In the realm of search engine and social media optimization, you’ll find people and companies utilizing practically every tool available. News corporations use Twitter to update readers on breaking exclusives, companies set up fan pages on Facebook and sponsor contests and chats, and the tried and true blog is used more than ever given how timely content is more attractive to search engines than static pages. Yet, for all the “tweeting” and blogging and “Digging” going on, one must ask if using all of these profiles and platforms to relay the same messages over and over is doing more harm than good.

In short, if you blog, does it make sense to feed the blog’s RSS into Twitter and Facebook, and anywhere else it may fit? Is there the risk that somebody who follows all three of your profiles will become bored or irritated by the repetition and drop you altogether?

The answer is hard to determine, as one can’t truly determine how social media optimization will work for everybody. What works for Company A could backfire for Company B. However, there are pros and cons to repetitive content that can be explored and considered by those interested in getting the most out of their social media profiles.

Duplicating Content: Advantages

Tools exist that allow you to feed your blog posts into your Facebook profile and your Twitter account. Though there is no discernable way to feed a blog into MySpace’s blog, widgets can be set up to present an RSS version on your material on your profile. The main advantage to having everything connected is that you can create content at one source and distribute it easily to several places with the click of a mouse. There’s no need to log into several profiles. With the addition of bookmarking tools on your browser menu bars – for social bookmarking sites like Delicious and Digg – you can reach diverse audiences with your content.

Also, optimizing specific keywords to link back to your main site can be helpful in boosting your search rank.

Duplicating Content: Disadvantages

If you spend enough time in the Twitter and Facebook worlds, you may tend to read from other users of their dissatisfaction of some profiles. While it’s a given that anybody who sets up a social profile is advertising to some degree, to simply set something up as a droning feed may be a turnoff to some users. “Social” is optimal word in social media, so if you do have these profile it is encourage to use them beyond their RSS functionality and converse with the people who choose to follow your exploits.

It may take some experimentation to find the perfect balance between your content and the way it is presented. Study how you use social media, and learn what works and what doesn’t.

Kathryn Lively is a freelance writer specializing in articles on Virginia web design.