Blogs, RSS and Duplicate Content

[FreeAgent]

I have a small network of media website. On my core site I want to set up a blog for news and press. Each blog category and subcategories will be for a specific website in the network.

For Example:

Website 1

News
Press

Website 2

News
Press

Website 3

News
Press


Each of the website in the network will than have a news section in witch the news and press will be pulled via RSS from the core website blog. The main reason I want to do this is because I don’t want to add a blog to each of the sites.

Now for my question…

Being that the news and press will be on two websites (the core site and the network site) will I get hit with duplicate content penalties?

[FreeAgent]

Ok, 73 views and not a single reply.

I know there is no simple answer to this question. From what I have been reading Google (for example) will not penalize you for duplicate content. Google will just choose witch page to rank over the other.

Now, if I were Googlebot I would choose to rank the main source. This however does not help for what I am trying to accomplish. I want my network site with the RSS feed to get the rank because the news and press will be more relevant to the network site.

I guess a simple solution would be to ban all bots from spidering the blog section on my core site, and then manipulate the RSS feed on the network site so it does not link back to the blog on the core site.

What do you guys think... Good idea or Bad idea?

[FreeAgent]

On second thought... I would not want to block bots from spidering the entire blog section. I still want them to rank news and press about the core site, so maybe I should only block off all the network site categories.

Doing it this way brings another question to mind. Do you think the SE algo's will think something is fishy with my blog when the majority of the categories are blocked off?

I know all of this may sound crazy, but if owned a major SE like Google or Yahoo my algo would be checking odd things like that.

[FreeAgent]

I'm still looking for some input on this matter... :confused:

[toprank]

Hey FreeAgent, I'll take a stab.

You're not really doing anything fishy are you? You're just using one blog as a CMS for the news that is relevant and unique to the network sites. I suspect there are quite a few online publications that do something like this, especially those that syndicate their own content across a network of sites.

If I read your posts correctly, it sounds like your intent is geard towards efficiency (or laziness :) ), not overt manipulation for search results. I think your intent is the most important thing to consider.

[FreeAgent]

Thanks for your reply Toprank.

No, I'm not doing anything fishy. Efficiency/Laziness is the only reason I want to do this with my network. I have had many blog sites in the past and going from site to site adding new content is a pain.

[FreeAgent]

Ok this is what I did...

On my core site I blocked all bots from spidering network site categories, and than I setup an RSS feed on each individual category.

On my network sites I made a script that stores the feed data into a database. I then output the data on the network site making it look like it has it's own blog.

Now here is the sexy part. :)

This new output data is also put into an new RSS feed on the network site, and it also pings various blog and RSS engines just like a real blog.

I should package this and sell it. :cool:

[toprank]

Hey FreeAgent. That sounds pretty slick. Be sure to post back on how it pans out.

[mocgiit]

I dont know if I am misunderstanding the post here, but a blog should not have the exact same content as the site. It is good to put a intro on the blog then link that to the main site. The cotent should not be the exact same though.

[mocgiit]

I dont know if I am misunderstanding the post here, but a blog should not have the exact same content as the site. It is good to put a intro on the blog then link that to the main site. The cotent should not be the exact same though.

[halcyon999]

"On my core site I blocked all bots from spidering network site categories"

I've not a lot of idea on how you do the rest of the stuff you are trying to accomplish - but I think the above 'bot-blocking' is good - just watched a Matt Cutts video (just search Google Video - he was relating how to stop 'cloaking' or redirect penalties for someone doing 'split A/B testing' and recommended stopping bots with a nofollow or with an .htaccess file). Different situation but with a similar problem I think. So that may well keep you safe from penalties.

Darren.