Could duplicate content be helpful to the original source?

[MonsterWeb28]

Greetings Mozzers,

I'm wondering if duplicate content could potentially function as a "link" in Google's eyes.  Since they know I have content first and then someone else just uses it, Google could maybe think of that as a recommendation that the content is good?

Reason I ask is, when I first starting going after a keyword for a company I wanted to go after two (2) separate regions, let's say "San Antonio" and "Dallas".  My non-region based keyword started to rank for "San Antonio Keyword" because the content on the San Antonio page was too closely related.  So i'm wondering if maybe having that content so close/duplicate may have boosted the original page because it was kind of like a recommendation?

Thoughts, Information, Clarification, any and all are welcome and appreciated!

[MonsterWeb28]

Thanks for some insight

[johncallaghan]

I think what's happened here is Google has recognized that you have multiple pages with very similar content and disregarded all but one version and that version is ranking. It's probably been chosen because of how it fits in your site structure in compared to other pages with the similar content but there are other potential reasons i.e. inbound links.

Duplicate content can function as a link but only when it's published on a third party website in the form of a citation. For the citation to be counted the third party website in question would have to be authoritative and reputable (to filter out sites with scraped content).