Duplicate Content - please let this myth finally die!

[Rsberg]

WF Members, Newbies, random people just surfing your way through here and everyone else who still doesnt know...

Duplicate Content IS A MYTH...period!

I don't care if anyone replies to this or not but at the very least read the brief statement below before you go.

Duplicate content is ONLY an issue if you publish the same piece of content on the same site more than once.

I dont know how to make that any more simple to understand. If you still don't get it just ask and I'm sure either myself or someone else who does (get it) will try to better explain it to you.

I consider myself a very cordial person in general and don't typically "rant", if this comes off that way...well...so be it. I'm tired of seeing this rediculous myth continue and the only way it will die is if those that don't know it's a myth (and they should know now) stop spreading it!

Thanks for your time,
Robert

[brendan1]

Link?

[Big Money]

Okay, please don't blaze me.

What I've understood is that there is no penalty for duplicate content. It's just that Google only ranks whoever posted the content first.

Is this right?

[Richard Van]

Originally Posted by Big Money

Okay, please don't blaze me.

What I've understood is that there is no penalty for duplicate content. It's just that Google only ranks whoever posted the content first.

Is this right?

No it's not. Publish your article to your site, get it indexed and then submit to the directories. Google is quite capable of ranking both.

Duplicate content is ONLY an issue if you publish the same piece of content on the same site more than once.

This is fact. I have read countless threads of experienced full time article marketers saying this. The only people that say this isn't the case say so because they haven't tested it or they heard it elsewhere with zero proof. I have been outsourcing articles and occasionally doing them myself. I put them on my site, index them then distribute them to the better of the article directories. I don't change them except for removing the links from the main body of text. I have never been punished by Google.

[DireStraits]

A commendable effort, Robert, but I just wanted to forewarn you not to become too disappointed later, when you realise it was all in vain!

Some people will never understand this, and some will just outright refuse to believe it.

And even if this thread was made "sticky", it wouldn't stop people starting new threads about it, and/or others perpetuating the same misinformation and unsubstantiated claims.

It'll take a giant, cyanide-soaked, diamond-encrusted, solid-silver bullet fired from an elephant gun to even temporarily disperse this nonsense.

[Rsberg]

Originally Posted by brendan1

Link?

If you trying to emply that I posted this thread due to my sig link then I'm sorry but your sadly mistaken and obvioulsy don't know me very well!

As a matter of fact the reason I started this thread was because I've seen this myth perpetuated at least 10 times in the last day or so and I just left a thread a few minutes ago where there were literally 4 or 5 newbies all saying the same thing to other newbies...which only continues to spread the myth that much more.

[Rsberg]

Originally Posted by DireStraits

A commendable effort, Robert, but I just wanted to forewarn you not to become too disappointed later, when you realise it was all in vain!

Some people will never understand this, and some will just outright refuse to believe it.

And even if this thread was made "sticky", it wouldn't stop people starting new threads about it, and/or others perpetuating the same misinformation and unsubstantiated claims.

It'll take a giant, cyanide-soaked, diamond-encrusted, solid-silver bullet fired from an elephant gun to even temporarily disperse this nonsense.

Oh I know.....

I certainly didn't expect to cure the world of this cancer with one post and like cancer it may live forever. I was just hoping that a few would read it, believe it and help in the cause everytime they saw it themselves.

Making a "Duplicate Content is a myth" thread as a sticky would be awesome, but you're right...still wouldn't stop it, unfortunately.

[Brandon Tanner]

Originally Posted by Rsberg

Duplicate Content IS A MYTH...period!

Duplicate content is NOT a myth, and I will prove it.

Duplicate content is NOT a myth, and I will prove it.

Duplicate content is NOT a myth, and I will prove it.

There, I just proved it twice in one post.

[Big Money]

You say "Duplicate Content IS A MYTH...period!"

What do you mean by this? What's the myth?

[Rsberg]

Originally Posted by Brandon Tanner

Duplicate content is NOT a myth, and I will prove it.

Duplicate content is NOT a myth, and I will prove it.

Duplicate content is NOT a myth, and I will prove it.

There, I just proved it twice in one post.

LOL...ok, you got me...thats funnny!

[brendan1]

Originally Posted by Rsberg

If you trying to emply that I posted this thread due to my sig link then I'm sorry but your sadly mistaken and obvioulsy don't know me very well!

As a matter of fact the reason I started this thread was because I've seen this myth perpetuated at least 10 times in the last day or so and I just left a thread a few minutes ago where there were literally 4 or 5 newbies all saying the same thing to other newbies...which only continues to spread the myth that much more.

lol no, not at all... I just wanted to know if you had a link to back up your statement.. Not disputing your claim, it would just be nice to see more evidence to back up the many claims/statements that are made these days..

[Rsberg]

Originally Posted by Big Money

You say "Duplicate Content IS A MYTH...period!"

What do you mean by this? What's the myth?

There is a VERY common misconception (myth) that there is some form of penalty or your site will get deindexed or who knows what else is being said about it...simply because you republish content from another site on your site.

For some reason people think Google views this as "duplicate content" and somehow punishes you for republishing it. The punishments that you will typically hear is anyting from low rankings to death to all of your sites immediately after Googles spiders discover the dreaded piece of duplicate content (content that has been published elsewhere on the net) on your site.

There is a REAL duplicate content issue that you should try to avoid at all costs. What I am referring to is actually what "duplicate content" is...

Duplicate content is the same piece of conten being posted on the same site more than once...double posting. That WILL hurt your site so don't do that.

Hope that helps

[Big Money]

Thanks for the explanation. I've been hearing the term "duplicate content myth" for years, but I didn't know what the actual myth was.

So you say that is will harm you to post the same content on the same site more than once. What exactly happens. Are you sure this isn't just an extension of the myth?

Originally Posted by Rsberg

There is a VERY common misconception (myth) that there is some form of penalty or your site will get deindexed or who knows what else is being said about it...simply because you republish content from another site on your site.

For some reason people think Google views this as "duplicate content" and somehow punishes you for republishing it. The punishments that you will typically hear is anyting from low rankings to death to all of your sites immediately after Googles spiders discover the dreaded piece of duplicate content (content that has been published elsewhere on the net) on your site.

There is a REAL duplicate content issue that you should try to avoid at all costs. What I am referring to is actually what "duplicate content" is...

Duplicate content is the same piece of conten being posted on the same site more than once...double posting. That WILL hurt your site so don't do that.

Hope that helps

[Rsberg]

Originally Posted by brendan1

lol no, not at all... I just wanted to know if you had a link to back up your statement.. Not disputing your claim, it would just be nice to see more evidence to back up the many claims/statements that are made these days..

LOL..oh ok...sorry. I guess that one went right over my head.

Do I have a link..no.

Can it be proven to be a myth...certainly.

Just ask any one of the hundreds if not thousands (probably more to be honest) of other WF members (along with myself) who use (what is often referred to as duplicate content) on their sites and manage to somehow (by magic if you were to ask those that beleive the myth) get our sites ranked...and ranked well I might add.

If the myth were actually true...then getting sites ranked well that have "duplicate content" on them and maintaining that rank would be impossible...wouldn't it?

[Rsberg]

Originally Posted by Big Money

Thanks for the explanation. I've been hearing the term "duplicate content myth" for years, but I didn't know what the actual myth was.

So you say that is will harm you to post the same content on the same site more than once. What exactly happens. Are you sure this isn't just an extension of the myth?

You are quite welcome...if at least one person learns it then it was worth starting the thread!

What happens if you do it - your sites ranking will drop at the very least. I have seen it with my own sites and as soon as I corrected it (realized that I had dup content) the site gradually recoverd from its dip back to its original ranking...but it didnt happen overnight. Ive heard some people say it happens fast for them, others not so fast. It might be that those whos sites recoverd quickly were spidered by G shortly after fixing it...not exactly sure but either way they do typically recover.

There have been far too many people confirm drops in site rank due to having the same piece of content on 1 site for it to be an extension of the myth and in most cases you will also hear those same people tell you that their sites rank improved once the dup content was removed.

[Richard Van]

So you say that is will harm you to post the same content on the same site more than once. What exactly happens. Are you sure this isn't just an extension of the myth?

It is not an extension of the myth it's a fact. Please listen to what is being said here. If I had a site with an article and I published that over and over again on my one site, this is called duplicated content, this isn't allowed, henceforth the fact you never see it. If I publish the said article on my site and other article directories it is called syndicated content. This is fine and has been going on for a long time.

[Entrepreneur Stream]

haha This conversation has come up at least once per week on every forum around.

The myth will never die!

[Rsberg]

Originally Posted by Entrepreneur Stream

haha This conversation has come up at least once per week on every forum around.

The myth will never die!

I know...crazy isn't it!

[MarkSherris]

Yeah it's a funny myth this actually, and one that is easily busted, all you need to do is go over to a popular blog, copy a segment of text from one of the articles, put it in Google like this: " text goes here " (Text with speech marks around it) and you will find loads of different results pop up, because the content has been taken and published all over the place!

[jhonsean]

Duplicate content is a reality nothing more nothing less.

[MarkSherris]

Originally Posted by jhonsean

Duplicate content is a reality nothing more nothing less.

what do you mean by this exactly?

[Rsberg]

OK all...I will let others fend off the myth for a while, I'm headed to bed. After midnight here in Iraq.

Shame the mods moved this from the main forum...was hoping it would be seen by a few more people there before it happened but then again this is probably the place it needs to be.

Good luck in your IM!

[Rsberg]

Originally Posted by MarkSherris

what do you mean by this exactly?

I think it was meant to be a factual statement...

Duplicate content is a reality because it exists everywhere.

OK...now I'm off to bed.

[MarkSherris]

Fair enough :-)

[birdman87]

So how exactly do you take advantage of this if, say, you are an article marketer? If I write an article for one article website, should I then copy the same article into numerous other websites as well to provide extra backlinks? And I assume, by what you're saying, that these articles will have all the same backlink power they'd normally have if they weren't duplicate articles.

Also, say I had a website about halogen heaters. I could add a 'guest post' that was just an article written on ezinearticles, or hubpages or something? I can see how this could save a ridiculous amount of time.

I assume that article sites have a problem with duplicate content though?

[jibjam]

Originally Posted by Rsberg

WF Members, Newbies, random people just surfing your way through here and everyone else who still doesnt know...

Duplicate Content IS A MYTH...period!

I don't care if anyone replies to this or not but at the very least read the brief statement below before you go.

Duplicate content is ONLY an issue if you publish the same piece of content on the same site more than once.

I dont know how to make that any more simple to understand. If you still don't get it just ask and I'm sure either myself or someone else who does (get it) will try to better explain it to you.

I consider myself a very cordial person in general and don't typically "rant", if this comes off that way...well...so be it. I'm tired of seeing this rediculous myth continue and the only way it will die is if those that don't know it's a myth (and they should know now) stop spreading it!

Thanks for your time,
Robert

you mean that if i copy some article and past it into my site it will be alright?

[kakaboo]

Hey I'm a newbie and I just tried this out - but I dont really understand

I just simply took one whole sentence of 12 words from a PLR article and input it into Google search bar, and it returned me 11k ++ results!

So much for those people who says your site/article won't get indexed if they are the same content... it's just that when you click to the last page, it will say "is only showing ___ results and omitting the rest cos they are revelant, blah, blah"

I tried it for 2 more articles and they both returned me 9k + and 12k+ results too! (whole sentence in quotes"

So according to what I did, I personally think that duplicate content is a myth although I am a newbie, but what I dont understand is if my results are in the "omitted results", will they still have the same effect if I am just using them for backlinks?

[dburk]

Hi Robert,

By the way you worded your post I must assume that you meant this thread to be linkbait, or controversial. Surely, you must realize that the way your phrased your assertion that "Duplicate Content IS A MYTH...period!" is at the very least a gross over-generalization. I picked up on the subtle, yet unstated, inference to a penality, however, many others may not.

For clarification I will add that duplicate content does indeed exist and that there isn't a search engine penalty. There is a duplicate content filter that often filters all but one version of duplicated content from SERPs. Those are well known facts that are collaborated by the search engines themselves.

I believe the primary source for nearly all controversy on this topic stems from the ambiguous, or over generalized, statement like those made buy you and others on this topic. Speak clearly and be understood!

@brendan1,

Here's a couple of links for you:
Official Google Webmaster Central Blog: Demystifying the "duplicate content penalty"
Official Google Webmaster Central Blog: Deftly dealing with duplicate content

[keepkalm]

Rsberg & dburk thanks for this thread, a lot of SEOs have this idea that copies of their content online will divide their authority and it is ingrained in them from the word go.

Please read the Google Webmaster blog if you are still confused about this matter. I've seen a lot of blog posts syndicated across different article networks without penalty that I can see. It makes sense because that is what article sites are for. And Press Releases.

Every time I hear this myth brought up I always bring up the press release, it is meant to be duplicated and picked up across multiple sites and outlets. Think about it. Makes perfect sense.

[Dele]

Originally Posted by Richard Van

It is not an extension of the myth it's a fact. Please listen to what is being said here. If I had a site with an article and I published that over and over again on my one site, this is called duplicated content, this isn't allowed, henceforth the fact you never see it. If I publish the said article on my site and other article directories it is called syndicated content. This is fine and has been going on for a long time.

Syndicated content just like republished content on the same site is still duplicate content, only that no penalty results from Google for that across sites.

That is actually where the misconception on this whole myth issue is. People assume all duplicate content should be punishable by Google which is not the case. That is not to say Google is in love with any type of duplicate content. Google is just trying to be realistic and practical. If Google has a choice, it will hammer down on all forms of duplicate content.

To be better informed see => Duplicate Content

[perfect]

Let hope that this misconception will end one day.

[nmarketing]

"However, in some cases, content is deliberately duplicated across domains in an attempt to manipulate search engine rankings or win more traffic. Deceptive practices like this can result in a poor user experience, when a visitor sees substantially the same content repeated within a set of search results.
Google tries hard to index and show pages with distinct information. This filtering means, for instance, that if your site has a "regular" and "printer" version of each article, and neither of these is blocked with a noindex meta tag, we'll choose one of them to list. In the rare cases in which Google perceives that duplicate content may be shown with intent to manipulate our rankings and deceive our users, we'll also make appropriate adjustments in the indexing and ranking of the sites involved. As a result, the ranking of the site may suffer, or the site might be removed entirely from the Google index, in which case it will no longer appear in search results."

Please read this a few times.

Source: google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=66359

[Amys101place]

On a different note, is a .info as good as a .com?

[FamilyFrugal]

Originally Posted by nmarketing

"However, in some cases, content is deliberately duplicated across domains in an attempt to manipulate search engine rankings or win more traffic. Deceptive practices like this can result in a poor user experience, when a visitor sees substantially the same content repeated within a set of search results.
Google tries hard to index and show pages with distinct information. This filtering means, for instance, that if your site has a "regular" and "printer" version of each article, and neither of these is blocked with a noindex meta tag, we'll choose one of them to list. In the rare cases in which Google perceives that duplicate content may be shown with intent to manipulate our rankings and deceive our users, we'll also make appropriate adjustments in the indexing and ranking of the sites involved. As a result, the ranking of the site may suffer, or the site might be removed entirely from the Google index, in which case it will no longer appear in search results."

Please read this a few times.

Source: google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=66359

So that implies that it will be penalized? Seriously, I'm a newbie at all of this and horribly confused. I have unique articles (all written by ME) that I'd love to submit all over the place to generate backlinks. I don't have the time or money to spin them all 50 different ways.

I don't want to be penalized though. and this tidbit from google leads to believe I could be.

[TimD]

A couple of years ago when I was deep into article marketing I had an interesting run in with the "duplicate content" myth.

I submitted an article to EZA (I was a premium member then so it got posted fast). The next day, I submitted the article to another of the Big 10. Somehow they put my article title (about cover letter software) on the top of someone else's tooth whitening article. That article outranked my EZA article and the other author's tooth whitening article.

Very bizarre.

[thebitbotdotcom]

Originally Posted by Big Money

Okay, please don't blaze me.

What I've understood is that there is no penalty for duplicate content. It's just that Google only ranks whoever posted the content first.

Is this right?

WRONG! Plenty of my articles that I have syndicated with a link pointing to my original article have been outranked by sites hosting copies of those articles that Google considers more of an authority site than mine.

[garner808]

Originally Posted by FamilyFrugal

So that implies that it will be penalized? Seriously, I'm a newbie at all of this and horribly confused. I have unique articles (all written by ME) that I'd love to submit all over the place to generate backlinks. I don't have the time or money to spin them all 50 different ways.

I don't want to be penalized though. and this tidbit from google leads to believe I could be.

I think the duplicate content being referred to in the article is the same content within ONE domain. You may get penalized if you publish the same content on your domain, but if you publish them on other sites, such as article directories, you wouldn't be penalized. However, only the original version will rank well, and the others might get filtered out. Well, at least that's based on my understanding of their articles.

[alphazulu]

In any research or study you need more then one example, however i am not going to study this since I never did believe that duplicate content was bullspit anyways.

I will tell you why....

a Few years ago I started Internet Marketing, but I had no idea what I was doing, but I tried anyways. After about 2 months I gave up and went back to whatever I was doing, In those two months I made a few sites and I wrote about 5 very bad articles.

When I relocated everything and I fixed it up I decided to run my site through rank checker to see where this very small trickle of traffic was coming from.

Turns out that two of the articles I wrote were ranked in spots 3 and 4, as well as a youtube video ranked at 10.

Now how this relates to what this discussion is about is that if you search in google for the broad phrase unemployment tricks (very bad keyword btw nothing I ever had in mind, but I didn't know a lick about SEO then) you will see the two articles I mentioned, but then look at the spot held by #8, it is a hubpages website, and the only content on the site is an exact copy and paste of the article I wrote and submitted to ezine.com

Ok not saying this makes anything definite, but I just wanted to supply an example of duplicate content being ranked in google.

[Look4VGames]

Originally Posted by Rsberg

WF Members, Newbies, random people just surfing your way through here and everyone else who still doesnt know...

Duplicate Content IS A MYTH...period!

I don't care if anyone replies to this or not but at the very least read the brief statement below before you go.

Duplicate content is ONLY an issue if you publish the same piece of content on the same site more than once.

I dont know how to make that any more simple to understand. If you still don't get it just ask and I'm sure either myself or someone else who does (get it) will try to better explain it to you.

I consider myself a very cordial person in general and don't typically "rant", if this comes off that way...well...so be it. I'm tired of seeing this rediculous myth continue and the only way it will die is if those that don't know it's a myth (and they should know now) stop spreading it!

Thanks for your time,
Robert

no offense intended but if you want the myth to die maybe you will keep your mouth closed and quit opening new threads? does it really matter if thousands of people think its real? that just gives you a better advantage as they will be super cautious and have to spend more time developing content then yourself.

[orvn]

Let's make something clear;

DUPLICATION ≠ SYNDICATION

[seonooid]

Hi Rsberg

if I got it right:

For Google Crawlers duplicate content represent multiple URLs of the same site showing the same page.
just like ww.warriorforum.com/ and ww.warriorforum.com/index.php/
The site it's not penalized for this, but will have only one version of the URL indexed.

The same version of an article posted on multiple sites it is "duplicate content" for readers, but it will still be indexed and ranked by the same criteria that search engines use. The more you optimize it, the more value and backlinks you add to it, the higher the rank you will get for it.

[achong]

We have know that duplicate content is good too, but combination between fresh content and duplicate one will be better.

Craft Blogs

[dburk]

Originally Posted by orvn

Let's make something clear;

DUPLICATION ≠ SYNDICATION

YouTube - Is eating the same sandwich every day...

[DireStraits]

Originally Posted by dburk

YouTube - Is eating the same sandwich every day duplicate content?

LOL ... what the hell was that? Never seen that one before!

[fortony]

I still wonder if it is a good idea to use the same articles from a blog or whatever for link building. Even without a penalty, I assume Google is still going to give more weight to an link coming from a unique article than a the same one.
Also, another problem I can think of is that if a good article is posted on a newer blog and a site like Ezine, then the article on Ezine would could outrank the article on the blog for the keyword phrase.

[Rsberg]

Originally Posted by dburk

Hi Robert,

By the way you worded your post I must assume that you meant this thread to be linkbait, or controversial. Surely, you must realize that the way your phrased your assertion that "Duplicate Content IS A MYTH...period!" is at the very least a gross over-generalization. I picked up on the subtle, yet unstated, inference to a penality, however, many others may not.

Actually it wasnt meant to be either (link bait as you word it or controversial). I simply started it because in the few days prior to posting it I had seen well over 10 posts (mostly by newbies) that claim for a fact that it is a reality (in the way that the myth is often misunderstood).

For clarification I will add that duplicate content does indeed exist and that there isn't a search engine penalty. There is a duplicate content filter that often filters all but one version of duplicated content from SERPs. Those are well known facts that are collaborated by the search engines themselves.

I believe the primary source for nearly all controversy on this topic stems from the ambiguous, or over generalized, statement like those made buy you and others on this topic. Speak clearly and be understood!

I assume you are referring to the fact that I didn't go to greater depths explaining it as you did. If that is the case then your right...I didn't, my main objective here was to clear the air as to the main myth that does revolve around this topic and the way it is generally misunderstood.

As to your "Speak clearly and be understood" comment I assume you have never not spoken clearly then...is that right? Either that or you just like being impudent.

[Rsberg]

Originally Posted by seonooid

Hi Rsberg

if I got it right:

For Google Crawlers duplicate content represent multiple URLs of the same site showing the same page.
just like ww.warriorforum.com/ and ww.warriorforum.com/index.php/
The site it's not penalized for this, but will have only one version of the URL indexed.

The same version of an article posted on multiple sites it is "duplicate content" for readers, but it will still be indexed and ranked by the same criteria that search engines use. The more you optimize it, the more value and backlinks you add to it, the higher the rank you will get for it.

Bingo...

You will hear many sucessful writers/ article marketers say that they have an original article on their blog and then submit that same article to Ezine and both will rank and both drive traffic in their own ways.

[Rsberg]

Originally Posted by Look4VGames

no offense intended but if you want the myth to die maybe you will keep your mouth closed and quit opening new threads? does it really matter if thousands of people think its real? that just gives you a better advantage as they will be super cautious and have to spend more time developing content then yourself.

Im not even quite sure this deserves a reply.

"no offense intended...but keep your mouth closed"

Interesting...

[Rsberg]

Originally Posted by jibjam

you mean that if i copy some article and past it into my site it will be alright?

If you get the article from a source that allows it to be coppied, leave the content alone (dont make changes to it) and leave the link back to the original author then that is perfectly fine and allowed.

I may not have explained myself well enough (as was pointed out by one other poster) but the intent here was to educate people that are confused about this subject.

There can be a penalty for duplicate content and this is where I didnt explain it as best as I should have.

The kind of duplicate content you need to worry about is having the same piece of content on the same site more than once. The penalty for this is typically a drop in the SERPS, at least thats been my experience in the past as well as other I know who have made this mistake.

[orvn]

Originally Posted by dburk

YouTube - Is eating the same sandwich every day duplicate content?

lmao, win!