WA blog, Website blog, everywhere a blog blog "cornfusion". Input anyone?

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As a newcomer here who has only a bit of general web experience I've gotten questions like these below (and the best answers I've been able to come up with). Could someone please tell me if I am correct before I make this into a training gone bad in a coupla months?

When someone talks about a BLOG, which blog are they talking about? It could be either. You have to listen to the context or ask specifically if you otherwise can't tell. Even the highest ranking Ambassadors throw out the term without delineation, so if doubt just remind them by asking.

What is the difference between our blogs here at WA and the blog at our website?

Our WA BLOG is intended to serve as a PERSONAL blog, although we tend to use it to blast out our personal experiences and questions with the BUSINESS, since that's what we are essentially all here for.

My personal experience is that "new" people, especially those who haven't experience in public writing and feedback, can get a TON of comfort out of banging out some writing that is well responded to, and the WA blog is perfect for this! New people get only one blog a day for the first 3 months to keep spammers from jumping in and wasting too much of anyone's time.

Our WA blogs are visible to members only however they DO get indexed out on the internet. We are able to start our referral base by writing a particularly good blog that happens to rank, and brings someone to our WA blog page. Then I understand a pop-up offers for them to sign up for free, and because it is connected to our Affiliate Link we get credit for the referral. Sweet!

Also know that your blogs are not private within WA they are also ranked within Google and other search engines. (The exception to this is if you decide to set your blog to be viewable by Premium Only, it seems.)

Your WEBSITE BLOG is intended to be relevant to your site and/or the promotion/growth of your business, of course. Your Website Blog is also indexed on the internet.

So what if you DUPLICATE CONTENT originally written on your WA Blog, and flesh it out to use on your WEBSITE Blog? Hmm. I have read both that you can and can't do this. I have had people tell me both that you can and can't do this based on Google information. For me personally, I don't want to risk Google purposely dropping one particle of my website down in ranking because of my laziness, whether it is their policy now or later, so I've decided to play it safe and rewrite at least 60% of whatever I want to take from my WA Blog to the site: Google seems to allow a 35% "plagiarism" just because anyone speaking the same language about the same subjects are likely to hit upon similar phrasing and patterns anyway. The most current stuff I read basically says not to worry about it, but knowing how things change I don't want to ever have to go back and rewrite every stinkin' page of websites I'm workin' my butt off to build. I want it to stay done with reasonable updates.

Are YOU duplicating content onto your website from your blog?

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Recent Comments

34

After having gone through the above article, I got some idea about the difference between a WA blog and a website blog, but is there any message/confirmation on this from Kyle?

Hi - this post is over 4 years old. However, what is within it is correct. As regards the final question, no, you can't have the same content in your WA post as you have on your actual website. That would be duplicate content and frowned upon by Google.

I am interested in hearing an answer to your questions. I think the answer to why so many blogs is to help us all get better at producing great content which will be of great benefit in the long run.
Marilyn

Hi Marilyn... well I didn't hear back from Kyle but I've noticed people use the WA blog for both personal/social interacting and training on internet marketing... then we use our website blogs for whatever subject matter pertains to the website itself. That's the general gist of things ;) -Alexx

You are probably right. Write, write, write seems to be the theme around here. lol
Mailyn

Hi Alex, Great Blog, you brought up a lot of valid questions and provided lots of knowledge. In my opinionated, opinion. I believe it's Best to ask the Question from the Powers that be if you're not sure of the Good Guys answers. So ask Kyle, you can even PM him and he will sort this out for you. I myself am relatively new just over a month and have been hard at work designing my website, helping others and creating content. I will need to know the answer to this too. Please share it once Kyle tells you the dos and don'ts.This would be of great help to a lot of people that are unaware and a nice way to pay it forward.. Thanks for all your hard work on the Blog, Well Done! Sharon:)

Ok Sharon... I will do!

Thanks SupportWorx, I look forward to helping you with things I do know about, so please do continue to ask me questions. Have a prosperous day:) Sharon

Thanks Sharon! I messaged Tom about that blog, by the way, and am just waiting to hear back. Thanks for the suggestion! -Alexx

You're Welcome, I'm glad Tom will be able to help you as well. ttyl. Sharon:)

You've covered it well, Alex. ~Jude

Hey, Alex
Looks like you got your answers from some of my favorite members.
These are the ones who've helped me get to where I am now.
Still lost and confused but not by their doing, LOL!!

Larry

Hey Larry... oh YES I totally got hooked up by the good guys! Now I'm lost and confused on everything but this! lol -Alexx

Greetings Alexx!

Taking a look at your questions above, here's how I'd weigh in.

- 1st question: Blog determination by context is best. As you say, if you have a question as to intent, ask.

- 2nd question: The WA blog is intended for consumption by the membership. It's forbidden to leave links to your website blog anywhere here on WA, with the exception of a few places. See for more on this.
- I'm not entirely certain about the "one blog a day" rule for freemium members. For some reason, I have it stuck in my head that it applies to all new Premium members. I may have this all wrong though.
- Regarding visibility, everything here is visible to all the search engines, and hence to any surfer on the net. In fact, if anyone sees your content link in a search page and clicks that link, you'll get affiliate credit when they sign up. For more on this, see As you said, Sweet! There is no setting to "limit each blog to Premium viewers only" that I'm aware of though.

- 3rd question: The search engines visit sites to index content. For sites with rapidly changing content (read: WA), they will visit frequently - every few hours. For sites that change slowly (read: your website), they may visit only every few days or even every few weeks. If you put content on your website and then put the same verbiage on WA afterward (or substantially the same verbiage), the search engines may index the WA content first - and attribute yours as duplicate content! I actually made a screen shot where that exact scenario had come to pass - a member's blog entry at WA had rated #1 for their selected keyword, and their own blog wasn't even in the search results. Having said that (and as noted elsewhere), there is no 'penalty' as such for duplicate content. Note that Google HAS said they will simply drop your website's 'duplicate content' from their search results however. No penalty, my aching butt! I want my content to bring traffic to my site, and if it isn't in the SERPs, I'm being penalized. End of story! Moral of story? Put your best work on your website. Don't copy and paste anything here at WA!

There you have it - everything I know. It's not quite in 25 words or less, but it'll have to do!

Dennis

KILLER answer... I'm making changes right now! THANK U THANK U

Oh, and yeah... MY ACHIN' ONE TOO lol

Hi Dennis,
Your comments are always well worth reading so more than 25 words is excellent. :)
You can limit viewing of blogs and/or training you create to only premium members. You can also set them so no one can share them.
I double checked on the blog part, as I wasn't 100% certain and took a screenshot.
http://screencast.com/t/s0pj6VUSZR

Oh ok... so does it still get indexed or not... if it's limited to Premium? THANKS A.

I would advise checking with Kyle to be 100% but in my opinion I would think not, since the only people who can view them are WA premium members when that setting is selected. But I could be completely wrong.

Hi Angela and Alexx -

I'll be dipped in weenie water - who knew I had the power to turn off sharing and mark content as premium only!

I'm testing Google's speed to index new WA content, and whether it indexes blogs marked as "Turn Sharing OFF" and "Set as Premium Only".

Two tests actually...

I just posted a new blog at 9:58PM EDT (US east coast). The blog title is "For Angela and Alexx", and I turned off sharing and I set it for Premium viewing only.

Test 1 - can I log in to WA as an unregistered guest (not even a freemium member) and see the page? I logged in using a different browser in incognito mode, and visited my profile by going to http://my.wealthyaffiliate.com/prestones. As expected, I got a pop-up asking me to sign up. I closed the popup, and opened the blog link "For Angela and Alexx" in the right sidebar in a new tab.

Result? Denied! "We're sorry, you do not have access to this Premium content..."

Test 2 - will Google index the page and show it (or show a cached version of it)? If it does index it, how long does it take? I checked using the search term site:http://my.wealthyaffiliate.com "For Angela and Alexx"

Result? Unbelievably, when I first checked at 10:15PM, it showed up in the search results - in less than 20 minutes!! The search results didn't offer any clue as to the content, however. See the attached "Result 1" and "Result 2". Result 2 is the screenshot taken after clicking the link in Result 1.

HOWEVER, if I grabbed the cached copy of the page from the link in Result 1, the result is different, and shows the first bit of my test blog. See Result 3. That's as close as I could get to reading the content though. Clicking on the link for the cached page only gave me the "We're sorry, you do not have access to this Premium content..." message.

Bottom line? Google is unbelievably fast in indexing WA, and WA is good at protecting that which is restricted.

Are either of you able to access the test blog?

Dennis

YESSS... here's how the result looks on Google!

Wealthy Affiliate
https://my.wealthyaffiliate.com/ · What is the best theme for a local business? bnickel Premium Top 200 started question ...

Dennis, you just absolutely ROCK. You used the scientific method!! Not the "ask everyone" method like I used, but at least I got to YOU!

THANK YOU SO SO MUCH! -Alexx

Jay (magistudios) is the presenter for the Live Video Classes linked in the left sidebar.

He does local marketing for businesses in the Vancouver area, and has done several classes on it. Click on the Live Video Class link and put "local marketing" in the search bar for more... lots more!

He uses the Genesis theme together with the eleven40 child theme, and likes it a lot!

Dennis

Hmmm... I researched Genesis a bit and kept coming up with this Child Theme thing... is it literally a child-proofing theme of sorts?

Here is an excellent description of child theme:

That is so nice of you Angela... you are just an Angel! I will read it right now!! -Alexx

Hi Alex, you seem to have already received good answers to your questions and tutorials for backup.

My take on your questions is similar to Nathaniell's. This area within WA is considered for personal, business, socialising and general use. As mentioned by Angela, as long as you stay within the guidelines you can write about anything you want.

However, to be productive you need to concentrate more on your website posts/pages/blogs.
--------------------------

The terminology of 'blog' used throughout conversations and replies to questions, generally relates to this area of WA where you can ask questions, provide updates on your progress and the general information that you want to share.
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Concerning duplication of text between WA and your site. I know Google states that duplication is alright and that they will only rank what they consider to be the most relevant copy. However, I still steer away from duplicating as I feel it is better to come up with original text each time. That is just my preference.

Also, my understanding of plagiarism is that you cannot plagiarise yourself. It is only if you blatantly copy someone else's work that you will be penalised for plagiarism.

I hope this helps.

Lis.

I think Angela has you covered here, there's nothing I can really add to that

Thanks J.

I think you have covered the subject well and I agree with most of it.
Here is something about duplication: BUT I still would continue what you are doing if it were me.

WA blogs are used for many things and as long as the content doesn't violate this policy, then you can write about whatever you like. Our blog here on WA does not have to specifically talk about business, they are also meant to be encouraging to others and a way for you to express yourself.

I have written about personal matters many times because that is as much a part of my life as my business and in fact - it is the reason I have my business - to enhance my personal life.

The content is indexed so you can use by targeting keywords and trying to get it ranked.

It really is a personal preference on what you decide to write here. If you look at my blogs, I have written about:
personal issues
health issues
frustration with my website
sharing something new I discovered
tragedy
bits of humor

I say write whatever you like - as long as it's not a NO NO ;)

Thanks so much. Well, that's why I summarized the WA Blog as personal, even though it isn't exclusively so. At first I thought it was kind of to be all business, but it seems it is anything but, as you say, and I'm struggling to differentiate it for someone I will be answering questions for. ;) -Alexx

use it in the way that serves you best :)

Yes ma'am... Thx much!

I think you have misunderstood this: "Our WA BLOG is intended to serve as a PERSONAL blog, although we tend use it to blast out our personal experiences and questions with the BUSINESS".

In fact, our WA blogs are supposed to be related to our business activity.

Duplicate content is not an issue for Google:
https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/66359
http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.ca/2008/09/demystifying-duplicate-content-penalty.html

Thanks for noticing my blog. Here is one example of the confusion... Nathaniell to me regarding my Writer's Post Blog, which was all business:

"It's a great post - but to be honest, I would spend your time and energy on your website. It's fun to be an active part of the WA community, but I wouldn't worry about getting feedback on your blog posts. The blogs here are just for fun and being social.

If you want to get feedback on writing, you should post something to your blog [MEANING WEBSITE BLOG I ASSUME], then you can request feedback in a variety of places on WA, including from me..."

The only way I could synopsize this for my referral person was to say a PERSONAL blog... see people chatting socially, but often, ABOUT the business.

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