CASE STUDY: 1 Article (Identical Content) Submitted to 20 Article Directories 2 Months Ago

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14 years ago

Originally Posted by Steven Wagenheim

Finally...somebody who gets it.

Spinners are a TOTAL waste of time and duplicate content is a bigger
myth than Big Foot.

Now I'm waiting for all the naysayers to tell us that we're BOTH wrong.

(ducking into my bunker)

Haha - no ducking my friend... I do have just one thought on this that morphs the two theories together:

Google recognizes duplicate content, but considers a duplicate page only AFTER it has looked at other pages that have a higher PR, more RELEVANT backlinks (relevant to the keywords in quotes - or without), etc.

To repeat: Through my observations, it seems as though if Google doesn't FIRST find a site that has a better set of *relevant* backlinks, THEN it will throw up the page containing the duplicate text.

That is precisely how I would attempt to write a search algorythm, because ultimately this way would assure the best user/reader experience when using Google/others.

So, yes, you're both right in my opinion. ~p

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14 years ago

Originally Posted by Steven Wagenheim

Finally...somebody who gets it.

Spinners are a TOTAL waste of time and duplicate content is a bigger
myth than Big Foot.

Now I'm waiting for all the naysayers to tell us that we're BOTH wrong.

(ducking into my bunker)

Steven,
Agree with you and Kate on the duplicate content - For several years now I've been saying that duplicate content was not an issue but mirror content is what gets your site tanked by Google.

However, I was also at one time against article spinners but now see them as a useful tool in the article marketing kitbag.

Consider this, if you have the same article ranking for 5 different article directories on Google's first page and a web surfer visits the first article and it doesn't draw them to your site then they click on the second article and see it is the same as the first article they previously read and they leave....same for the third, fourth and fifth article.

My argument for article spinners (when used properly) is that you have the opportunity to occupy those same positions with a different article version that may appeal to the web surfer.

For me, article spinning is not about the duplicate content issue (never has been). Instead it has always been about the user experience which is where we provide enough quality info to drive the reader to our website.

Hopefully that made sense and kept you from staying in the bunker -

Respectfully,
Tim

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Rhett

14 years ago

Originally Posted by Steven Wagenheim

Finally...somebody who gets it.

Spinners are a TOTAL waste of time and duplicate content is a bigger
myth than Big Foot.

Now I'm waiting for all the naysayers to tell us that we're BOTH wrong.

(ducking into my bunker)

Well Steve, if it makes you feel any better (whilst you are inside your bunker, lol), you converted me months ago with your thoughts on this subject!

Saved me hours, even days, of work.

Thanks

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Cash37

14 years ago

Originally Posted by Steven Wagenheim

Finally...somebody who gets it.

Spinners are a TOTAL waste of time and duplicate content is a bigger
myth than Big Foot.

Now I'm waiting for all the naysayers to tell us that we're BOTH wrong.

(ducking into my bunker)

I agree, if dupe content was a big deal then you wouldn't have major media sites all syndicating content from the AP, etc. put people don't get it.

I'll leave you all to spin content and I'll keep submitting my stuff to the media for syndication

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Andyhenry

14 years ago

Hey Kate,

Thanks for taking the time to share your results with your fellow warriors.

Whatever the situation regarding duplicate content the fact that you cared enough to share your findings was really great anyway.

To your success

Andy

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Carol01 14 years ago

Thanks a lot for taking time and telling your test's results. It is going to help me a lot as i really did not like spinners and was worried since i can't write so many original articles for submitting to various directories.

It would be very helpful if you can share the remaining directories names also which you used for article submission.
- Thanks
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coluden 14 years ago

Sorry if I disappoint but I DON'T believe you are wrong. In fact, I am quite sure that this duplicate content stuff is not the whole truth. In fact, I wonder if the creators of article spinners started 'the rumour'?

Anyway, thanks for sharing your test results. I'll probably still stick to the top 5 or so directories, but as I've said elsewhere, marketers in general give Google much more credit than they deserve.
- Thanks
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HungryFish

14 years ago

Thanks Kate,

I am thrilled to hear someone has taken the initiative to test this issue in real time. It is great to know I don't have to spin my articles. I will give it a test on my next site...

Thanks

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Sarah Russell

14 years ago

Thanks for taking the time to share the results of your case study! Interesting stuff

Thanks

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tush

14 years ago

KateD,
Thanks for taking time to share and for these wonderful forums as well. I never used to submit the same article. I was even naive. I did not know that before submitting any article, one should first publish it on their blog/website. I did this and actually my rankings and earning improved in a short time without extra effort on my part

Thanks for sharing

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glynlafferty

14 years ago

Kate

I found a few months ago that the same article showed up in google for eza and article base.

With all the talk about duplicate content you actually start to believe it thanks for reinforcing the truth

Glyn

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timpears

14 years ago

Hopefully this will put the duplicate content myth to bed. But somehow I doubt it.

Thanks for sharing your experience.

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Ryan Shaw

14 years ago

Article duplication is very rampant over the internet and you are right there my friend...

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cballi 14 years ago

Thanks for sharing your results, Kate.

Clearly you have shown that duplicate content is indexed but I still have to wonder if 20 backlinks from the same exact article are as strong as 20 backlinks from articles that are 50%+ unique. Maybe I am giving Google's algo too much credit, but it seems possible that Google could discount the backlink juice for duplicate content. Did your ranking improve after submitting this same article to multiple directories?

It seems the next experiment would be to compare the ranking effects of 20 article backlinks using duplicate content versus using spun content. Because of the variables involved in ranking a site that experiment may not be conclusive, but it would be interesting.

But even if dupe content BLs are as good as non-dupe I still see value in spinning. There are a few directories (and web 2.0 sites) that won't accept duplicate content and you can usually get higher acceptance rates in blog networks using spun content (b/c some blog owners won't approve dupe content). I just think spinning an article can get you alot more mileage in the long run from just one article.
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14 years ago

What you have described and proved is that there is no penalty for "article syndication".

There never has been.

Duplicate Content refers to using the same content on your site over and over again to fool Google into giving you a better ranking.

Try stuffing your site with keywords (go to Google Webmasters Blog and look up keyword stuffing) and see if there are no negative consequences.

Even EzineArticles won't accept an article that has more than 2% keywords. You don't have to call that a penalty if you don't want to. Call it whatever you want.

Now why do you think EzineArticles won't accept an article that is stuffed with too many keywords? Could it be that Google won't list one of their articles if it is stuffed with too many keywords?

Stuffing an article, blog post, blog, website...with too many keywords is one of three Google definitions for "duplicate content".

When you submit your article to multiple directories, Google calls that "syndication".

Syndication good. Duplicate content bad.

Not knowing the difference between "article syndication" and "duplicate content" is what keeps this debate going.

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14 years ago

Originally Posted by Matt M

What you have described and proved is that there is no penalty for "article syndication".

There never has been.

Duplicate Content refers to using the same content on your site over and over again to fool Google into giving you a better ranking.

Try stuffing your site with keywords (go to Google Webmasters Blog and look up keyword stuffing) and see if there are no negative consequences.

Matt, that's true. But that's a totally different issue than submitting the
same article to various article directories.

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14 years ago

Steven, you're exactly right and what do you think the OP has described?
Article syndication.

You can't use article syndication arguments to prove that duplicate content penalties don't exist.

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14 years ago

Originally Posted by Matt M

Steven, you're exactly right and what do you think the OP has described?
Article syndication.

You can't use article syndication arguments to prove that duplicate content penalties don't exist.

The only place that duplicate content penalties exist is IF you place the
same article on your own domain multiple times.

The problem is not with the definition (technically you are correct) but in
how people perceive duplicate content.

They DON'T think of it in terms of what it actually is.

They DO think of it in terms of what the OP described.

And since THAT is essentially how it is judged (by whether or not you
can get away with submitting the same article, unspun or unaltered
to multiple directories) within that context, the OP is 100% correct.

Even if the technical definition is not the same.

Perception, and how the term is used is all that matters here.

Now, if somebody is stupid enough to put the same article on their
own domain 10 times, well, they'll just have to find out the hard way
that they're going to get slapped.

But that's not what we're talking about here.

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Steven Wagenheim 14 years ago

One other thing, keyword stuffing is not duplicate content. It's just keyword
stuffing. Yes, it's duplication in a sense where you are using the same
keyword over and over to try to get a better ranking.

But again...it's how the terms are understood by the vast majority of the
public and how they are used.

Tossing technical definitions at them is pointless when their issue is with
one thing and one thing only.

"Can I submit my article to more than one site and get them all ranked or
will I be penalized for this and get none of them ranked?"

That is the crux of this whole damn argument, regardless of whatever
technical definitions you want to toss at people.

They don't care. They only care about the issue, whether it is technically
syndication or duplicate content.
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TimG 14 years ago

Originally Posted by Steven Wagenheim

The only place that duplicate content penalties exist is IF you place the
same article on your own domain multiple times.

Bingo - I call that mirror content and it was responsible for taking a site of mine that was making $3000 a month and turned it into making only $300 a month.

Mirror content sucks....don't do it!!

Tim
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KateD

14 years ago

Steven,

Exactly. When people talk about submitting the same article to different article directories, the naysayers jump out and start screaming about "duplicate content".

What I did was article syndication. Not duplicate content. Most people don't know the difference.

KateD

Originally Posted by Steven Wagenheim

The only place that duplicate content penalties exist is IF you place the
same article on your own domain multiple times.

The problem is not with the definition (technically you are correct) but in
how people perceive duplicate content.

They DON'T think of it in terms of what it actually is.

They DO think of it in terms of what the OP described.

And since THAT is essentially how it is judged (by whether or not you
can get away with submitting the same article, unspun or unaltered
to multiple directories) within that context, the OP is 100% correct.

Even if the technical definition is not the same.

Perception, and how the term is used is all that matters here.

Now, if somebody is stupid enough to put the same article on their
own domain 10 times, well, they'll just have to find out the hard way
that they're going to get slapped.

But that's not what we're talking about here.

Thanks

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Official Google Webmaster Central Blog: Demystifying the "duplicate content penalty"

14 years ago

Well Google itself is responsible for most of the confusion.

Here is a video I just made:

YouTube - duplicatecontent.mp4

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rapidscc

14 years ago

Just to add some points to the OP...

I once wrote news articles and so when doing my research
would stumble across the exact same news piece of one
big news corp copied to the letter by other smaller news
sites.

And yes, Goog includes all of them in the SERPS.

However, if you plan to use the articles in web 2.0 sites you better
re-write or spin it. Duplicate content checking is implemented
by some web 2.0 sites. Try building a hubpage with contents
copied from EZA and they will mark your page as duplicate.

I think squidoo also checks for duplicate content.

So, my final thought is this, yes you can submit the same
articles on different directories without the need to alter it.
However, if you use it on some web 2.0 sites, there might
be a chance that it will be tagged as duplicate content.

All the best,

Thanks
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14 years ago

Originally Posted by rapidscc

However, if you plan to use the articles in web 2.0 sites you better
re-write or spin it. Duplicate content checking is implemented
by some web 2.0 sites. Try building a hubpage with contents
copied from EZA and they will mark your page as duplicate.

That's what I have found from my testing and every time that I have tried to bring it up here, or mention it to a newbie, I get shot down by all of the "duplicate content is a myth" people here.

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14 years ago

Originally Posted by Matt M

That's what I have found from my testing and every time that I have tried to bring it up here, or mention it to a newbie, I get shot down by all of the "duplicate content is a myth" people here.

And there again is an entirely different issue altogether.

A site not allowing you to submit an article to them that you submitted
elsewhere is not a duplicate content penalty. It is simply, "Hey buddy,
you got this article on xyz site...you can't have it here too."

This is a TOS issue that is going to be different for every single site out
there. But as far as a penalty for having the content on their site, since
you can't have it there in the first place, there's no penalty. You just
have to find someplace else to put your stuff.

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theverysmartguy

14 years ago

Originally Posted by rapidscc

Just to add some points to the OP...

I once wrote news articles and so when doing my research
would stumble across the exact same news piece of one
big news corp copied to the letter by other smaller news
sites.

And yes, Goog includes all of them in the SERPS.

However, if you plan to use the articles in web 2.0 sites you better
re-write or spin it. Duplicate content checking is implemented
by some web 2.0 sites. Try building a hubpage with contents
copied from EZA and they will mark your page as duplicate.

I think squidoo also checks for duplicate content.

So, my final thought is this, yes you can submit the same
articles on different directories without the need to alter it.
However, if you use it on some web 2.0 sites, there might
be a chance that it will be tagged as duplicate content.

All the best,

I was going to read the entire thread before responding to this, just in case it has been covered. But I am feeling lazy right now.

The reason why they "check" for duplicate content, is because they truly and actually want to have UNIQUE content on their site, That is basically what it really boils down to with them.

-- Jeff

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frankstar

14 years ago

Thanks for sharing your findings KateD. Great call.

I have a question in relation to content that maybe people can answer.

Google's "primary directive" is to provide useful and relevant results. It won't for example allow to many results from one domain in the top 10 rankings, or any subsequent block of 10. My question is, is this the same for content?

If Google sees 20 article directory pages with the same content, will it only put 1 or perhaps 2 of them in each block of 10 results?

This would mean that if you wanted to dominate the top 10 results with article directory postings (assuming this is possible for the purposes of this example), you would then need to significantly alter the content, otherwise in order to be useful and relevant, Google wouldn't allow too much of the same content in the rankings.

Anyone know if that's true?

Francis

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aandersen

14 years ago

i concur about the web 2.0 thing. if you go out right now and create 10 web 2.0 blogs with the same article most of them will not get indexed. even if you spin it lightly it still may not. but if you spin it really good and add some different images and paragraph structure, most if not all will get indexed. at least this has been my experience. I have only had this problem specifically with web 2.0 blogs like weebly, vox, jimdo, wordpress.com, etc... i think that people went too hard with their linkwheels over the last year or two.

on another note, i never spin my articles before submitting to article directories or posting to my sites or submitting to blog networks and they always get indexed.

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Dennis Gaskill

14 years ago

Kate

Thanks for posting your findings. It should end the controversy for the next week or two, then it will be back. Several of us here have been saying there is no duplicate content penalty as most people believe it exists for a long time.

Matt M explained what it is in post #12, but there are also a couple of innocent mistakes people make that can cause Google to see duplicate content on your site.

1) If you have printer friendly page for your visitors convenience, Google may see duplicate content. Google is usually pretty good at determining which version to show, but you can tell Google which version is priority.

2) If you move a page or rename a page and don't use a 301 redirect to tell the search engines of the change so the old page can be de-indexed, they'll see duplicate content.

The only "penalty" these situation might cause, is that the page rank gets split up between the separate versions of the page. That's not a penalty, it's a function of how Page Rank works, but it can seem like a penalty because it can cause the page to drop in the SERPs.

In the case of intentionally "mirroring" content, as Matt calls it, that may cause a penalty.

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14 years ago

Kate,

thank you for your work and posting here. I do appreciate it and don't want you to think that I don't respect your hard work.

As Steven has pointed out, for the people that are fearful that submitting your article to multiple directories can be penalized, you have indeed cleared that up.

Matt

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Christophe Young

14 years ago

I did a similar test recently.

I'm targeting a specific long tail keyword. I wrote an article with the Keyword as the title. I then posted it on my main website AND submitted it to EZA. I also put the long tail in my website title tag.

A few days later, I enter the keyword into Google and what do I find...

My site ranking number one for that keyword. (www.mysite.com)

My article on my site ranking number two. (www.mysite.com/article title)

My article on EZA ranking number six.

There I am listed THREE times in the top ten. Not Bad.

I've always thought spinning was a waste of time and more importantly, it makes your articles look like crap.

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14 years ago

Google knows exactly what is happening in the IM world and knows all the tricks. Their only concern is to improve the user experience. This video makes a distinction between non-malicious duplicate content and spam, and that there is no duplicate penalty, but only a spam penalty.

Is article spinning spam? Probably. It is in the intent. Google's apparent philosophy is that "distinct information" is golden.

This is a video all on this thread should view, and offers a better explanation on some points brought up better than any here. ~p

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sanssecret 14 years ago

Great video and was just about to post it myself. If you're using duplicate content with the intent of trying to 'cook the books' then you're likely to face a penalty. But, as noted, the penalty is for spamming and I doubt any of us would disagree with that particular penalty being imposed.
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Davioli

14 years ago

I'm looking at this from a purely SEO viewpoint.
Even though its a myth.. (as a lot of you say) it just doesn't make sense.

Google may index these pages.. but don't you think they would devalue these links? Imagine a page on your website.. getting a hundred backlinks from pages that all contain the same content.

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JMartin

14 years ago

KateD, great post.

By the way, I just looked up a juicy article I wrote and submitted, without spinning, to many directories in the beginning of 2004. Google is showing lots of listings. Kind of fun to see new listings added years later.

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14 years ago

I didn't have time to post this earlier but the mirror content penalty I suffered occurred when I took an article on my website that I wrote for California Discount Auto Insurance and replaced California with the name of all the other states.

So essentially I had the same article on my site for each state with the only difference being that the state name was different for each article. The net result was within 48 hours my site disappeared from the high search engine rankings it was enjoying and the $3000 a month it was generating from organic search engine traffic was replaced with $300 a month from the traffic my article marketing was sending to the site.

Painful lesson to learn!!

Respectfully,
Tim

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Bill Farnham

14 years ago

Originally Posted by TimG

I didn't have time to post this earlier but the mirror content penalty I suffered occurred when I took an article on my website that I wrote for California Discount Auto Insurance and replaced California with the name of all the other states.

So essentially I had the same article on my site for each state with the only difference being that the state name was different for each article. The net result was within 48 hours my site disappeared from the high search engine rankings it was enjoying and the $3000 a month it was generating from organic search engine traffic was replaced with $300 a month from the traffic my article marketing was sending to the site.

Painful lesson to learn!!

BINGO!

This is generally the way I understand Google defines duplicate content.

Additionally, I have products on my site that fall into several catagories and if were to simply copy the product description and use it in several of the main catagories on my site (skin care, health and beauty, hair products, bath products, as examples) Google would not list all the product pages when someone typed the brand name in.

Dup content is not article syndication as was mentioned.

~Bill

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ContentYogi

14 years ago

I love the ambiguities associated with Content uniqueness and such. There are so many theories and they all seem convincing. Being an article services company, I needed better understanding of the business we were in, hence we did a little experiment a while back with two blogs.

Blog A
I just copied some articles from Ezine to my blog with all due credits to the owner of the author.

Blog B
We wrote an original article from the scratch and posted it on Blog B. This article showed 100% unique on Copyscape.

Now the moment of truth:

Blog B with original content gets 146% more traffic to it from the search engines.

Now here is something that should interest you all: Blog A with the copied Ezine article on it is not just indexed on Google but it gets 23% of its traffic from search engines.

So what do you really make of this?

Unique content is definitely the way to go! Duplicate content? Well, I don't think it will kill your site if you choose to use it but you would rather use unique content if your objective is to generate traffic off it.

Hope this was an interesting share for you all. Don't hesitate to ask questions if you need clarification.

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14 years ago

Unfortunately this proves nada.

Since when has anybody ever said Google removes dupe content???

That's never been the basis of the "myth".

What has been said is that extensive dupe content hits the supplemental, AND IT DOES!

Just go and submit an indentical article to 100 sites, then search for a unique
string in quotes and go see what you find, perhaps 20+ or so listed, then the rest
you have to visit the supplemental for.

I've made this point before, it's such a yawnfest.

If you submit 20 copies, sure, no issue, Google will often show in the SERPS between
10-20 or so of the exact same article before the rest hit the supplemental.

There isn't and never has been a dupe penalty in the sense Google doesn't
penalize a site with dupe content linking back to it.

however, once that stuff hits the supplemental you won't see any real additional
back linking value from it. The juice value goes into the floor.

The fact that people still think Google is so absurdly retarded that it will allow
you to simply spam the same article to 2000 sites and get the same value
from every back link as you would from unique content is so absurd , it's laughable.

Spinners or re-writing the article manually is not a waste of time, because if you
submit the same content past around 10-15 copies it simply dissapears up it's
own arse into the supplemental.

Google will take into account the trust of the sites the content is being placed
on and all things being equal show as varied a result as possible for the term
searched on and that focuses around displaying the unique content, not the dupe.

If Google cares so little about this content it removes it from the main listings
and dumps it into a secondary listings, do you really think you're getting the
same link juice from the content as unique content that shows in the primary SERPS?

If it were so, all anybody would need to do is submit the exact same piece
of content to 10,000 sites and forcibly get a no1 position for any term
you wanted.

Unfortunately this test was hugely flawed by the fact the volume was
tiny, and the OP even claims of that tiny volume not all showed in the listings.

This debate always gets messy, in part because people keep combining
multiple issues surrounding the dupe penalty, often erroneously with back link
juice,rankings, on site dupe content, off site dupe content all thrown in to one
melting pot.

Hell, look if folks want to send the same article out to thousands of sites thinking
they are going to heaven in the SERPS from that identical contents backlinks,
that's fine by me.

Less people to compete with.

Anybody who does SEO for a living will tell you back links placed in unique content
pushes positions in SERPS , identical content pretty much has almost no value
past around 20-30 links from the same content.

Dupe content externally can in NO way hurt your site, it just won't help it.

There's plenty of benefits of content syndication, identical content syndication
that is, but in terms of back link benefits to your "money site", it's naff.

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LIndaB

14 years ago

I agree with Simon on this. Just because you can type in the name of your article in Google and it shows all your submissions does NOT mean all of those are going to rank - or even show up in the main index. I would be interested in knowing, Kate, where exactly those articles rank. I personally think it pays to do some careful spinning, and especially to use a lot of different titles when submitting to various directories.

Also, if you use any of the article networks like Unique Article Wizard, et al, they aren't going to even accept content that isn't spun to some degree. So if someone wants to syndicate their articles to a lot of places, they are probably going to need to do some spinning.

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KateD

14 years ago

Originally Posted by LIndaB

I agree with Simon on this. Just because you can type in the name of your article in Google and it shows all your submissions does NOT mean all of those are going to rank - or even show up in the main index. I would be interested in knowing, Kate, where exactly those articles rank. I personally think it pays to do some careful spinning, and especially to use a lot of different titles when submitting to various directories.

Hi...

Point taken. But when I am submitting the articles, I am doing so to get backlinks, not traffic from the articles themselves. So it really doesn't matter to me where it ranks.

And the backlinks do count. When I check the backlinks to my niche blogs, I'll see dozens of them all resulting from the same original article.

KateD

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14 years ago

Originally Posted by SimonHarrison

however, once that stuff hits the supplemental you won't see any real additional
back linking value from it. The juice value goes into the floor.

...

Spinners or re-writing the article manually is not a waste of time, because if you
submit the same content past around 10-15 copies it simply dissapears up it's
own arse into the supplemental.

Dupe content externally can in NO way hurt your site, it just won't help it.

There's plenty of benefits of content syndication, identical content syndication
that is, but in terms of back link benefits to your "money site", it's naff.

Those are interesting assertions. I actually have tested exactly the assertions you made here and have not found the same experience. I've tried distributing the exact same content to 20-30 article directories. Then I tried doing the same thing with 200+ directories via mass article submission. I did this for over 100 websites. OK, let me say it again. I did this with over 100 websites. In all cases, the larger distribution resulted in better rankings. What kind of testing did you do before you came up with the "supplemental results theory"? My experience is completely different. I've tried it. Over and over again.

I would also like to mention one other thing. Some people seem to think that all their articles all over the article directories will outrank their own site. Google is smart enough to see all the links pointing to your site's copy of the article and realizes that you are the source and credits you accordingly. I have always outranked (eventually) the article directories for my articles.

One more thing. I want to emphasize that unless you write the most amazing article ever written about an extremely tight niche topic that gets syndicated millions of times all over the globe (is that enough hyperbole?) then ONE article is NOT enough to get your site to the top of the search engines. This discussion is limited to maximizing the effectiveness of a single article. One IM buddy of mine makes a decent living with article marketing alone. He told me one of his most profitable niches. I actually had a site in the same niche. My site has made 0 sales. He makes thousands of dollars/month with the same niche. I wrote 5 articles. He wrote 3,000. I fell off my chair. Of course, I realized why I did not make it. Lesson here is maximize each article's effectiveness and write your a$$ off until you get where you want to be.

TomG.

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14 years ago

Originally Posted by tommygadget

Those are interesting assertions. I actually have tested exactly the assertions you made here and have not found the same experience. I've tried distributing the exact same content to 20-30 article directories. Then I tried doing the same thing with 200+ directories via mass article submission. I did this for over 100 websites. OK, let me say it again. I did this with over 100 websites. In all cases, the larger distribution resulted in better rankings. What kind of testing did you do before you came up with the "supplemental results theory"? My experience is completely different. I've tried it. Over and over again.

There's so many variables in that , it's hard to know where to start.

Sorry but "better" combined with 20 links versus 200 and the trust of the
sites and a multitude of other issues come into play.

I can't comment on your results ,but anytime you want to put up
50 unique pieces of content linking back to a money site vesrus
50 duplicate pieces of content and then measure the differential
as per my clean test post , you'll see the "theory" in action.

Linksare devalued, whether 200 beats 20 or not , that's
an entirely different question Tom, and requires a considerable
amount of investigation into various variables.

I've done similar myself and yes all things being equal 200 beats 20 links.

That's not really the point at hand.

A better question is do 200 links from unique content KO 200 links
from duplicated content.

Go to any reputable SEO firm and ask then the simple question ?

Will links from within dupe content carry the same weight as those
from within unique.

See what your answer is.

Most would laugh at this thread.

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14 years ago

Originally Posted by SimonHarrison

There's so many variables in that , it's hard to know where to start.

Sorry but "better" combined with 20 links versus 200 and the trust of the
sites and a multitude of other issues come into play.

I can't comment on your results ,but anytime you want to put up
50 unique pieces of content linking back to a money site vesrus
50 duplicate pieces of content and then measure the differential
as per my clean test post , you'll see the "theory" in action.

Linksare devalued, whether 200 beats 20 or not , that's
an entirely different question Tom, and requires a considerable
amount of investigation into various variables.

I've done similar myself and yes all things being equal 200 beats 20 links.

That's not really the point at hand.

A better question is do 200 links from unique content KO 200 links
from duplicated content.

Go to any reputable SEO firm and ask then the simple question ?

Will links from within dupe content carry the same weight as those
from within unique.

See what your answer is.

Most would laugh at this thread.

Ahh, but I wasn't arguing the point you just made. I did NOT say that 50 of the same articles would beat 50 unique articles. In fact, I said that having different content will in fact target different keywords and add diversity to your links. What I did say was that you should MAXIMIZE your efforts by distributing your articles far and wide. Now, using your logic, would you rather 1) write 50 articles and distribute them to one place (like EZA)? OR 2) write 50 articles but distribute them to several hundred directories? I submit to you that you CAN write fewer articles if you have a wider distribution.

TomG.

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14 years ago

Originally Posted by tommygadget

Ahh, but I wasn't arguing the point you just made. I did NOT say that 50 of the same articles would beat 50 unique articles. In fact, I said that having different content will in fact target different keywords and add diversity to your links. What I did say was that you should MAXIMIZE your efforts by distributing your articles far and wide. Now, using your logic, would you rather 1) write 50 articles and distribute them to one place (like EZA)? OR 2) write 50 articles but distribute them to several hundred directories? I submit to you that you CAN write fewer articles if you have a wider distribution.

TomG.

Seems like you're talking at cross purposes Tom, no ?

Your initial post suggested that you had submitted the same content to
more sites, and got better rankings to your money site from the back links.

My point was, so what, yes those links surrounded in dupe content
have SOME worth, so yes of course in your tests 200 back links
beats 20, but that has zero impact on my point, it's not a test that
makes a comparison.

Take 200 links in different content versus 200 links from the same
content, then you have a comparison

My links are bigger than your links :-)

Your point about distribution above seems moot, do I agree
distribution is good, yes, but I've never made any point that
suggests submitting 50 articles to one side is better than
50 to multiples, in fact, it's not related to my point at all .

My point is , was and always has been crystal clear and
would bore me to repeat a 3rd time.

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14 years ago

Originally Posted by tommygadget

One more thing. I want to emphasize that unless you write the most amazing article ever written about an extremely tight niche topic that gets syndicated millions of times all over the globe (is that enough hyperbole?) then ONE article is NOT enough to get your site to the top of the search engines. This discussion is limited to maximizing the effectiveness of a single article. O
TomG.

Couldn't agree more if you're referring to the power of the links from those articles.

Think about this logically for just a second, let's all take a breather.

If a link surrounded by the exact same piece of content had the exact same value
as a link surrounded by unique content, there would simply be no more SEO .

The entire game would simply be down to taking the same article and
submitting it to more sites than your competitor.

That's a million miles from the truth.

Sure, I can imagine you may well get better results from 200 back links than 20,
as per your example but that's not really the point at hand.

The guy who has hundreds of different articles pointing back to his site
will always get better rankings than the guy with the same content linking back.

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14 years ago

Originally Posted by SimonHarrison

Sure, I can imagine you may well get better results from 200 back links than 20,
as per your example but that's not really the point at hand.

The guy who has hundreds of different articles pointing back to his site
will always get better rankings than the guy with the same content linking back.

Okay, maybe I'm not making myself clear.

I'm not arguing with what you're saying above. It is absolutely correct.

What I am saying is, given the man hours and money to generate 500
pieces of unique content versus 500 duplicated articles, the measurable
difference for people JUST looking for link juice (talking bottom line here)
is slim.

Remember, you have to take into consideration two things.

1. The competitiveness of the niche itself.

2. How much money is out there to be spent on that niche.

Personally, and again, I don't do the syndication thing personally, but from
the people I have worked with coaching one on one (those who refuse to
write tons of unique content and those who have no problem doing so)
I have seen little difference in the bottom line.

And that all goes to my ultimate assertion that backlinks by themselves
are not the be all and end all.

I don't write articles for backlinks. I never did and I never will because I
don't put as much value on them as some SEO people seem to. I write
content to be read...period.

And it gets read...to the tune of 10 to 20 opt ins daily.

Check my sites to see how many backlinks they have.

It's a joke. In fact, let me check now.

Domain 1 - 14,400 (203 in main index)
Domain 2 - 77 (all in main index)
Domain 3 - 55 (all in main index)
Domain 4 - 128,000 (186 in main index)
Domain 5 - 57,700 (159 in main index)

Okay, my backlinks are a joke.

So what?

Doesn't stop me from getting 300 to 600 new opt ins every month.

I am concerned as much with how many backlinks I have as I am with
what's going on on Pluto.

I get my visitors from the actual content that's read...not from my site's
placement in the SERPs, because frankly, you couldn't find my sites if you
tried.

But it doesn't matter.

People fine me through article directories, social sites, other people's blogs
and so on.

So why should I knock myself out to play the backlink game when I can
do just as well simply getting my content out to places where actual
eyeballs are going to see it.

There is more than one way to win the "how do I get traffic to my site"
game and SEO is NOT the only game in town.

So, if I was somebody who hated to write original content and knew that
I could get a decent number of backlinks from mass submitting one article,
I'd do it.

Again, you have to take those two things I listed into consideration when
you decide how much time, effort and money you're going to put into
something.

Only an idiot would argue that duplicate content is as powerful as
original content, especially somebody who writes for his bread and butter.

But to say that one absolutely KILLS the other in the backlink wars?

Sorry...but I don't see it.

Like I said, just something we're going to have to disagree on.

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14 years ago

Originally Posted by Steven Wagenheim

Okay, maybe I'm not making myself clear.

I'm not arguing with what you're saying above. It is absolutely correct.

Ok goodo, common ground, always a good start.

What I am saying is, given the man hours and money to generate 500
pieces of unique content versus 500 duplicated articles, the measurable
difference for people JUST looking for link juice (talking bottom line here)
is slim.

Ahhh, but it's truly not Steven depending on what you're ranking for.

Let me give you an example.

I have guys writing content for me pretty much day and night.

I can have pretty decent SERPS content written for about $3
per 500 worder , I order a lot of articles from multiple sources.

Now even taking the 500 articles example, could be a lot
less depending on the situation but lets go with the 500 example.

Cost , about $1,500.00

It's peanuts, well it's a chunk but not in relation to the eventual
payoff.

Let me give you an example, I am currently ranking at position
8 or 9 (still dancing) for a one word keyword which has 17,200,000
results.

It has a Adwords value of over $4 per click, I have moved
it for the client from position 270+ to it's best of 8 , which is
where it sits today, it's moving between 8 and 9.

It has 201,000 searches daily and Market Sam tells me a no 1 position
will yield around 84,000 clicks per day.

Do you see where I'm coming from ?

Couple of thousand bucks for content make sense, this thing
is worth a couple of thousand bucks a day.

If all I had done is ship out the same article to 500 sites, I simply
wouldn't be anywhere. You can't beat out high competition sites
in competitive markets by mass submitting the same article
all over the net with your keywords in.

Remember, you have to take into consideration two things.

1. The competitiveness of the niche itself.

2. How much money is out there to be spent on that niche.

Personally, and again, I don't do the syndication thing personally, but from
the people I have worked with coaching one on one (those who refuse to
write tons of unique content and those who have no problem doing so)
I have seen little difference in the bottom line.

Yes, I can sort of see that , it's a different scenario.

My sole focus is ranking for big clients, clients who demand
results, let me assure you that pulling some of these
terms into top 5 positions on page 1 are worth hundreds
of thousands of dollars a year, there is a huge difference in the
bottom line.

To boot, I've found that while links in dupe content do work,
ie you get some results from them, their value is relatively weak
in pushing up a site in the SERPS and against anything competitive
it's horribly weak.

So yeah 200 links from dupe is better than nothing but
it won't cut the mustard at the top end.

Remember I'm not discussing the pros and cons of indexing,
this is is relative to the value the money site gets from
identical syndicated content linking back versus unique.

And that all goes to my ultimate assertion that backlinks by themselves
are not the be all and end all.

We agree again here. I don't intend to get into a whole new debate
but if people understood how big a myth it is that on-page is a tiny
element, I would have a lot more competition. Site structure, silo
framework, contiguous themed content within the silo structure and
making all superflous links no follow have a huge impact on how much
love Google will give the same number of external links.

Suffice to say I have moved up 2 positions in the top 5 on a hugely
competitive keyword, by simply adding 50 unique articles to the
money site which were themed on the incoming back links.

That's another discussion however, and I'm glad most folks
thing back links dictate everything and onpage is almost
irrelevant.... long may that myth live :-)

I don't write articles for backlinks. I never did and I never will because I
don't put as much value on them as some SEO people seem to. I write
content to be read...period.

And it gets read...to the tune of 10 to 20 opt ins daily.

I don't want to play the mines bigger than yours, but please
understand one site I've worked on runs 600+ opt ins per day.
The position that site is in for various terms is , bar the on-page
optimization, purely down to back links.

I am concerned as much with how many backlinks I have as I am with
what's going on on Pluto.

I get my visitors from the actual content that's read...not from my site's
placement in the SERPs, because frankly, you couldn't find my sites if you
tried.

That's fine and dandy, I appreciate your business model but it's
somewhat off point in regards whether dupe is the equal of unique
in back linking prowess.

I have a client right now who is very similar, he just writes great
quality content, it's syndicated all over the place, he has a good
rack of affiliates , between the above and paid traffic , he's had
little requirement for rankings via back links.

So why should I knock myself out to play the backlink game when I can
do just as well simply getting my content out to places where actual
eyeballs are going to see it.

There is more than one way to win the "how do I get traffic to my site"
game and SEO is NOT the only game in town.

No argument here. It's entirely dependent on the type of site
you're getting ranked for, the business model, the scale and various
other factors.

But to say that one absolutely KILLS the other in the backlink wars?

Sorry...but I don't see it.

Like I said, just something we're going to have to disagree on.

That's fair enough Steven, always a pleasure, we actually agree
on more than we disagree on, it's context based.

It does KILL it in some scenarios and in others, it's almost moot.

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14 years ago

Originally Posted by tommygadget

One IM buddy of mine makes a decent living with article marketing alone. He told me one of his most profitable niches. I actually had a site in the same niche. My site has made 0 sales. He makes thousands of dollars/month with the same niche. I wrote 5 articles. He wrote 3,000. I fell off my chair. Of course, I realized why I did not make it. Lesson here is maximize each article's effectiveness and write your a$$ off until you get where you want to be.

TomG.

Tom,
Great point and that's one of the driving forces behind my decision to stop focusing on 20-30 different niches and instead focus on a select few in order to get their article Soldiers out into the battle for visitor superiority.

Tim

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JackPowers

14 years ago

I have a similar list, but it's about 30 directories long and I do think spun articles stay indexed longer.

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Mokai

14 years ago

i totally agree i have been saying this for a long time duplicate content gets you no where, add real value to the internet and you will reap the benefits

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mattlaclear

14 years ago

Yeah I have observed the same type of results myself. So does that mean we can all go to our plr folders and just start ripping thousands of unspun articles out to the article directories every day? If Google isn't penalizing for duplicate content and if even 20% of the sites take the articles you'll still come out way ahead.

Mind you I'm not advocating doing so...so don't start throwing Molatov's at me just yet.

But the logical conclusion looks like Google does indeed index duplicate content in some cases and not in others.

But maybe, just maybe the reason they don't all get indexed is because their crawler hasn't found them all yet.

Or better yet...maybe Google indexes duplicate content only when they see that you are not trying to promote the duplicate content as relevant to their search inquiries and therefore they begrudgingly give you the back link juice.

Or could Google be giving you a false positive just to make you think you're getting credit for the back link because it's showing up in the index but secrety behind the scenes Google tags it as a duplicate.

If enough of us share our experiences we can cross analyze each other's data without ever compromising the our clients keywords.

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inter123 14 years ago

I don't know if its been asked above but what about link value? Google indexes them but does it in any way diminish the link juice as a result of duplication?

Inter
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14 years ago

For reference, here's a proper test (as it relates to back link value).

Register 2 pretty much identical domain names. Make them rubbish
for example test12345.com and test54321.com. So neither has
any advantage over the other.

Place on each of the domains 1 page of identical content themed
on a topic.

Choose a 2-3 word phrase you wish to rank for, it will need to have
competition.

Write 1 article themed to match the domain content and submit it
unchanged to 500 sites with an anchor text based back link to your
first domain.

Now go and write 500 unique articles on the same themed subject
and submit them to the SAME 500 sites with the same anchor text
based back link to your second domain.

Obviously your anchored back links will be a phrase themed to the
domain content and content distributed.

Stir until browned, leave to cool.

Do a taste test and see which of your two domains ranked higher.

Any of the , "you don't need to create unique content" crew want
to wager which domain comes limping behind the other in the SERPS?

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RentItNow

14 years ago

Sounds great, Kate!

The one thing to remember is to get ezine approval first as I have been caught on publishing very similar content on blog first and they denied article (no article, no ezine Page Rank). But I guess you could always leave them out.

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IMStudentforlife

14 years ago

Originally Posted by Steven Wagenheim

And there again is an entirely different issue altogether.

A site not allowing you to submit an article to them that you submitted
elsewhere is not a duplicate content penalty. It is simply, "Hey buddy,
you got this article on xyz site...you can't have it here too."

This is a TOS issue that is going to be different for every single site out
there. But as far as a penalty for having the content on their site, since
you can't have it there in the first place, there's no penalty. You just
have to find someplace else to put your stuff.

I've only gone for one of the above listed ezine sites (I know I need to do more), and I did read their TOS.

Would any one know of a site that would list the differences of the individual site's TOS ? As to save time.

And what about using one account but having two/three Aliases for writing different articles? as I have two blogs that are in the same category but are a different niches.

(Sorry if this is not the thread for this but I've wondered about this for awhile now.)

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sanssecret 14 years ago

Simon
I fully agree with you. It starts to get confusing when you talk about duplicate content in relation to different things, eg, backlinking, indexing, ranking...

Google may very well 'index' all of your duplicate articles. But they won't all rank. Check out the video from Greg Grothaus (Googles' search quality team) posted earlier. They will simply disappear into the supplemental neverland.

Fill your own site up with purely duplicate content and you will find your own rankings 'adjusted accordingly'.

sorry, Tried to make the image smaller after posting but couldn't resize it, lol.
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Janice Sperry

14 years ago

Here is the best article I have seen on this topic...

The Google Duplicate Content Penalty: The Truth

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14 years ago

@simon

You're splitting hairs and arguing a completely different matter.

1. Nobody is saying that original content submitted to 500 sites will
not outrank the same content submitted to 500 sites. So please don't
insult us with your apples and oranges example. It's not what we're talking
about.

2. Take an article and have 500 PR 6 sites all place it on their site and tell
me which 470 or so out of those sites Google is going to say, "Sorry, you
don't get indexed for this article." It's laughable to even suggest this will
happen to authority sites. If this were true, there would be no incentive
for anybody to take non original content and put it on their site...none.

3. You have to weigh the benefit of busting your ass to write 500 unique
articles against sending one article to 500 sites. Show me where the
benefit is so astronomical that it's worth all those man hours or outsourcing
costs if you don't write your own material.

Please don't get me wrong. I am an article writer and have never used
syndicated content...ever. And when I do write an article, I submit to a
few places at most aside from putting it on my blog.

But to suggest that you're going to get screwed by mass submitting
articles is a joke. The time it takes to submit 500 is no more than it takes
to submit 30 with your top submitters. So what's the difference?

There is none.

And if you can get those articles on 500 high PR sites, trust me, each one
will get indexed and NOT just the 20 or 30 that you think.

I can show you articles where hundreds of copies are listed...not just
20 or 30.

Your argument doesn't hold water.

But like you said, we're going to be arguing this thing forever and neither
side is going to give in.

So with that, I'm just going to bow out of this now because quite
honestly, I don't care enough anymore. Each side is going to do what it
wants to do and nothing anybody says or does is going to change the
die hards. Everybody else will eventually choose a side...whatever side
that is.

It's not my problem anymore.

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14 years ago

Originally Posted by Steven Wagenheim

@simon

You're splitting hairs and arguing a completely different matter.

Erm, actually I am not Steven. The OP is making a case that
submitting identical content has the same value as unique
content for back links - I am saying it is not. It's neither splitting
hairs or a completely different matter. It's one part of the
discussion.

The OP again goes on to clarify in another response, that she
is submitting for back links only. It's exactly the same matter
Steven.

1. Nobody is saying that original content submitted to 500 sites will
not outrank the same content submitted to 500 sites.

That's not in debate though. I'm saying that the site you LINK to
from that content will not rank as well and that duplicate content
hits the supplemental. That point above becomes an unintentional
strawman.

So please don't
insult us with your apples and oranges example. It's not what we're talking
about.

Actually it is exactly what the OP was talking about and many others.

Not sure who this "us" is Steven, a fair few people seem to agree
with my points, you're the only one claiming to be insulted by what
are frankly 100% on point responses to claims made.

It's not an apples/ oranges scenario . There are as I stated
numerous cross over discussions going on with makes it somewhat
confusing in places but I am dealing with EXACTLY the topic the OP
stated.

2. Take an article and have 500 PR 6 sites all place it on their site and tell
me which 470 or so out of those sites Google is going to say, "Sorry, you
don't get indexed for this article." It's laughable to even suggest this will
happen to authority sites. If this were true, there would be no incentive
for anybody to take non original content and put it on their site...none.

Ahhh, ok, I see what's going on, this is where why there's a confusion.

Nobody is saying something isn't indexed,don't confuse content within
the supplemental and non indexed content, content in the supplemental
is indexed, it wouldn't be in the supplemental if it wasn't.

I said they will be put into the supplemental index and the link value
then becomes devalued.

I also said that if you search for a unique string in an article which
has been mass submitted you'll see around 10-30 listings for it
with the rest in the supplemental with a link to view them.

Both of which are 100% accurate.

Google will give the sites it feel are most relevant to the content
and supplemental the rest - fact.

It's irrelevant what the sites PR is by the way, pretty much, there
are numerous factors which dictate who Google shows for the content
in the primary SERPS and who Google lists in the supplemental.

You don't need to believe me though as it's criminally easy to prove.

Go and search for an article that has been submitted at least say
to 100 places. Search for a unique string in that article, then come back
and tell me that you don't see a nice little link from Google telling you they
have removed the same content and to click to see identical
versions.

You will see 20-30 or so depending on the level of the comp and then
you'll see Google give you a nice little place to click to view the rest.

3. You have to weigh the benefit of busting your ass to write 500 unique
articles against sending one article to 500 sites. Show me where the
benefit is so astronomical that it's worth all those man hours or outsourcing
costs if you don't write your own material.

Are you talking link benefit here? If so when you do SEO for a living,
you'll get it. the benefit is EVERYTHING. Without it the links , past
a certain point are weak as a new born baby.

Google looks at the content surrounding the link, it looks
at themes, if the content surrounding the link on the page is indentical
on 500 sites, then it's not going to give you the link juice you would
if it was unique.

Seriously, just for a moment , think about the ramifications if it
was the case that duplicate content provided the same link juice ?

All ranking would require is the guy with the biggest submit tool.

But to suggest that you're going to get screwed by mass submitting
articles is a joke.

Steven, go back and read my post, seriously. I not only say you don't get
screwed I made the point in 3 places that there is zero penalty to
the site you link back to. Nobody is getting screwed, what is happening
is however that not all those versions of the exact same article will
show up for the search term, they are moved to the supplemental.

If they didn't it would be a god awful mess.

The time it takes to submit 500 is no more than it takes
to submit 30 with your top submitters. So what's the difference?

There is none.

Errm, correct, but what's your point? I get the distinct impression
there's a large degree of cross purpose discussion here.

And if you can get those articles on 500 high PR sites, trust me, each one
will get indexed and NOT just the 20 or 30 that you think.

Steven, you keep discussing whether something is being indexed or not.
ALL content once spidered is indexed, whether it be dupe or otherwise.
I have not said otherwise, you need to understand the difference between
indexing and being in the supplemental, they are not mutually exclusive.

I can show you articles where hundreds of copies are listed...not just
20 or 30.

Without being in the supplemental ? Perfect, lets see it, I'm all "eyes"

I have never seen more than around 30 in the primary SERPS then you get
this..." In order to show you the most relevant results, we have omitted
some entries very similar to the X already displayed.If you like, you can
repeat the search with the omitted results included."

Give us a unique search string from an article that has hundreds of copies
out there in the SERPs .

Depending on the competitiveness of the article you'll see "x" copies
in the primary with the rest showing only in the supplemental.

Your argument doesn't hold water.

Which argument because I think you're talking at cross purposes
and misunderstanding my point (s).

It is not about whether content is indexed or not. For it to be in the
supplemental it has to have been indexed.

My points are very simple , lets boil it down.

a) Duplicate content submitted with the aim of generating backlinks
is of lesser value than unique content.

b) If you submit an identical article you will see anything past around
20 or so , (this often depends on the level of competition for the keyphrase,)
end up in the supplemental index.

Those points don't just hold water, they could hold a dam back.

But like you said, we're going to be arguing this thing forever and neither
side is going to give in.

I think on reflection, you'll probably find actually we already agree on
your point, you're simply presuming that supplemental means not indexed,
it doesn't.

If you're referring to back link value, then yes you're free to argue
forever or you can give some credence to a guy who works with
6 and 7 figure marketers on large scale SEO projects who
has tested this to death and back and universally found that unique
content surrounding links is taken into account and back links from
that content provide SERPS benefits whereas back links surrounded
by duplicated content, just don't have the same value.

[ 2 ] Thanks

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Warrior Dude

14 years ago

I have submitted articles to Isnare in the past. They submit the identical article to thousands of sites.

What I noticed is maybe 20 or 30 of them will show up as back links after a couple months time. And the rest of the thousands, where did they go? Who knows.

It seems like only the highest pr sites stick.

It may not be a dupe content thing it may just be high pr sites stick and junk sites don't.

Also, I noticed with the Isnare submissions that if even a junk site with no pr takes your article and only spins the title that many times it will show up as a back link.

So maybe there is something to dupe content.

Thanks

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Ernie Lo

14 years ago

Thanks for sharing Kate! That should put some misinformation to rest.

How do you submit an article to multiple directories? Each one manually or is there some submitter you use?

Thanks

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14 years ago

Sorry, but this is nothing new, and there's a lot of errors on this page.

GOOGLE NEVER HAS HAD A DUPE PELANLTY, THEY USE A DUPE FILTER!!!! AND ALWAYS HAVE!

Every page on the Warrior forum has a duplicate page called a "Printer friendly" version, with same content on it.

Here's a doop of this very thread:
http://www.warriorforum.com/main-int...ago-print.html

Google doesn't penalize either this thread or the printer friendly thread, it simply tries to figure out the best one to show in the SERPs and FILTERS out the printer friendly page, neither is "penalized", but one isn't shown.

And in 13 years of SEO expience, SEs only penalize doop content is if they feel its SEO "doorway page" type spam. Otherwise, they just ignore what they feel is doop.

Another logical fallacy is that because some articles are syndicated across multiple domains is that it's OK for you to do. Is it possible that Google gives special treatment to certain sites and treat them differently? We know Google has HUMAN INSPECTED news sites...Who would you trust more, the NY Times or Joe Schmoe's blog? Why not give a "boost" to certain sites you know and trust and have been approved by a real human like Google news source sites are?

Next, searching for full titles has always returned multiple results of the same article, this is nothing new. But article titles are usually VERY long tail and quite possibly trigger a different algo in Google than a "normal" search. Where are these articles when using search queries REAL people will use?

Next, has the actual benefit of these articles been tested? If the goal is link juice, is it possible that Google adjusts link value based on originality? For example, if a page is considered 95% "original", it will pass 95% of its link juice. Whereas a page that is only 5% "unique" will pass only 5% of its link juice. Not saying this is how it's done, only that it's one of many possiblities and no one here has provided any evidence that the links from doop articles is better/worse/the same as links from non-doop.

The only thing this thead presents is that you can find doop articles using an extreme long-tail keyword which isn't new. No other benefits have been suggested or stated.

Thanks

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14 years ago

From the article:

"Not all duplicate content pages will be refused a listing. If these duplicates are articles, then the algorithms that the spiders carry on their backs will take the links from these articles into consideration, the authority of the directory on which it is published, and other factors, before deciding which should be listed."

This article is a good one. It mirrors what is in the posted video. It really is simple when one looks at the video and reads this article.

Thanks for posting that, JMS. ~p

Thanks
2 replies

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Adrianne_ 14 years ago

Thanks Kate for bringing up this topic again. Even though this probably won't be the last time the subject comes up, its good that IM'ers hear about the difference between duplicate content and syndicated content. I think many people are confused by it, including myself, because the jargon in spinner software videos promote making your articles different enough to be accepted by the SE's. This gives the impression that content may be rejected by google.

I'm not knocking article spinning; i actually have a subscription to AMA myself but when I purchased the subscription, I thought dupe content was one article copied to several external locations and thought I would be penalized for it. I even checked in the product review section of this forum before going with AMA and I did not come across any mentioning of syndicate content until this thread. Thanks again. Its been enlightening.
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14 years ago

Originally Posted by pjblanch

From the article:...

reads this article.

Thanks for posting that, JMS. ~p

Why read an article from another site when you can read what Google says right here on their official blog?

Official Google Webmaster Central Blog: Demystifying the "duplicate content penalty"

Why does everyone keep sending people all over the web reading stuff written by people who don't work for Google when you can read it straight from the "horse's mouth" above?

I would like to see everyone read that page from Google above and come to your own conclusions about a penalty.

Especially this part quoted from Google on their official blog answering this subject:

"Having duplicate content can affect your site in a variety of ways; but unless you've been duplicating deliberately, it's unlikely that one of those ways will be a penalty."

Now look at that bottom line: "it's unlikely that one of those ways will be a penalty".

Doesn't "unlikely" imply that it "can" happen?

"Unless you have been duplicating deliberately, it's unlikely that there will be a penalty".

So again, they are saying in a round about way, that there can be a penalty.

So my question has always been "How do they determine that you have been duplicating deliberately?"

But I have not been able to get very far with that question around here because the belief is that there is no penalty.

So as long as we believe there is no penalty, then we can never talk about how they determine your content to be deliberately duplicate.

Thanks
3 replies

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Mike Grant

14 years ago

Originally Posted by Matt M

Why read an article from another site when you can read what Google says right here on their official blog?

Official Google Webmaster Central Blog: Demystifying the "duplicate content penalty"

Why does everyone keep sending people all over the web reading stuff written by people who don't work for Google when you can read it straight from the "horse's mouth" above?

I would like to see everyone read that page from Google above and come to your own conclusions about a penalty.

Especially this part quoted from Google on their official blog answering this subject:

Now look at that bottom line: "it's unlikely that one of those ways will be a penalty".

Doesn't "unlikely" imply that it "can" happen?

"Unless you have been duplicating deliberately, it's unlikely that there will be a penalty".

So again, they are saying in a round about way, that there can be a penalty.

So my question has always been "How do they determine that you have been duplicating deliberately?"

But I have not been able to get very far with that question around here because the belief is that there is no penalty.

So as long as we believe there is no penalty, then we can never talk about how they determine your content to be deliberately duplicate.

I've always figured that syndicated content on your page is absolutely fine, as long as there is also unique content.

I've always thought that the penalty happens when the spiders find a certain percentage of your page as syndicated. Maybe that bar is set at 70%, or so, so as long as you're about 65% syndicated content you are fine.

It's a big ol' question mark.

Thanks

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14 years ago

Originally Posted by Matt M

So my question has always been "How do they determine that you have been duplicating deliberately?"

But I have not been able to get very far with that question around here because the belief is that there is no penalty.

So as long as we believe there is no penalty, then we can never talk about how they determine your content to be deliberately duplicate.

Very good question. Google does say that they "sometimes get it wrong". It looks like that they try to write algorythms that try to solve this problem. I don't think that it will ever be 100%.

Thanks

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14 years ago

Originally Posted by Matt M

But I have not been able to get very far with that question around here because the belief is that there is no penalty.

I think this is why these conversations become somewhat confusing
as we have numerous folks talking about microcosms within the
same discussion.

The old fashioned duplicate content penalty myth should really be resigned
to the dustbin at this point in time.

There simply can't be a penalty for duplicate content externally pointing
links towards your site.

That is no more than syndication and it's what every legitimate news site
and PR type site do.

CNN, the BBC, Reuters etc, they would all be penalized if this was the case.

Nobody has to fear Google penalizing the site the duplicate content
links back to, it just doesn't make sense.

Thanks
1 reply

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14 years ago

Originally Posted by SimonHarrison

I think this is why these conversations become somewhat confusing
as we have numerous folks talking about microcosms within the
same discussion.

The old fashioned duplicate content penalty myth should really be resigned
to the dustbin at this point in time.

There simply can't be a penalty for duplicate content externally pointing
links towards your site.

That is no more than syndication and it's what every legitimate news site
and PR type site do.

CNN, the BBC, Reuters etc, they would all be penalized if this was the case.

Nobody has to fear Google penalizing the site the duplicate content
links back to, it just doesn't make sense.

HI Simon,

I addressed this directly in my post above. We can't assume because CNN and BBC publish doop content that it's OK for all sites. Google news source sites are hand-inspected and hand-approved and very likely are (deservedly) white-listed by Google in many ways.

Nor do we know exactly how Google treats links on content it feels is syndicated.

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14 years ago

Originally Posted by Kurt

HI Simon,

I addressed this directly in my post above. We can't assume because CNN and BBC publish doop content that it's OK for all sites. Google news source sites are hand-inspected and hand-approved and very likely are (deservedly) white-listed by Google in many ways.

Nor do we know exactly how Google treats links on content it feels is syndicated.

Hi Kurt,

I simply don't put stock in this because if you remove the big boys from the
equation, there are still thousands of sites who take content from the PR, who
don't all dissapear.

It would be a horribly messy job for Google if somebody sat in a little room
manually wading through the SERPS checking out websites and putting
them in a nice little white list.

I don't believe it happens, it would make a mockery of press syndication
as we know it.

I can also tell you from personal experience that I have sites which are
almost 100% duplicated content which feed in press releases and
news daily, they have zero issue, the same can be said for bazillions
of auto bloggers and so forth who don't all just get removed.

I'm sorry, I give it no credence, major news site or small news site
btw, I even OWN a news site , it's an approved Google news site
now but it never was , it used to happily pull in press content
for years without a problem.

Thanks
1 reply

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14 years ago

Originally Posted by SimonHarrison

Hi Kurt,

I simply don't put stock in this because if you remove the big boys from the
equation, there are still thousands of sites who take content from the PR, who
don't all dissapear.

It would be a horribly messy job for Google if somebody sat in a little room
manually wading through the SERPS checking out websites and putting
them in a nice little white list.

I don't believe it happens, it would make a mockery of press syndication
as we know it.

I can also tell you from personal experience that I have sites which are
almost 100% duplicated content which feed in press releases and
news daily, they have zero issue, the same can be said for bazillions
of auto bloggers and so forth who don't all just get removed.

I'm sorry, I give it no credence, major news site or small news site
btw, I even OWN a news site , it's an approved Google news site
now but it never was , it used to happily pull in press content
for years without a problem.

Hi Simon,

The problem is, I only gave an example. And this doesn't mean all news source sites are whitelisted in the same way the NY Times is.

Your train of thought suggests all sites should be treated equally by Google. I totally disagree with this assumption. If I owned Google, I'd give priority to the NY Times over your site. I'd be stupid not to, and I don't assume Google is stupid.

It would be a horribly messy job for Google if somebody sat in a little room
manually wading through the SERPS checking out websites and putting
them in a nice little white list.

I've made 3 or 4 posts on this issue already proving Google can easily afford this. As a matter of fact, I showed how they could possibly do it spending about 1/10 of 1% of their total EARNINGS, not gross.

I suggest you actually do the math (like I did) before making this statement. Plus, Google doesn't have to check every search, only the top percetange that brings in the majority of their profit.

You said yourself that you have a news source site, therefore you should surely accept the fact that someone did "sit in a little room" and check your site. The problem is, judging by your answser you assume they give the same "pass/fail" grade to all news sites. Is it posible your site passed with a "60" while the NY Times got an "100"?

Yes, it is possible.

And I'm sorry, but I give zero credence to your idea that Google treats all sites the same way. It just doesn't make sense.

I can also tell you from personal experience that I have sites which are
almost 100% duplicated content which feed in press releases and
news daily, they have zero issue, the same can be said for bazillions
of auto bloggers and so forth who don't all just get removed.

I'm sorry, I give it no credence, major news site or small news site
btw, I even OWN a news site , it's an approved Google news site
now but it never was , it used to happily pull in press content
for years without a problem.

Here's my experience, as far as I know I am the first person I know of that used RSS pheeds in a search engine friendly way when I created BlogBomb in 2003. I've been doing this as long as anybody.

(Note to those that want to bring up Magpie, etc. It was around before Blogbomb, and there were other syndication tools, but they all used javascript and were used to display only headlines. None of them wrote the content in a SE friendly way.)

I never said not to use doop content. My point was, and is, you can't tell people to observe major sites and assume their sites will be treated in the same way.

Also, you don't know if they have "zero issues". Because a page ranks well and gets traffic doesn't mean there aren't issues. It's quite possible that Google uses some type of "original meter" and factors this into the rankings. This doesn't mean that doop content can't and won't work, it only means it would be less effective, which it should be.

I've also developed my own search engines over the past 12-13 years. I didn't have the same sophistication as Google by any means, but the problem of wanting good results for users is the exact same. In my own search engines I hate having doop pages taking up multiple spots in the SERPs. And I'm willing to bet that Google feels the same way. The only thing up to debate is how they handle it.

the same can be said for bazillions
of auto bloggers and so forth who don't all just get removed

I never said doop content is removed. I used the word "filtered". And most autobloggers "stitch" content, another technique I helped develop...Meaning they mix and match content from various sources on the same page, making the results only "partially" doop, which isn't the the original point of this discusssion, which concerns exact doops of the same article.

On this thread I've mostly concentrated on the logic and reasoning, not on whether one should use doop content or not.

If it works for you, use it. We just shouldn't be telling others that it's optimal, because we don't know that. On the other hand, it's likely that while doop content isn't optimal, it is still usable in many ways.

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14 years ago

Originally Posted by Kurt

Hi Simon,

The problem is, I only gave an example. And this doesn't mean all news source sites are whitelisted in the same way the NY Times is.

Your train of thought suggests all sites should be treated equally by Google. I totally disagree with this assumption. If I owned Google, I'd give priority to the NY Times over your site. I'd be stupid not to, and I don't assume Google is stupid.

I don't in ANYWAY believe Google treats all sights equally Kurt. I do believe however
that Google doesn't penalize a site for having duplicate content linking back to it.

Your main point about whether a site is penalized for internal dupe content, is
open to debate of course.

Those are two entirely different issues.

Ive made 3 or 4 posts on this issue already proving Google can easily afford this. As a matter of fact, I showed how they could possibly do it spending about 1/10 of 1% of their total EARNINGS, not gross.

I'm sure they can afford to do anything Kurt, I'm sure they could afford
to go through every site in the index and add smiley faces to it, doesn't
mean they do, would want to , or that there would be a single benefit
to doing so.

Just doesn't seem that sane to me, certainly not as it relates to whether a not
a site is penalized by syndication.

I suggest you actually do the math (like I did) before making this statement. Plus, Google doesn't have to check every search, only the top percetange that brings in the majority of their profit.

What maths and what statement exactly, lets be specific here.

You said yourself that you have a news source site, therefore you should surely accept the fact that someone did "sit in a little room" and check your site.

You have to submit your site after following a large number of caveats and
then it's reviewed. They don't "happen across your site" in some swathing
check of websites and whitelist it on the off chance you'll syndicate your content.

I never said not to use doop content. My point was, and is, you can't tell people to observe major sites and assume their sites will be treated in the same way.

Hmm, you seem to be discussing the merits or otherwise of on site duplicated
content here, if you're talking about on site duplicated content, then our positions
are the same, it's not optimal because whether you get listed in the SERPS vs
the supplemental for that content , it will be down to how much trust Google gives
your site.

But that's an entirely seperate issue from a site syndicating its' content
and getting penalized by Google from the links coming back to it from
that syndicated content.

Two issues going on here I think, sorry it was very late last night and
perhaps I misunderstood your point.

Also, you don't know if they have "zero issues". Because a page ranks well and gets traffic doesn't mean there aren't issues. It's quite possible that Google uses some type of "original meter" and factors this into the rankings. This doesn't mean that doop content can't and won't work, it only means it would be less effective, which it should be.

Are we talking about the same issue here Kurt??

I am saying syndication of content that back links to a site does not hurt
the site it back links to.

Above, you're talking about how well a duplicate content page ranks.

I've also developed my own search engines over the past 12-13 years. I didn't have the same sophistication as Google by any means, but the problem of wanting good results for users is the exact same. In my own search engines I hate having doop pages taking up multiple spots in the SERPs. And I'm willing to bet that Google feels the same way. The only thing up to debate is how they handle it.

Exactly, this has been a huge point I've been making Kurt, have you read
my posts ? There's no doubt whatsoever that duplicated or syndicated
content is put into the supplemental and not all versions are shown and in
my opinion those in the supplemental have devalued link juice.

I think you'll find you're preaching to the choir here.

And most autobloggers "stitch" content, another technique I helped develop...Meaning they mix and match content from various sources on the same page, making the results only "partially" doop, which isn't the the original point of this discusssion, which concerns exact doops of the same article.

Some do, some don't, some spin, some convert to ascii to fool Google, some
translate and back again, and plenty just take plain old press releases and
import them to their sites, again, you're talking about ONSITE syndication
and duplicate content issues here.

On this thread I've mostly concentrated on the logic and reasoning, not on whether one should use doop content or not.

I think our points are entirely different , and not even contrary in many places.

If it works for you, use it. We just shouldn't be telling others that it's optimal, because we don't know that.

I'm absolutely convinced it's not optimal as far as it relates to back link juice.

I'm absolutely convinced it's not optimal for traffic as most of it hits the
supplemental.

I'm absolutely convinced that if a site breaks a story and that story is
syndicated around the web and sites link back to the site that broke
the story, that the site doesn't get penalized.

I think if I understand your position correctly you believe that the site
that broke the story suffers a SERPS penalty unless some bod from
Google comes along and adds it to this "whitelist" you talk about.

It simply makes no sense (IMO) to take that position.

Here's another set of parameters for you Kurt.

Lets say some site does a great article on how to keep your dog warm in winter.

Lets say it goes mini viral via Facebook or whatever and that little site gets
that article reprinted on various dog sites and gets a couple of hundred new
back links.

Is it your position that the little dog information sites then gets penalized by
Google because it's content was syndicated ?

And that Google spend their time looking out for every permutation of syndication
across millions of sites and white list sites so they don't suffer a penalty?

Aside from anything else, do you not see the potential for abuse on a massive level
from competitive niches ?

I think on the onsite duplication issue we probably agree on 50%, I think there
are negatives, in the sense if your site contains the exact same content
as hundreds of others you restrict your relevence in the SERPS, however
I don't and have not ever seen a site suffer overall in the SERPS from being
predominantly dupe content.

I think the housekeeping Google would have to do and the variation in
such an action to "value" every site that contains duplicate content
is a step that has no overall value to Google and seems in the grand
scheme of things somewhat a strange use of resources.

In regards OFFsite content, syndication in other words, ie numerous versions
of the same content, all linking back to one "money" site, I have
never seen a penalty ever in regards the SERPS, I've simply never seen
a major benefit.

As I said previously, the link juice from 200 pieces of doop is greater all things
being equal than the juice from 20, but it doesn't ever really seem to shift
terms past any level of competition, to do that, you need unique.

My 2 cents of course...

Thanks

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wendymay1

14 years ago

Hi Kate

Thanks for bringing this invaluable information to the Forum.
Matt M also thanks. Now I can believe in Content syndication.

Thanks

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Kelvin Brown

14 years ago

For years we have talked about duplicate content. Earlier there was a lot of discussions on the meaning of duplicate content vs syndication.

There are several on page factors that make even most syndicated content, NOT a duplicate page.

Site #1:
article title: What is duplicate content?
Blogger.com
2 columns

site #2
article title: What is duplicate content?
Wordpress blog
3 columns

*each blog is active, meaning having several posts.

I could list more variables, but let's just look at the 2 differences.
The search engines, don't just go there and spot an article, they SPIDER pages.

Just the fact that one blog uses 3 columns and one uses 2 is enough to say the pages are NOT duplicates, even if using the exact same articles, because the blog with 3 columns will additional content on the page, maybe a calendar, if using summaries, maybe the summaries are different sizes. The tags, h1 headings, etc, will be in different places. Catogries will be in different, maybe even have different names. They are likely not updated at the exact same moment.

Bottom line, it is very tough to actually have duplicate (pages) on various websites.

If you have a full article on your page, and I have a full article on my blog, it is still very likely to have at least a 25% difference in the actual page content, because of all the other factors, as mentioned above.

Kelvin

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14 years ago

Originally Posted by Kelvin Brown

Just the fact that one blog uses 3 columns and one uses 2 is enough to say the pages are NOT duplicates, even if using the exact same articles, because the blog with 3 columns will additional content on the page, maybe a calendar, if using summaries, maybe the summaries are different sizes.

...Bottom line, it is very tough to actually have duplicate (pages) on various websites.

Interesting take, but I...don't...knowwwww -- I could write code that parses tags, structure, etc from the article itself.

With the millions of lines of code Google has in their algorythm and the NASA-types that work for Google, I think that they can work around site structure, and a lot of other amazing things.

Also, Google themselves said that the article doesn't have to be 100% the same to be tagged as the same article. One example is a post date an article might have. There are no doubt thousands of other little examples.

Anyhow, my point is untested. I'm just surmising at this point. ~p

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Kelvin Brown

14 years ago

Originally Posted by pjblanch

Interesting take, but I...don't...knowwwww -- I could write code that parses tags, structure, etc from the article itself.

With the millions of lines of code Google has in their algorythm and the NASA-types that work for Google, I think that they can work around site structure, and a lot of other amazing things.

Also, Google themselves said that the article doesn't have to be 100% the same to be tagged as the same article. One example is a post date an article might have. There are no doubt thousands of other little examples.

Anyhow, my point is untested. I'm just surmising at this point. ~p

I am sure that you are very talented and of course google buys a lot talent.
But just as a note, i am not just talking about tags, but the content within those tags.
That is what really makes the difference. Your calendar and mine may be the exact same plugin: But if you say 'car' and I say 'automobile' then the content is different. And yes, I know it is easy enough to look at context, and see that the 2 mean the same.

Kelvin

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billionareHuman

14 years ago

duplicate content from other sites linking to yours is a myth. However spinners are useful.

which do you think should give you more ranking power?

A. the exact same content pointing to your site spread accross 100 sites

B. different content pointing to your site spread accross 100 sites

Thus B assumes that there could be lot's of different people writing about your site. For A we know only 1 person wrote about your website.

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14 years ago

Simon, you're a real character, I'll give you that. What I was saying from the start is that you only have so many hours in the day to write articles. So, given that you've written 1 or 10 or 50 per day, maximize their effectiveness by distributing them widely. That's all.

TomG.

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Steven Wagenheim 14 years ago

Simon, thanks. I think we actually DO agree on more than we disagree on.

Yes, for people looking to do hundreds of thousands of dollars a month and
where dropping $1,500 is peanuts for original articles (that's almost 15% of
my monthly income) I can see it. But for me to spend that kind of money
where I don't have that kind of potential anyway, it's pointless.

My monthly expenses are under $200.

How many people make 6 figures a year on that kind of budget?

That's why I don't place as much importance on this as you do and yes, I
do see where you're coming from.

As you said in your last post.

It does KILL it in some scenarios and in others, it's almost moot.

When you're working with the market I'm working with (small businesses)
it's worse than moot.

It's meaningless.
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14 years ago

Originally Posted by tommygadget

Simon, you're a real character, I'll give you that. What I was saying from the start is that you only have so many hours in the day to write articles. So, given that you've written 1 or 10 or 50 per day, maximize their effectiveness by distributing them widely. That's all.

TomG.

My character or otherwise is irrelevant Tom, If you want to have
a discussion , I'm all ears, if you want to make snidey comments,
at that level, sorry , I have better things to do with my time.

What you said from the start is crystal and in black and white.

What your saying above really means nothing in context to the point
about duplicate value content links and unique.

Right, getting late for me, adios.

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14 years ago

Simon, I'm sorry you took my comment the wrong way. I find the way you respond to this thread and the time you've put into it interesting, and not in a bad way. If you know anything about me, I don't make snide comments. I was not trying to insult you. I simply did not think the comment needed a smiley, but here's one anyway

TomG.

Maybe it's my avatar pic. Someone said I looked angry in that picture.

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14 years ago

Originally Posted by tommygadget

Simon, I'm sorry you took my comment the wrong way. I find the way you respond to this thread and the time you've put into it interesting, and not in a bad way. If you know anything about me, I don't make snide comments. I was not trying to insult you. I simply did not think the comment needed a smiley, but here's one anyway

TomG.

Maybe it's my avatar pic. Someone said I looked angry in that picture.

Perhaps it's an "across the pond" issue Tom, it sounded derogatory.
If no negative inference was intended,please take my response with
a pinch of salt .

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Arizona

14 years ago

I have also done the same thing, meaning I have posted an article on EzineArticles and then spun the article slightly and submitted it to other sites. It has also worked for me. I must say that I do not always spin the article though and I still get the exact same article posted on other article sites.

I use this strategy on Improve-Your-Business-Today

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Joseph Park

14 years ago

Wow, man.. This is huge. So everything people said about duplicate content penalty has been a lie then? But what happened though? I remember Google de-indexing quite a number of same contents in the past and that's why people started to develop content or article spinners, no?

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rts2271

14 years ago

Duplicate content IS a issue, but not for the reason you think. There is a difference in how search engines treat the content. Feeds are almost never penalized for being duplicated. If duplicate content was equally rated your saying I can scrape CNN meticulously and within X time I would be in equal ranking to CNN? I think not. Ask Ezine articles about why they want unique content at the time of posting. All links are not the same. A score is factored to the source that no piece of duplicated content can achieve.
I don't think hundreds of hardcore SEO and content people would get this wrong. Go post this on digitalpoint, bhw or seobook and see how quickly they laugh you off the forums.

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14 years ago

A lot of people I really respect have commented on this post asnd many with different thoughts.

For what it is worth, I've learned quite a bit from the various postings and what I really think is fantastic is the respectful manner in which the postings are taking place.

Well done Warriors....well done!

Respectfully,
Tim

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KateD

14 years ago

Originally Posted by TimG

A lot of people I really respect have commented on this post asnd many with different thoughts.

For what it is worth, I've learned quite a bit from the various postings and what I really think is fantastic is the respectful manner in which the postings are taking place.

Well done Warriors....well done!

Respectfully,
Tim

I totally agree with TimG. There has been plenty of knowledge and experience passed back and forth on this thread, and I appreciate everyone's input.

One thing that I want to emphasize is that I'm not trying to "convert" anyone into sharing my opinions.

I'm just sharing what I have seen personally, and am encouraging others to put ANY theory/myth/commonly held belief to the test themselves.

Much Success,

KateD

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Kelvin Brown

14 years ago

Anything that I write and it sounds good, feel free to attribute it to Kurt. Some, many of the things I mentioned I learned in his forum, or at least discussed them further there.

Kelvin

PS> only if it makes sense. IF not, it was just me thinking out loud again.

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14 years ago

Originally Posted by Kelvin Brown

Anything that I write and it sounds good, feel free to attribute it to Kurt. Some, many of the things I mentioned I learned in his forum, or at least discussed them further there.

Kelvin

PS> only if it makes sense. IF not, it was just me thinking out loud again.

Thanks Kelvin...I really appreciate it.

The bad part of this thread is that it can make it seem like it's a "one or the other" decision.

One of the things we discuss is that when there are no clear-cut "winners", to exploit all reasonable possibilities. In this case, it means to use both original and doop content, as neither is a clear cut choice.

There's times when the highest quality, unique content is best and times when PLR or scraped articles will work.

Then there's always the definition of what "duplicate content" really is...It's possible that one can post a doop article and because they have a lot of other stuff on the same page, and at the same time another site posts the same exact article on their own page that also has tons of other stuff, that the two pages are scene as "50%" doop.

Just because two pages use the same articles doesn't make the pages 100% the same.

I'm just guessing, but if I were Mr. Google, I wouldn't have a pass/fail for doop content. Instead, I would try to judge how original the article is.

Is it 50% original? 70%? 10%?

I'd try to factor these into the algo on a "sliding scale", with pages with a higher "originality score" getting a boost over pages that have a lower originality score.

I don't know how much, I'm sure it would take a little tweaking. But I'd probably have the algo make it possible for a 10% original page to outrank a 90% original page, but a lot of other factors would have to fall into place.

Can they do this? Quite probably. The people behind Google Alerts are the same people that own Copyscape, so we know at the minimum Google has a working relationship with them.

Run a page through a copyscape-type algo every few months and give a page a quick uniqueness rating. Then apply it as part of the other 200 page factors Google claims to use.

So now when a really long-tail keyword phrase is used, doop pages with exact matches can still show up in the SERPs, since they are more "relevant" due to the number of keywords used in the query. But they don't have the same juice and won't outrank many pages when more general keywords are used.

Sure, it isn't perfect, but neither are SERPs with 100 results all containing the exact same article.

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anwar001

14 years ago

Article spinning is good when you are using services like uniquearticlewizard or AMA that submits to hundreds of blogs and sites. When you are handsubmitting to a dozen or so sites (mostly high PR article directories) then spinning is not required in most cases. That is my opinion about article marketing and spinning.

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Quentin

14 years ago

Two years ago we made 30 blogs all with identical information which was used for the travel industry. It dragged in content from the main site.

All those sites ranked quite well in the search engines and provided some great revenue.

The company got scared off in the end by some SEO company telling them they were dupe content and I sold them all off on their instructions.

Some of them are still doing well today.

Quentin

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14 years ago

Ahhh Kurt, sorry I've just re-read your initial post from last nights discussion.

It twas late from my end.

I do think we are probably talking at cross purposes here, that may be down
to me , not you.

I can see where this went awol , it was in post 67.

You responded to a post where I stated there was no penalty for having
syndicated content link back to you.

The conversation between us then seemed to move from the issue
of back links in syndicated content causing the linked to site to be
penalized to a conversation about the merits of ON site content
duplication.

I've said all I can without repeating myself on the subject now.

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Joseph Then

14 years ago

In case someone's wrong, or Google changes its mind, I rather work on 2 types of submission style:

1) Spend 50% of my time submitting original articles to articles directories
2) Spend 50% of my time submitting spinned articles to articles directories

Balance is what I would believe in.

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Lisa Gergets

14 years ago

Originally Posted by KateD

I am not saying that you should take my word for it. What I do recommend is to do your own testing, and see the results for yourself.

KateD

BRAVO to you Kate! If more internet marketers were like you, they wouldn't have to worry about silly distractions like "duplicate content".

Test for yourself! WOOT!

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14 years ago

As Tim G said about respecting the people here in this thread, I too respect you guys and would like to say that if anyone here wanted to learn more about writing articles you can't do better than Tim G and Steven Wagenheim.

I own products from both Tim and Steven and they definitely know what they are talking about when it comes to article marketing.

I don't know about Steven's career as a ventriloquist, but that's another story

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14 years ago

Originally Posted by Matt M

As Tim G said about respecting the people here in this thread, I too respect you guys and would like to say that if anyone here wanted to learn more about writing articles you can't do better than Tim G and Steven Wagenheim.

I own products from both Tim and Steven and they definitely know what they are talking about when it comes to article marketing.

I don't know about Steven's career as a ventriloquist, but that's another story

Thank you for the kind words Matt - It truly means a lot -

Respectfully,
Tim

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14 years ago

Originally Posted by Matt M

As Tim G said about respecting the people here in this thread, I too respect you guys and would like to say that if anyone here wanted to learn more about writing articles you can't do better than Tim G and Steven Wagenheim.

I own products from both Tim and Steven and they definitely know what they are talking about when it comes to article marketing.

I don't know about Steven's career as a ventriloquist, but that's another story

Thank you Matt. As Tim already said, this means a lot.

As for my career as a ventriloquist, no comment.

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14 years ago

Originally Posted by TimG

Tom,
Great point and that's one of the driving forces behind my decision to stop focusing on 20-30 different niches and instead focus on a select few in order to get their article Soldiers out into the battle for visitor superiority.

Tim

Yes Tim, I agree with this approach. You need to put out a lot of feelers before you find those 20-30 niches that are worth the thousands of articles necessary, though!

Originally Posted by SimonHarrison

Perhaps it's an "across the pond" issue Tom, it sounded derogatory.
If no negative inference was intended,please take my response with
a pinch of salt .

Nope, no negative inference at all.

TomG.

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14 years ago

Originally Posted by tommygadget

Yes Tim, I agree with this approach. You need to put out a lot of feelers before you find those 20-30 niches that are worth the thousands of articles necessary, though!

TomG.

Very true, very true - I remember a few years back I could accurately tell if a niche was going to be profitable enough to build a site around from as little as 3 articles in less then 24-36 hours.

Of course, times have changed and it requires a little more work to determine the true profit potential for a niche topic but sending out some feelers (I prefer the term Recon Articles

) does help expediate the process.

Respectfully,
Tim

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jimgk 13 years ago

see # 27

http://www.warriorforum.com/adsense-...s-my-site.html

i am pretty sure it is relevant?

jim
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numba8

14 years ago

very good post, and interesting

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Tyler Jonsson

14 years ago

This is a really great post. It's tough to know which "side" truly wins on this battle.

I think that for us "small time" webmasters who aren't in charge of sites that are expected to make tens if not hundreds of thousands of dollars a month, it seems like syndication is a good idea.

I know personally, it's just me and my wife writing articles and we don't have a ton of time. Nor do we have the capital to invest in getting articles written for us.

So if we can make our sparse amount of articles have "longer legs" so to speak by submitting to multiple directories, that would be a great benefit.

Would we be better off writing unique content for each and every directory... Sure, I don't doubt that. But it's also not even remotely possible. So that's out the window.

To the OP and others who advocate syndication:

Would you mind posting a list of the directories that have given you the best results other than EZA, whether it was good backlink juice or lots of organic click thru's?

If we could compile a nice list of 20-40 directories here that would be an amazing resource!

Thanks again for the really great thread of back and forth dialogue!!!

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