Distributing articles for SEO purposes

I'm looking to distribute some articles across article sites to boost rankings. My understanding is that it generates inbound links from pages with high relevance to my keywords within the article. A couple of things aren't clear

1) Do I need to make sure the article is changed for every posting to avoid it being a duplicate, or does this not matter as it still provides the inbound link?? I thought the benefit was that others can then further distribute...but this wouldn't work if it was null and void due to being a duplicate? Obviously having to change the content so as not to be a duplicate would be very limiting to the number of sites you can hit?

2) A lot of the article sites I've found have good page rank, but it looks like the pages the articles are on, are not getting cached...presumably, these are a waste of time, even though the sites have good page rank?

Do one thing.

Make a detailed article and post in on your site.

And then create an article which should highlight some interesting and informative points from the parent article.

Point a link to your main article from the second article with an anchor like "Click here to read on.." etc You may also include a link to your homepage on it.

Submit the later to article directories, this way you can:

• Prevent duplicate content issues

• Get the article re-published as it will be short and interesting

• Acquire large amount of backlinks, not only to the parent article on your site but also to your homepage

• Drive in visitors to your main site from article directories or other places where the article has been re-published (remember that "Click to read more" link ??)

Good Luck !

Do you "need to" - NO, BUT "should you" YES.

Anything "worth while" is more valuable if there is but a single version on the web... carbon-copies not only depreciate the value of each new copy but also depreciate the value of the original...

Dup content isn't really a concern unless the 'copies' point to the original or each other... but again the best value is found in a single version.



In general I would avoid "all currently populated, general interest article venues"... it is a great waste of time using them since Google adopted supplemental results... "IF" you post an article at an article venue and the page goes supplemental the link to you is worthless...

Since your article will not be on the mainpage (for long if at all) and not a second tier category page, and doesn't get much of a chance to acquire links from pages that are included in primary results - the chance of your article page going supplemental is like 99.99% -- meaning you have labored in vein.

You are best to seek out themed industry, niche resources whether traditional article inclusion resources or non-traditional source (yet informational sources -- one example: blogs) PLUS post in your own domain and start a social bookmark strategy.

While the old "article writing/post for link" still works; you are more likely to get "no links of any value" than getting "a link that will help".

From The Official Google Webmaster Central Blog on dealing with duplicate content

# Syndicate carefully: If you syndicate your content on other sites, make sure they include a link back to the original article on each syndicated article. Even with that, note that we'll always show the (unblocked) version we think is most appropriate for users in each given search, which may or may not be the version you'd prefer.

Fact is Google just want to tag the 'original' article for duplicate content issues..... So far what's worked is changing the article to each ezine (probably about 20-30 left that are any good). In the least change the title.

Supplemental results are generally a problem with ezines but what's happening is there's a handful of article directories that command a lot of links from other syndication sites that appear to be holding article out of the supps. BTW, there is rumblings supplementals will be removed completely and everything will be in the index, that means only a duplicate content issue to deal with.

Thanks djstreet - so its not so much the blogs etc. they get forwarded to that create the duplicate, but the listing on the Ezine iteself? Is it just better to distribute through one ezine if that's the case.



Would be lovely - mind revealing your source? I've not seen that bit of info anywhere yet.

Thanks for the comments here everyone, really useful.
Johnyb

Ezines generally will fight over the same article hence the need to change the article and the title to attempt to reap greater benefits.



Matt Cutts has noted his displeasure for it. You'll have to search the blogs for it, nothing secret.

On top of what has already been said there are some good responses here...
http://forums.seochat.com/google-optimization-7/unique-content-articles-etc-146318.html