100+ sites in different towns, Duplicate content question - Offline Business

[PeterJones]

Hi everyone,

I have landed a £xx,xxx contract with a large local plumbing company.

They require a website for each area that they cover, I have looked into detail and the number of different towns that they cover is over 100. They want to appear local to everyone and have the idea of having one site for each town.

Can you be penalised for duplicate conent if each site is on its own domain name?

I have had issues in the past with duplicate content on one domain name but have never had a project requiring this volume of domains. The problem is there is only so much I can do to to make each site unique. The sites are only going to be 6 pages each.

I look forward to your replies,

Kindest Regards

Peter Jones

[ehicks727]

I don't believe that's the best way of handling it. What you're proposing would look very much like trying to game the system. All it would take is a competitor ratting you out to Google and you're history.

Instead, I would suggest subdomains. There are many successful examples of using subdomains to handle your situation.

Look at CertaPro and Huntington Learning Centers

CertaPro uses subdomains for each location
House Painting, CertaPro Painters, Painting Contractors and House Painters
Certa ProPainters - Scott Neal

Huntington does a very similar scenario
Huntington Learning Center :: Tutors, Tutoring in Math, Reading, Writing, SAT and ACT prep
Huntington Learning Center :: Tutors, Tutoring in Math, Reading, Writing, SAT and ACT prep

[PeterJones]

Subdomins had crossed my mind, however because each towns site would be the same as all the others all of the content is on the one domain. how does that fair for duplicate content?

Thanks for your suggestion

[GoGetta]

Hi Peter,

As I mentioned in the earlier email I dont think it will matter too much. You see when I worked at my old job where I was just selling IM to businesses owners, the sites they put up were template sites and the content was pretty much identical each time. They had about 30,000+ clients with the same sites in the UK and they all ranked very well in Google!

But I am no Google expert! ; ) So I wouldn't be 100% but if they did it on that scale I am sure you could with 100 sites!

GoGetta

[PeterJones]

Cheers Jamie,

I have been reading up on it and there seems to be so much conflicting info on the subject.

Googles webmaster tools states:

Don't create multiple pages, subdomains or domains with substantially duplicate content

Then i read elsewhere what you have said, and what has already been mentioned about subdomians.

Peter Jones

[ehicks727]

Originally Posted by PeterJones

Subdomins had crossed my mind, however because each towns site would be the same as all the others all of the content is on the one domain. how does that fair for duplicate content?

As long as you liberally sprinkle the city's name, and substitute out some unique text in every subdomain, you won't have a dupe content problem. However, if you just blanket copy exactly the same text on every town's page(s) then yeah, you might have a problem.

This just boils down to good web copy. Study other examples (like CertaPro, Huntington) who have done this well, and copy what they do. Both of those companies have GREAT search engine results for each local franchise location (I know this because I build supplemental web directories for both of these companies). So don't re-invent the wheel.

I think making a separate domain for each location is insane. The maintenance alone is going to drive you insane. You'd be better off building out the "corporate" pages, and then have a subdomain for each location, and make it all database driven so you don't have to hand-edit the locations' pages. The locations can use shared resources, like contact forms, etc... Don't need a separate contact form for every location... that's too much work.

Save yourself a lot of headaches... use subdomains.

[GoGetta]

I dont think anyone other than Google know whats right and waht isn't. I would probably make sure you substantially rewrite the content somewhat on each site! May take a little longer but then at least you know!

GoGetta

[PeterJones]

Thanks to both of you for your advice,

If any one else has an opinion it would be much apprecated.

Peter Jones

[ehicks727]

Originally Posted by GoGetta

I dont think anyone other than Google know whats right and waht isn't. I would probably make sure you substantially rewrite the content somewhat on each site! May take a little longer but then at least you know!

GoGetta

I've done this on a site with over 6,000 pages. It's a web directory and it's all database-driven. The variable data is city and state. As long as you insert your variable data in the title tag, desc. & keywords meta tag, your H1, and a few times in the content, you're fine. You won't get penalized for dupe content (unless you're doing something else stupid).

Obviously, I don't know exactly how Google would determine duplicate content, but it HAS to be a hashing algorithm of some kind. So if you have variable data sprinkled in throughout the content, the hash value will change. You're safe.

[PeterJones]

Thanks for your advice jamie and EHicks

Peter Jones

[ehicks727]

Originally Posted by PeterJones

Thanks for your advice jamie and EHicks

Peter Jones

You're welcome... good luck!

[MarkR]

Peter,

I have another, similar view for you, with a twist.

The fastest way to do this with the least effort, that has been proven to work is an automated site generator. I'd strongly recommend a macro generator like Push Button Marketer. You can build the site once, paste it into a macro program and spit out as many sites or pages as you could ever want. It's an awesome way to do this without investing a ton of time.

I personally would be more comfortable with separate domains, as it would be harder, but not impossible for Google to recognize the duplicate content across domains, especially if they are on different IPs.

As far as content, I'd follow ehicks727 advice up in this thread by ensuring title tags, meta tags, etc. all have different city and state/province/village (or whatever) names. It's so easy to "program" the variables in a macro to paste them into the code, don't worry. I would take it a step further and also:

• have blocks of copy that you can swap between different URLs
• force the city, state names in the alt tags of the graphics
• force the file names of the photos and associated alt tags to be city specific
• force the file name of the HTML pages to be city/state specific
• header and footer graphics file names could be unique and / or location specific too.

Bottom line - if you have enough key elements of every page being unique, you'll be fine. I've seen other domains that have done this with great success. An automated site generator makes this way easier.

Lastly, if you don't do it well enough for Google, then you didn't waste a lot time building the properties with the macro type program.

Mark

[PeterJones]

Mark great advice there, I will be using parts of all the advice given so far. Im sure I can make them all unique enough and leave no traces so to speak. I havent used anything like push button marketer before but that looks interesting and as you have recommended it, I will mor ethan likely implement it.

Kindest Regards

Peter Jones

[Kurt]

I suggest using php with a mysql database and generate the sites dynamically, using custom data for each location, concentrating on making the home page of each unique.

This way, you can make changes to a single database and have the changes take place across the network.

Google likely won't penalize doop pages, but likely ignore them. Plus, most of the locations probably won't get much search traffic anyway. Plus, you shouldn't need to get all 6 pages ranking anyway, instead focus on getting each homepage ranked, especially for Google "local".

IMO, a database/dynamic driven site is your only option. And, I'm not sure why you need to have multiple domains (more money) or even sub domains, or duplicate 5 pages on all "sites"? Why not a single site, with pages dedicated to each location? This would concentrate any linking campaigns (benefits) to a single site.

Why does each location need it's own site?

[PeterJones]

Hi Kurt,

I have been looking into a php/mysql solution, but can't find any detailed info on the subject. Any clues on that?

[alloo]

Kurt,
Which tool (tulz?) would you recommend to update each page or each subdomain or each site?

[TheRichJerksNet]

Originally Posted by PeterJones

Hi Kurt,

I have been looking into a php/mysql solution, but can't find any detailed info on the subject. Any clues on that?

Peter,
I can build you a php / mysql system that will allow you to control the sites from a backend admin area.. Giving CMS controls and everything so each site can have unique content.

I see no reason why each town would have the sme info anyways as different towns have different events, different history and etc ...

If you interested in having a script built that you can use for this let me know. I can build the script then you just install it on each domain and customize it from the admin area ...

James

[Glenn Leader]

I've got a system that will build these sites for you, and give you unique content. It is very simple, and you won't need fancy databases and stuff. It's not on sale yet... it's in advance beta.

PM me if you want to see what it's able to do, and I'll give you a freebie to test my system further.

Glenn

[khtm]

Originally Posted by Glenn Leader

I've got a system that will build these sites for you, and give you unique content. It is very simple, and you won't need fancy databases and stuff. It's not on sale yet... it's in advance beta.

PM me if you want to see what it's able to do, and I'll give you a freebie to test my system further.

Glenn

Hi Glenn, I'm interested in testing your system. I'm quite handy with web design, programming, and databases. Unfortunately I am unable to use PM because I don't have 15 posts yet . Please send details to my email - [kane.web.marketing (at) gmail.com]