What is the impact of surfacing content through APIs and how it affects SEO strategies, and the problem with duplicate content (across the multiple site domains that consume the API content) and how it affects each sites search rankings?

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We are looking to implement two strategies with our APIs, but have concerns over the issue of SEO, specifically around using the same content on multiple sites (be it single region based, or through an internationalisation strategy).

Has anyone looked into the SEO best practices, and any issues caused by content through API on SEO?

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I'm not sure that this is an API-specific question rather than a dynamic content question and how that relates to duplicate content. When duplicate content comes up in the SEO context, I immediately think of rel="canonical", see: https://moz.com/learn/seo/canonicalization

It may not be API-specific, but is very applicable as part of an API strategy where you are surfacing editorial content as appose to data.

I am hoping this community has thought heavily about the impact of duplicated content by exposing content through an API, where the third party implementing the content might not put in canonical links - or if putting in canonical links, completely breaks the SEO ranking they would like to get from the use of the content.

Hi @Peter Dignan,

Typically, your HTML pages will be served by the web server. Your API layer will return data in a machine readable format (usually JSON, XML or CSV) which is then displayed on your page. In order to understand your question, I'd like to understand if your API will be returning the HTML itself rather than JSON?

It is the responsibility of the API client (the web developers) to ensure they implement canonical links correctly, set up robots.txt, sitemaps, metadata tags etc. correctly. The API cannot control these things, and cannot force the client to set them in a certain way.

Check out the following for a nice summary of SEO factors here.

If I have misunderstood, please give an example of a typical API response, and we can discuss your specific scenario.

Thanks,

Sean

Hi @Sean Davis

A scenario for this might be the following:

As a publisher you create an API for articles, in JSON, and as an example:

{  "request": {    "options": [      "_=1471453653443",      "callback=jQuery1111003340890318316614_1471453653441",      "format=jsonp"    ],    "pageUrl": "http://www.pistonheads.com/news/general-pistonheads/totd-surprisingly-quick-cars/34813",    "api": "article",    "version": 3  },  "objects": [    {      "date": "Wed, 17 Aug 2016 00:00:00 GMT",      "images": [        {          "naturalHeight": 450,          "width": 632,          "diffbotUri": "image|3|1876607366",          "url": "http://images.pistonheads.com/nimg/34813/mazda_3mps_010.jpg",          "naturalWidth": 600,          "primary": true,          "height": 484        }      ],      "author": "Nik Attard",      "estimatedDate": "Wed, 17 Aug 2016 17:10:52 GMT",      "publisherRegion": "Northern Europe",      "icon": "http://www.pistonheads.com/apple-touch-icon.png",      "diffbotUri": "article|3|1251575905",      "siteName": "Pistonheads",      "type": "article",      "title": "TOTD: Surprisingly quick cars",      "publisherCountry": "United Kingdom",      "breadcrumb": [        {          "link": "http://www.pistonheads.com/",          "name": "Home >"        },        {          "link": "http://www.pistonheads.com/news",          "name": "News >"        },        {          "link": "http://www.pistonheads.com/news/general-pistonheads",          "name": "General News >"        }      ],      "humanLanguage": "en",      "authorUrl": "http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/profile.asp?memberId=153009",      "pageUrl": "http://www.pistonheads.com/news/general-pistonheads/totd-surprisingly-quick-cars/34813",      "html": "<figure><img alt="" src="http://images.pistonheads.com/nimg/34813/mazda_3mps_010.jpg"></img></figure>\n<p>Moving across to the outside lane to overtake can sometimes come with a few surprises. With seemingly plenty of space for the manoeuvre, the rear view mirror then gets filled with something that was highly unlikely to trouble you, forcing you to either pull in again or accelerate harder.</p>\n<p>The thread is filled with plenty of forum users who have been surprised on a drive, with one PHer following a Vauxhall Vivaro from Castle Combe and realised he had to work harder than expected to keep up. Another was surprised by a BMW 335d, but that should come as no surprise as everyone knows there is nothing faster than a mapped 335d...</p>\n<p>Vans always seem inexplicably fast, but are there any cars that surprised you at how quick they are?</p>\n<p>Let us know in the forum <strong><a href="http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&f=23&t=1334247&i=0">here</a></strong>.</p>",      "text": "Moving across to the outside lane to overtake can sometimes come with a few surprises. With seemingly plenty of space for the manoeuvre, the rear view mirror then gets filled with something that was highly unlikely to trouble you, forcing you to either pull in again or accelerate harder.\nThe thread is filled with plenty of forum users who have been surprised on a drive, with one PHer following a Vauxhall Vivaro from Castle Combe and realised he had to work harder than expected to keep up. Another was surprised by a BMW 335d, but that should come as no surprise as everyone knows there is nothing faster than a mapped 335d...\nVans always seem inexplicably fast, but are there any cars that surprised you at how quick they are?\nLet us know in the forum here."    }  ],  "url": "http://www.pistonheads.com/news/general-pistonheads/totd-surprisingly-quick-cars/34813"}

Someone consuming the API (a subscription partner), would then create a page on their site where the majority of the content is the article text or html.

If the subscription was to take all news articles then they could create a site that has exactly the same words and pictures as the publisher's main site, or another subscriber site to the API.

As the purpose of the subscription is to create content for their users, and to have more content on the site for SEO purposes - then the subscriber wants to be high in Google Search rankings.

If the API was successful and there were 100 subscribers all with the same words and pictures, this would have a big impact on duplicate content issues with SEO - especially as there maybe little control on the subscriber putting canonicals (they want the SEO), attribution link (maybe want to represent it as their own content), noindex (they still want the SEO).

So as part of an API strategy, this seems to be an important consideration, especially for content APIs.

Hi @Peter Dignan,

Thanks for the example, it makes it a lot clearer.

My first instinct would be include...

<link href="{$.pageUrl}" rel="canonical" />

.. in the HTML that you return. That way search engines will treat the content as if it was a copy of http://www.pistonheads.com/news/general-pistonheads/totd-surprisingly-quick-cars/34813

However, clients could easily strip this or just use $.text which will continue to cause some duplicate content issues. The obvious suggestion here would be to only return the HTML.

Any further thoughts @Marsh Gardiner?

I've also struggled to keep up with many vans on the motorway in my little old Mini. I'm sure the Vauxhall Vivaro would be no different..!

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