March 23, 2015

Is Reposting Blog Content On LinkedIn Pulse, Medium, and Other Sites a Good Idea?

Is Reposting Blog Content a Good Idea

I’ve been questioning recently whether publishing to sites like LinkedIn Pulse and Medium is worth my time and effort.

While the benefit seems obvious (more eyeballs on your content) there’s a big cost—the precious time it takes to create content.

Compared to guest posting on other sites, LinkedIn and Medium use “no follow” links so there’s no link building SEO benefit. The benefit is purely exposure, awareness, and branding. And those are fleeting benefits, unlike the long-term benefits of creating content on your own site.

So what about reposting blog content? It would certainly be more time efficient, but are there drawbacks to that?

When I saw this post on Quicksprout confirming that you shouldn’t repost your content, I shelved the idea. My time would be better spent on guest posting where I could also increase exposure and get links back to my site.

But then I saw Andy Crestodina (one of my favorite bloggers) post the same article I had already read on his blog.

I never walk away from reading his posts without learning something new. So I had to get his take. I was confident he’d have the answers to my burning questions. And he did.

Below is an interview I did with Andy to pick his brain on the pros and cons of reposting blog content.

Chime in to the comments if you have any of your own questions.

Q: What are the benefits of reposting your blog content (verbatim) on sites like LinkedIn, Medium, Forbes, Entrepreneur, Inc, etc?

Andy:

Reach. The idea behind copying and pasting an article into another location is simply to make it more visible to a broader audience. It’s a brand builder and it works. But there are a lot of things that it doesn’t do…

  • Drive traffic to your site (well, it might send a few referral visits if you have internal links
  • Help with your search engine rankings (Google knows that this is the same article you already posted)

So if your goal is branding, but not traffic, the benefits are real.

Q: Ok, we can’t expect it to help our organic traffic, but can it hurt it? In other words, is it bad for SEO to repost an exact replica of your blog content elsewhere?

Andy:

It’s duplicate content, but I actually don’t think it will hurt your search rankings. It’s only a problem if the two versions go live at almost the same time. You want to have the original version on your site to be live for a few days or a week before posting it someplace else. This let’s Google know where the original is and avoids confusion.

Although “duplicate content” is a fairly new buzzword, it’s something that Google has been dealing with since the beginning. Trust me. They don’t get confused easily and I have seen VERY few examples of actual penalties. It’s not that easy to raise flags at Google.

Still, it’s a bit lazy to just hit ctrl+c and ctrl+v. It’s far better to add value and give the article a rewrite. One great way to do this is to write the “evil twin” of the original article. This was one of the tips in our recent What to Blog About article. Here’s how it works.

If the original post on your site was a how to post listing best practices, you can easily write it from the other perspective, explaining what not to do, or worst practices. Although the research and recommendations are almost the same, it will feel original.

Suppose you’re a dog trainer, writing a post about puppies. Here’s an example of a how-to original post, and an “evil twin” that could be posted elsewhere. Same article, different angle.

Evil twin posts help you avoid duplicate content when reposting blog content

The more effort you put in, the more ethical and effective it is.

Q: What if your article on LinkedIn, Forbes, or wherever starts getting a bunch of inbound links and social media buzz. Wouldn’t that be selling yourself short if the larger publication you republished on starts getting all the link juice and social shares instead of your original post?

Andy:

Yes, it would.

It would be a sad thing if the copied version got all the links and shares. But if this happens, don’t feel too bad about it. You already tried posting it on your site and it didn’t win those links, so you really didn’t lose anything. And hopefully, some of the sharing led to a social media benefit for you. Remember, this is more about branding and awareness than measurable Analytics.

If you want to get value from the social media buzz, put the URL into Topsy, see which influential people shared it and go thank them. Since they liked your article, they’re likely to be gracious and follow you back.

Q: Do you think it’s a good idea to republish all of your blog posts, or just a select few? When should you not republish your blog posts on other sites?

Andy:

It doesn’t hurt to republish them all, as long as everything is published in a place where the topic matches the audience. For example, articles with broad-based business advice are good for LinkedIn. Articles with narrow niche topics may do well on Medium.

Don’t just push everything out everywhere. Make it fit. As always, web marketing is a test of empathy.

Q: How do you go about getting your content republished on publications like Forbes, Inc, and Entrepreneur? I believe LinkedIn and Medium are self-service type of platforms? For the larger publications, what’s the best way to get your foot in the door?

Andy:

There is a two word answer to this question: influencer marketing. There are specific people who have control over the content on these websites. They will post your content (new or old) when they decide they like it and they trust you. So the trick is to impress them with your work and your character.

There are a hundred little steps that lead to these outcomes. First, you’ll need to have a nice body of work on your own site so that once you do get their attention, they’ll take a look at your content and be impressed. Now, we just need to get them to notice us.

Here are a hundred steps that you can take on the path toward getting the attention of a blog editor using social media. It really helps if you’ve taken the time to build up a credible following of your own. Each of these makes you slightly more visible. Some of these make them a bit grateful. They are all about networking and relationship building.

ProTip: This influencer marketing tactic works just as well for journalists, podcasters, event directors and any other influencer who makes content and has an audience they can share with you.

  1. Follow the editor on Twitter
  2. Retweet the editor
  3. Subscribe to their content
  4. Mention them in a Tweet
  5. Follow them on Quora, Instagram or other social network
  6. Comment on their content
  7. Like their comments (Google+, LiveFyre, Disqus)
  8. Add them to a Google+ Circle
  9. Friend on Facebook
  10. Like their content on Facebook
  11. Connect with them on LinkedIn
  12. Mention them in your content
  13. Email them, inviting them to a quick video chat
  14. Invite them to participate in an email interview for your website (this tactic is highly effective!)
  15. Call them on the phone, Skype or Google+ Hangout
  16. Meet in person if possible!

Once you’ve built a real connection, it’s time to pitch. Send them a concise, sensitive email that positions your article in a way that aligns with the goals of their readers. Remember, blog editors care most about the interests of their readers. If that’s also your top concern, the pitch should go well…

Kim:

Thanks Andy! The verdict is finally in. I’ll try reposting blog content on LinkedIn, starting with this post :)

Readers…Any more questions out there for Andy?

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About the Author
Kim Cooper

Kim Cooper is Sr. Marketing Manager at Rignite. She helps businesses get better results from their social media activity. She blogs about tips, best practices, and social media success stories.


  • Sue Anne Dunlevie

    Great info from Andy! I’m using Scoop.It to curate some content from my site. And Flipboard occasionally. I get traffic from both. What does Andy think about content curation (portion of the original content only)?

    Sue

    • Kim

      Good to see you here Sue! I pinged Andy to chime in…hopefully he’ll have a few free minutes later today. I’m curious to hear his thoughts too.

      • Sue Anne Dunlevie

        Thanks, Kim and Andy,

        I really appreciate the info, Andy! I also like doing roundups and email interviews and I’ve broken into podcasting.

        I appreciate your take on excerpts.

        Thanks for your time!
        Sue

    • Andy Crestodina

      Hi there, Sue! I’m a big fan of curation in all it’s forms. I like to do roundups and email interviews (that’s actually how this post came to be) and getting the voice of others’ on your blog should be a goal for every marketer.

      But I think your question was more about excerpts. I don’t see any problem with these, but I don’t see as much value in them. Ideally, they should link off the site, sending the visitor away to the full text …which isn’t great for the website owner.

      I think it’s probably better to write a full response, make it longer, more detailed and add as much value to it as you can! The visitor is more likely to stay. And where there’s traffic, there’s hope! :)

  • Jim Woods

    This is great article. However, I am inundated with similar articles keen on driving traffic with little attention on how this traffic drives sells. For example the article notes placing a url in Topsy to see what influentials have reposted. How does that behavior increase sells? Then the article asserts I can thank them for reposting. None of this behavior makes the person distinct enough to stand from the noise. Who cares if an influential person likes what you are doing? Does this produce you a sell or is it merely another long term marketing strategy with no credible research that drives sales? Marketing does not produce sales. With all due respect, the people who make the most money in social media appears to be the people and firms selling how to make money in social media.

    • Kim

      Hi Jim. If you’re looking for quick sales wins, this isn’t the right tactic for you. The intended goal for reposting your content on popular sites it to increase your reach. In other words, it’s impact is mostly top of funnel. Sounds like your focus is on bottom of the funnel (immediate sales).

  • http://jackhadley.com/ Jack Hadley

    Thanks Kim and Andy. The subjects your treat consistently provide both relevant and timely answers to important questions in this space. Like you, Kim, “I never walk away from reading (your) posts without learning something new.”

    • Kim

      Thanks so much Jack! That’s really nice to hear :)

  • http://www.windycityparrot.com WindyCityParrot

    with all due respect to Andy – it doesn’t matter what he says to do with the content, it’s what we test for. I see vastly different results accros social media I would advocate reading Google’s “duplicate content” patent so we can all get past the question “will I get penalized/” the short answer is no – google is smart enough to know that your content can exist in an unlimited amount of sites, It just doesn;t want to waste the bandwidth or storage so it will only index what it feels is the best representation of the piece

    I write 2 – 1000 – 3000 word blog posts a week to – how would spending anther 20 – 30 hours a week rewriting each piece help? the audience is the same just in a different place?

    • Kim

      Great point. There’s no silver bullet that works for everyone. You can only truly know if you’ll get benefit from it when you’ve tried, tested, and analyzed the results.

    • Andy Crestodina

      Hello, WindyCityParrot.

      I agree. If the post is simply rewritten for the same audience, there’s no additional value. If you’re truly empathetic to your audience, you wouldn’t give them more of the same. So I like your comment. It’s not about Google at that level. It’s all about the reader….

      “Windy City?” Any chance you’re in Chicago? I am. Snowy day here, eh?

      • http://www.windycityparrot.com WindyCityParrot

        just saw this – I figured eventually I would run into you at some networking event – were at 906 N. Western – sadly I am opening up a new digital marketing agency as well specializing in the holistic building & redesign of e-commerce sites on Zen cart and magento – providing social media marketing services & SEO too

  • http://it-sales-leads.com/ Barbara McKinney

    Hi Kim, Thanks for the info. I agree with what Andy has just said. Well, I’m also reposting my blog contents on other sites. There is nothing wrong about it. Make sure you are not reposting on the same site again. We also revise our blog content to have something new. Reposting blog content cannot drive traffic to our sites, but if our goal is branding, it is very useful.

  • http://www.webxity.com Zeeshan Raza

    Nice article. It at least helped me in making the decision. I had the idea of republishing content shelved for a long time. I was wondering however, what if I post a shorter version (summary) of my post on Linkedin and direct the users to my main post (Read full article here). Would that be a good idea?

  • http://www.supremeoptimization.com Leigh Wasson

    Man Andy is the man.

  • http://thehappinessbucket.com DanaMorales/TheHappinessBucket

    Your article answered a lot of my questions. Thank you very much for sharing.

  • Shiznogood

    Great pieces of advice, this really helped me with “the duplicate content” conundrum!

  • http://puptrait.com J.B. Shepard

    This is possibly the first post I’ve ever read where the author understood how to Linkedin properly. That website is stupidly powerful if approached properly, simply for making the inaccessible accessible. Hell of an interview there!