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How to Deal with Copy/Paste Bloggers?

by Mousumi
22 replies
Lately, I noticed that the organic traffic to my blog has declined. I asked my hubby to take a look into the matter and figure out if there was something going wrong.

Here is what he told me:

1. Almost all top performing posts' title (On motivation/Life Lessons) has been copied and at least three bloggers have targeted my blog. They have kept the title copy/paste and rewritten the content (I don't think I can file DMCA on this basis)

2. Over 50 posts have been copied/pasted in forums and blogger, tumblr and wordpress blogs. they are promoting their personal blogs and websites. Some of them have cited the my website as source and some have just cited the name and did not link back

3. He suggested me to spend time on social bookmarking sites and claim more positions in Google search results


I can't spend hours chasing such people. All I want to know is how to stay ahead. I have joined just one forum which is WF and the places I bookmark my posts are Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Stumbleupon and Scoopit and earlier I used to post on Digg and Delicious..but not now.

I will appreciate your help.
#blog #bloggers #blogging advice #copy & paste #copy or paste #deal
  • Profile picture of the author larryboy03
    I had this problem recently too. Although these bloggers were not copying all my content but they were linking back. I still don't want others stealing my content so I used a content protector plugin from wordpress.
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    • Profile picture of the author Mousumi
      I can't use that plugin, Larry. I have no problem is someone takes text from us and give us credit. My blog posts have been mentioned (as a source) on HuffingtonPost, Business Insider and BBC Magazine. Using this plugin seems too harsh.

      Originally Posted by larryboy03 View Post

      I had this problem recently too. Although these bloggers were not copying all my content but they were linking back. I still don't want others stealing my content so I used a content protector plugin from wordpress.
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  • Profile picture of the author Mousumi
    No further comments and suggestions?
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    • Profile picture of the author Claire Koch
      you should take the time to make sure someone gives you appropriate credit otherwise this will continue to go on.

      Whats the worst thing that can happen? You get them to take a look again and they may buy something from your site.

      You could partner up. Ask them to become your affilaite and sell your products? There's more then one way to look at this. Get a reciprocal link for every person who stole your content.
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  • Profile picture of the author Onora Oz
    Mousumi, did you check Tynt ?
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  • Profile picture of the author techbul
    Social signals are indeed efficient. If you publish an article and you get likes, tweets, social bookmarks, forum posts, blog comments then it means your content is quality content. Also, Google will index and rank your content accordingly.
    If you want to take this route, I think Synnd is one of the most complete services you could use, and it's not that expensive.
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  • Profile picture of the author FredJones
    How about sending DMCA notifications? I mean, I understand you don't want to invest time with these people, but at the same time I don't know whether these copycat businesses are proving to be too expensive for you. If not, don't bother...


    Originally Posted by Mousumi View Post

    Lately, I noticed that the organic traffic to my blog has declined. I asked my hubby to take a look into the matter and figure out if there was something going wrong.

    Here is what he told me:

    1. Almost all top performing posts' title (On motivation/Life Lessons) has been copied and at least three bloggers have targeted my blog. They have kept the title copy/paste and rewritten the content (I don't think I can file DMCA on this basis)

    2. Over 50 posts have been copied/pasted in forums and blogger, tumblr and wordpress blogs. they are promoting their personal blogs and websites. Some of them have cited the my website as source and some have just cited the name and did not link back

    3. He suggested me to spend time on social bookmarking sites and claim more positions in Google search results


    I can't spend hours chasing such people. All I want to know is how to stay ahead. I have joined just one forum which is WF and the places I bookmark my posts are Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Stumbleupon and Scoopit and earlier I used to post on Digg and Delicious..but not now.

    I will appreciate your help.
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    • Profile picture of the author Mousumi
      Can I file a DMCA to those who have copied just the title of my blog posts?
      I don't think it's possible.
      Yesterday, I sent emails to forum admins and asked them to either cite my blog as source or delete the content.


      Originally Posted by FredJones View Post

      How about sending DMCA notifications? I mean, I understand you don't want to invest time with these people, but at the same time I don't know whether these copycat businesses are proving to be too expensive for you. If not, don't bother...
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  • Profile picture of the author David Micheal
    You can write A guideline for those who want to copy paste your blog post. Outline what step that them have to take if they want to use your blog post.
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  • Profile picture of the author Josh Monroe
    It seems to me fro how give explained it that your content is being scraped for SEO purposes.

    If this is the case then there's nothing you can really do since the tools they are using are automated, and it's just taking content based f a specific keyword.

    It really wouldn't be worth your time to go around contacting all the different places your content is being posted, and even if you do a lot if the time you will be ignored.

    The only thing I can suggest is to make sure your doing you SEO correctly. As long as they don't rank above you, you will be fine.
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    • Profile picture of the author Mousumi
      You caught it right, Josh!

      Yes, it seems a group of bloggers have come to know about the keywords I am ranking in Google...Some of the main words are Success Stories, Success Story, Life Lessons, Lessons of Life, 10 life lessons and some more.

      I have installed SEO Yoast and going to fix all the posts. Such kind of attack is really annoying. Last month, someone had redirected thousands of fake visitors to my blog and as a result it crashed


      Originally Posted by Josh Monroe View Post

      It seems to me fro how give explained it that your content is being scraped for SEO purposes.

      If this is the case then there's nothing you can really do since the tools they are using are automated, and it's just taking content based f a specific keyword.

      It really wouldn't be worth your time to go around contacting all the different places your content is being posted, and even if you do a lot if the time you will be ignored.

      The only thing I can suggest is to make sure your doing you SEO correctly. As long as they don't rank above you, you will be fine.
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  • Profile picture of the author talfighel
    The only thing that you can do here is to email the people who have copied you and ask them, in a nice way, to delete their content that they copied. By the way, that is probably not going to happen so don't waste your time.

    You can email the hosting provider and tell them about this. They might delete their account by they can always use another hosting company and still copy your stuff. That would be a waste of time too if that happens.

    Or, you can move on in life and ignore this. Nothing you can do about it.
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    • Profile picture of the author Mousumi
      It's really tough
      Blogging isn't as easy as I thought it to be. Thanks for sharing your view!


      Originally Posted by talfighel View Post

      you can move on in life and ignore this. Nothing you can do about it.
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  • Profile picture of the author Mousumi
    Hi Chris,

    I have never used any directory to promote my blog.

    Originally Posted by Chris Kent View Post

    I'm confused why they would target you. Have you put your content on article directories too? Because many thieves will go there and copy a nauseum, without giving due credit.
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    • Profile picture of the author TerranceCharles
      At this point, there is not too much you can do. You can't catch everyone. You can use something like copyscape to help prevent it in the future. But, don't dwell on it too long, just keep putting out more blog post. However, I've had it happen to me before so I personally make a example out of someone for the rest to see

      Don't worry about calling them out, they stole your content in the 1st place. And you can put a disclaimer on your blog post itself at the bottom that says something like "This content is copywrited, unauthorized use in any way will be brought to attention and persued legally." Something along those lines, it will make people think before they decide to mess with you again
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      • Profile picture of the author DABK
        Removing Content From Google - Google Help

        Google will remove pages that break laws (plagiarism, and others). Report the pages to Google.

        I don't think the traffic decline's got anything to do with people copying your stuff without your permission. If that were the case, I'd just copy like crazy the sites above mine and jump to #1. And they, of course, would do the same, and I'd be back down. Then, I'd copy their stuff and... you can repeat and the results don't change... Pointless.

        Besides, not in Google's interest to show cheap copied stuff.

        PS How's tynt worked out for you?
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        • Profile picture of the author plb09
          You can use Myfreecopyright or DMCA to protect your content. When you find the site where is your article, contact the site owner to remove it. If the blog owner does not respond, use the tool WhoIsHostingThis to find his web hosting company.Write to the hosting company and explain the situation.
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          • Profile picture of the author honed
            What about the CopyLink plugin? "CopyLink adds a custom link attribution under content copied from your website or blog."

            If you are being scraped, this *may* be a solution.

            DCMA is an option if you have a copyright on your pages that were scraped and if you want to file a DCMA with their host and Google. It's not a lot of work, but that depends how many you need to file.

            If you check copyscape, that can indicate how many sites your content is on. A lot of content stealers don't realize how this hurts the original site, but stealing/scraping is shady in all cases.
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          • Profile picture of the author sunray
            Originally Posted by plb09 View Post

            You can use Myfreecopyright or DMCA to protect your content. When you find the site where is your article, contact the site owner to remove it. If the blog owner does not respond, use the tool WhoIsHostingThis to find his web hosting company.Write to the hosting company and explain the situation.
            Actually, she cannot use DMCA at all. Her site is Indian, and DMCA only applies to American websites.
            This could be the reason why she is targeted.
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  • Profile picture of the author irshad321
    Use Tynt. It helps
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