Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
Publishing testimonials on your site that are from your Google + (or other review sites page)
-
Ive got a site with some good Google + Reviews and some other good reviews on other sites that id like to be able to publish on a testimonials page on our website, but im worried about being penalised for duplicate content. Any idea of the best way to get these reviews on to our website, i was thinking about placing the text in as an image, but id prefer to do something semantic if at all possible.
(I know that some review sites have javascript widgets you can use to pull in your reviews but for most of the sites we are reviewed on they dont)
-
Hi Sam!
It might be helpful to start with a little clarification here - in Local SEO, the term 'testimonials' tends to indicate direct-to-business owner content while the term 'reviews' typically indicates content that exists on a third party platform. In researching this topic, it would likely be better to search for 'reviews' rather than 'testimonials' as you are talking about third party reviews.
Mike Blumenthal wrote a great little post about this earlier this year:
http://blumenthals.com/blog/2014/04/24/using-google-reviews-on-your-website/
Hope it helps!
-
I would agree with everyone here that duplicate content isn't really an issue here. And it's really not the concern it once was. I personally would take a screen shot though, just to show where the original is for your audience. I also heard somewhere that you can't republish Yelp testimonials elsewhere, or maybe it was Google+, and have them still featured on the original source. So you may want to double check the rules around testimonials for those two sites.
-
If you're really worried about content duplication, I would do as you suggest, placing them as an image. Personally, I wouldn't lose sleep at night if I copied and pasted some reviews from my G+ Local.
(Former?) Google employee, Matt Cutts once posted a video claiming that duplicate content won't hurt you unless it's spammy. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vi-wkEeOKxM&feature=youtu.be
If you're still on the fence, what I would also suggest is to try asking the same question at Google's Webmaster Central Help Forum. I think you'd get a fairly definitive answer possibly from a Google employee like John Mueller.
-
Differently from (as an example) facebook, google + API doesn't provide a mean of extracting customer reviews. So programmatically you can't, given you rule out scraping them.
Manually you can do whatever you want.
As for content duplication, is a risk, but there's no such thing as content duplication penalization, when facing duplicate content google just make a choice, indexing one or another.
And to have google consider your content duplicate, you really need to copy everything, and have you page share the vast majority of the html with another page.
-
Having a testimonials page on your website is a great idea. It shows the clients going to your website that you are a good provider. I would think you could just place "Review from Google+" or "Review from Yelp" at the bottom of a comment.
Here is our testimonial page: http://www.essentialpest.com/testimonials/
We don't place reviews from other websites. The testimonials we have posted came from emails, letters, etc. - However, I would think that if you linked the word "Google+" from "Review from Google+" with a link to that review, it would just be proof that review does exist.
This may be useful to you. http://moz.com/blog/getting-reviews-the-right-way-for-local-businesses
Good luck!
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
-
Any Success Getting Fake 5 Star Google My Business Reviews Removed From Competitors?
Hi, I am working on a competitor who is obviously building up fake reviews using a 3rd party service. I need to build more evidence. A majority of his reviews on Google My Business, they are done by reviewers with very few reviews (no profile pic), and that seem to review 3-4 companies in the Chicagoland area the exact same day. This happens again and again. It started about 1.5 years ago. Before that everything looks normal. Any idea how much proof I need to actually get those reviews and/or his company removed? I am working on getting access to a private group on Facebook where he talks about it. Thanks in advance!
Reviews and Ratings | Feb 20, 2020, 4:02 PM | vetofunk1 -
3rd Party Approved Reviews - Widget or API Feed - Any thoughts ?
Hi Mozzers, We use a google approved 3rd party review company to collect reviews for our branches and now also for our products( this is about to be implemented). We currently use one of their widgets on our site (its javascript) to show the reviews. I don't think google can read this and I don't think we currently, therefore, get any direct seo benefit from it. My questions are as follows : I obviously want to get any SEO benefit from any review text which customers leave but as the data itself is housed on the review site with a widget on my site pointing to it,should I use an API feed as opposed to a widget. If google can read the review text on my page - then surely i should some benefit from it even though, it could technically be classed as duplicate content what are peoples thoughts ? . thanks Pete
Reviews and Ratings | Nov 28, 2017, 9:18 AM | PeterCol120 -
How many Google reviews can I collect at once?
I work for a University with 10,000+ students and alumni that could submit reviews. But how many reviews should I be collecting at one time? I don't want to overload the reviews and put up a red flag in Google...any insight on how much is too much?
Reviews and Ratings | Apr 19, 2017, 5:28 PM | GabeGibitz0 -
If I use schema markup for my google reviews, would it be smart to have Google review's on my home page?
Hello, Moz's I'm thinking about added scheme markup to show my google reviews. I have a 4.8 rating and 25 reviews. I'm thinking about added scheme markup to show my google reviews. I have a 4.8 rating and 25 reviews. My first question is: when people see that and then visit my site, would it be good to have the Google reviews on the home page? My second questions is: Is there any reason why I wouldn't want to add this to my site? None of my competition has done this, so I'm a little apprehensive? Thanks in advance 🙂
Reviews and Ratings | May 29, 2017, 11:07 PM | MissThumann0 -
Moving my photography business to another state. Is it possible to transfer Google My Business listing WITHOUT losing my Google Reviews?
A friend of mine is transitioning her photography business to another state. She moved about 5 years ago and consequently lost all of her Google+/Yelp reviews. Having reviews as a photographer is EXTREMELY important for her business reputation. She doesn't want this to happen again. Is it possible to change the location of a Google my Business page and keep the existing reviews? Thanks
Reviews and Ratings | May 8, 2015, 9:45 PM | RosemaryB0 -
How can I avoid duplicate content when building a review widget?
My website has a profile page for each of the home improvement contractors who signs up. They accumulate reviews on those pages. I want to build a review widget to display our reviews on our contractors' websites. How can I avoid duplicate content issues for the reviews? Example of a profile page with a few reviews: http://www.thehomefixers.com/members/425/waterheaters-plus-llc.php
Reviews and Ratings | Dec 9, 2014, 5:08 PM | menachemp0 -
Do schema review numbers have to be manually updated?
Hi! I've had success with review schema rendering in SERPs but have had to manually code the numbers and update those numbers as more reviews come in (which is a bit time-consuming). Is there a way to use auto-generated numbers that will still render schema or do those numbers have to be manually added? I've looked at the schema for sites like IMDB, and their schema numbers seem to be manually added, which seems like a huge lift. Advice/input is appreciated!
Reviews and Ratings | Sep 24, 2014, 1:06 PM | 199580 -
Too many reviews too quickly?
Is there any sort of guideline on this? Right now, we have very few google reviews. However, I've cross referenced a list of our happiest clients with people who have g+ accounts. There are at least 12 clients, I feel strongly would write us g+ reviews if I asked them to. I want to just get the word out today, but I'm worried if 8-12 reviews in a week would red flag us. I've heard that getting too many reviews to quickly can be a problem, but I'm thinking that more like 100 than 10, but I have no idea. Most of my competitors don't have any reviews, and the most any of them have is 10. I don't know if that matters at all either in terms of triggering a red flag. I'd appreciate whatever insight you all could give. Thanks, Ruben
Reviews and Ratings | Aug 22, 2016, 5:38 PM | KempRugeLawGroup0