affect me?
Hi, This is my first post/question in the forum - so apologies if this topic has already been covered - or if the question seems daft! Here's the issue: I have started working on two websites, and have been doing a lot of on-site work, increasing valuable content, etc... I'm now slowly moving onto more off-site stuff and have noticed that a lot of the backlinks to both websites (built by SEO companies before I got here) are 'dead' and simply return 404 errors (yet they still show up in site explorer). I'll be honest, the links aren't great; the SEO companies have taken the word 'relevant' and completely re-defined it in their books! Will these links - from sites that aren't relevant... but are dead - have any impact on my SEO efforts from now on? Or should I treat these sites as a kind of 'clean slate' and work on building the brand naturally through social media and user experience, etc? Also - I'm re-structuring the internal pages of the site... would it be worth re-directing the old URLs (with all the dead in-bound links - that may have suffered a -50 penalty) to the new ones, or just start fresh with the new pages? Any advice, tips or stories to share (relevant ones, of course!) will be greatly appreciated! Thanks, Nick
Link Building | | Danapollo1 -
What impact do no follow links in blog comments have if any?
Hi I think we all agree that social network sites such as pintrest/instagram/twitter are all now no follow however I believe there is benefit in having them.... So I wondered if anyone had been experimenting with commenting on blogs which had no follow attributes and if there was any benefit in terms of improving your rankings?
Link Building | | RankStealer0 -
Good SEO Companies
Can you recommend any reputable SEO companies for someone with a smaller budget? Mainly just looking for link building.
Link Building | | bigboy7250