Original post: http://www.trafficgenerationcafe.com/search-engine-ranking-debate/

1. t raf f icgenerat ioncaf e.com http://www.trafficgenerationcafe.com/search-engine-ranking-debate/
When “They” Steal Your Search Engine Ranking and Traffic…
Being protective of your content is a natural trait of every blogger.
Af ter all, your content is your brain child.
It started as a mere idea.
You put that idea into words.
You gave it your personality.
And then you released it onto the world.
To be f ruitf ul and multiply.
To bring in more readers.
So f ar, so good, right?
But what happens when your content starts to bring in readers to another site rather than yours?
As in “another site outranks your original content in Google search“?
Search Engine Ranking Loss: The Premise
A f ew days ago, Ileane Smith f rom BasicBlogTips.com decided to give me some homework by posting the
f ollowing comment on my How to Convert Blog Posts to PDF YouTube video:
She also emailed me the f ollowing screenshot to show what she meant:

2. And so the battle f or the top search engine ranking begins:
Why let another site steal your search engine ranking?
Let’s begin with making some assumptions.
Search Engine Ranking Assumptions
1. If we syndicate our content on a site that surpasses our own in authority, chances are they’ll outrank us.
2. They’ll get the lion’s share of search engine traf f ic because of that higher search engine ranking.
3. We could’ve ranked our blog post f or that same keyword without syndicating our post to other sites and
getting those backlinks.
4. Thus, we shouldn’t put ourselves in a position where we have to compete against our own syndicated
content.

3. If some of this doesn’t make sense, I hope we’ll be on the same page by the end of the post.
Side note: this post is a continuation of a discussion started here:
* Slideshare Traffic Case Study: From 0 to 243,000 Views in 30 Days
The Thought Process
Why do we use other sites to market our business, content, brand to begin with?
For leverage.
For rankings.
For traf f ic.
Af ter all, it’s unrealistic to expect to draw in any signif icant amount of traf f ic without any help f rom third-party
websites, like YouTube, Slideshare, EzineArticles, Squidoo, Scribd, or extensive guest blogging, or even
working our rears of f building presence on social media sites.
That’s the whole idea behind maximizing your existing content by repurposing it and allowing it to build natural
links and traf f ic.
You can learn more about it in this post:
Content Marketing Leverage System: How to Multiply Your Reach
In short:
1. You take one piece of content (like a blog post);
2. turn it into a PDF, a video, a Slideshare deck, a mindmap, an image library, etc.
3. submit it to various third-party platf orms;
4. get quality links and traf f ic back to your original piece.
And that’s when we run the risk of being outperf ormed by our own syndicated content – in this particular case,
getting a lower search engine ranking.
But is it really that risky?
1. My current search engine ranking
It’s been a couple of weeks since I published my original blog post and the Slideshare PDF Ileane was ref erring
to.
You can see both at the f ollowing links (no worries, they’ll open in new tabs):
Be Everywhere: How to Convert Blog Post into PDF in Under 60 Seconds
And the PDF version of that same post on Slideshare:
How to convert blog post into pdf (and upload it to Slideshare)
As of the writing of this post, my search engine ranking of the original post has improved:

4. 2. Higher search engine ranking: the chicken or the egg?
Yes, Slideshare has more overall domain authority than Traf f ic Generation Caf e.
As much as it pains me to admit that many sites are more powerf ul and authoritative than mine, it’s true.
Then the question is this: since Slideshare (a more authoritative site) is linking to my original blog post, thus
giving me a quality backlink, might that be the reason my blog post has a high search engine ranking for
that keyword to begin with?
In other words, would I have ranked as highly without that link f rom Slideshare?
I’ve tracked down a f ew other posts of mine that were syndicated on Slideshare (i.e. either I made a
presentation based on the content or converted the original post into a PDF and submitted it to Slideshare).
The results are “win some, lose some”.
Search Engine Ranking Example 1:
Keyword: “get more f acebook f ans” – f airly competitive
10 Killer Tips on How to Get More Facebook Fans blog post vs
How to Get Facebook Fans: 10 Outside-the Box Ways to Do It Slideshare presentation

5. Side note: you might’ve noticed that the Slideshare presentation title appearing in the search results is slightly
dif f erent f rom what I mentioned above.
If curious why, read this post where I talked about my shenanigans with MGM studios.
Search Engine Ranking Example 2:
A slightly less competitive variation of the previous keyword “HOW TO get more facebook fans” and yet the
results are switched:

6. So, as you can see, it’s hard to know when or why an original blog post might get higher search engine ranking
over syndicated content or vice versa.
Moving on.
3. Does higher search engine ranking yield more traffic?
So in those cases when my Slideshare deck was ranked above my blog post, do I really miss out on the traf f ic?
I don’t think so.
For three reasons:
1. My blog posts simply look better in the search engine results.
Which one would you be more likely to click on?

7. Personally, with the author’s picture, social proof (Google+ circles), etc, I’d def initely click on the blog post vs
the Slideshare result.
So simply getting a higher search engine ranking f or a particular keyword doesn’t automatically mean more
search engine traf f ic.
2. Slideshare brings me a lot of traffic.
If someone lands on one of my Slideshare presentations as a result of a Google search, chances are they’ll
f ollow me to Traf f ic Generation Caf e.
Just look at my ref erral traf f ic f or the past month: Slideshare sits very comf ortably right below Facebook.
3. I gain more credibility.
Search engine rankings f or my own blog are great, no question about it.
However, creating a network of excellent content throughout the web is priceless.
“Being everywhere” def initely increases your expertise, authority, and ultimately, builds up your brand and your
site.
Search Engine Ranking: Loss or Gain?
In the end, I still f eel like a winner when one of my “repurposed” pieces of content ends up ranking highly on
Google, even if it outranks my original post.

8. Either way, my brand gets visibility.
Either way, I get traf f ic.
I build quality backlinks to my blog, as well as individual posts.
Those links help me build long-term domain authority.
My increasing domain authority will help me to get better search engine rankings f or my original content
in the f uture.
Realistically, my original post might not rank at all without the supportive links f rom syndicated content.
However, I do think I could make one important tweak to make my content leverage system work even better.
Ileane was right: it might be better to wait a week or two before syndicating your content.
That will ensure that Google gets around to doing its job of identif ying YOU as the original content source.
Not sure if you noticed this little detail in one of the screenshots above:
Even though the Slideshare PDF was uploaded a day or two after my original post was published, Google still
thinks that the PDF was a f ew days older, thus might be THE original content.
Marketing Takeaway
Well, I know what my marketing takeaway is f rom this extensive research into search engine rankings: all
rankings of YOUR content lead to YOU.
And that just can’t be bad.
What about you though?
Will these results discourage you f rom repurposing your content?

9. Let me know in comments!
If you like this post and think it would be valuable to your f ollowers,
share the ish out of it f or me, would you?