Can duplicate content HURT you?

It all depends on scale as much as anything else -- focus you time and efforts on doing what Google is actually looking for: creating quality content. That would be my advice anyway.

However, to answer your question, on a smaller scale duplicate content isn't likely to have a negative impact on your performance in the SERPs (in theory). Look at the range of duplicate article submissions in the link profile behind any SEO'd site...

Final caveat, if you're are going to post duplicate content on-site then the sites will effectively be competing against each other for position...

It won't hurt your site. But as I said in your OTHER thread spinning it is a good idea. Or how about not even using articles?? I have a site that is ranking great and I only use WP Robot to pull in youtube videos.

Now that Google has RECENTLY started to penalize alot of the duplicate content sites (such as autoblogs and such), you will have a harder time than before. Unfortunately this is very new, and not many people are aware of it, so in this case YES it can hurt you, and if you really want to do things right you should get a spinner. What do I mean by a spinner? It's a software to create unique articles - for example with wordpress, there is a plugin called Wordpress Unique. Check it out! Be careful ..

Cheers

It is of no use and through which one website cannot get good PR and reputation over search engine.

I've been using duplicate content and recently, when Google has changed algorithm, some of my sites dropped..

I have 20+ Amazon website which using spin + restructured articles and the position is safe. I add 1-2 original paragraph only to the whole page.

Lately 2-3 of my sites have started to drop since Google did a change in their algorithm, so be carefull when implementing WP Robot It might hurt you site just as it did with mine.

if you simply copy past the content of someone else on google it will harm your seo efforts for sure, but you add some more content to it then it should go well.

Not only about using spinner, but the spinned article should be more than 30% original

I think it's still work, as long you can assure that the spinned article is still readable to human. And i think that is the most hard part. However, rewriting is better than spinning

Publish it on your web page and get it indexed there first. Then distribute it elsehwhere

but if you spin... is it really a quality article?. That is why I never spin. you are just putting out verbatim in cyberspace....more than there already is now.

Duplicate content will hurt your rankings if you use WpRobot to auto post duplicate articles.The only type of duplicate content that doesn't get penalized and can be used with WpRobot is Amazon products on my opinion.
What you do is add a short description of product (you set this up in wprobot) and you make each site niche targeted (lego toys, digital camera, etc).

Yeah, duplicate content can hurt you. I mean, last weekend, I had this friend who was surfing through one of those bad internet neighbourhoods? And a gang of spun articles came out and started harassing him, walking really close to him, all asking for money and stuff. Calling him "homes" and "boy" and things like that, you know. Then one of them pulled out a direct affiliate link and outright demanded he hand over at least 30 seconds of quality page views to the ad network, almost like one of those old "pay to surf" programs, you know? And then they wrapped him up in an old 468 by 60 ad banner and stuffed him in an abandoned USENET group somewhere in the rec.* heirarchy. He contacted the internet police, and they took his statement, but they said there's really nothing they can do about it.

So yeah, I don't mess with duplicate content. It's just crazy, man.

Too funny. CDarklock, maybe your friend needs to pay for cyber protection from Al Gore, since he invented the internet.

For me duplicate content will surely hurt your site. you will also lose credibility. Whatever you do to that particular content, the concept still remains. The only difference is that the concept of the original content was said in different way, but the main point is the same

Goolge had announced duplicate and low quality content can't get a good rank.. so you want a better rank, you should write yourself.

Duplicate content is not good. It creates bad reputation towards all search engine specially google.

ummmm yuh yuh yuh yuh yuh yuh yuh yuh yeah.

With the new google duplicated content is very low seen at. I`ve seen sites going down in searches if the site content wasn`t more then 30% unique.
Article marketing became harder, Ezine is going down and autoblogs are already down.
Dont start an autoblog, they are very hard to rank-tried it!

Don't think I've seen such a load of bullocks advice on the "duplicate content" topic since way back in the day.

SYNDICATING your content is not only harmless, it's extremely helpful. Syndicated content is the reason we have rainbows and bunny rabbits. It is what will stop the aliens from taking over Los Angeles. It will win an Oscar next year. With syndication and some duct tape, you can build a rocket ship and slow global warming. Syndication caused my sister to lose 35 kg in 3 days.

Yes, I'm taking the pi$$ but I'm also thinking maybe that's what some folks need to hear, because otherwise they these threads will continue being bombarded with this kind of stuff...

Anyone telling you (^^^) syndicated content is bad or harmful is either inexperienced in the technique of promoting content, or they have a stake in getting you to buy some useless spinner software. OR, perhaps they believe in the myth that your content needs to exist only once, in one URL, ever, because, err... ummm... because it just makes sense. Or better yet, they have horrid SEO experience and they're blaming syndication for their sh!te ranks because it's too damned hard to figure out all that other pesky stuff.

Syndication is what you want your material to accomplish. You WANT other sites picking up your words, your brand, and the name behind it. You want the word to spread and you want the folks linking back to your articles and posts. In order to do that you promote your material by syndicating it yourself, via article directories, and via other means. That - my superstitious friends - is how you make the big bucks. Writing unique content once and leaving it sit on a site getting maybe 25 visits a day? Well, basically that's how you kill any dreams of buying that Tuscan home in Southern Italy next year.

I would add however, at this point spinning content is to be done at your own risk. From what I and other marketers/observers have seen, it's the directories that housed such spun horsesh!t that have taken the big whopping ding from almighty google. It is the vast amounts of LOW QUALITY content which caused google to write the "farmer" algo. See, this all started because people complained to google that the results from their search queries were getting pretty bloody lame. Why? Because they were consistently landing on sites with content spun so badly, so many times that you'd need a decoder ring to figure out it's even English. So google laid down the hammer on the sites where that spun nonsense existed in bulk.

Yes, the update is also weighed to favor the original copy of said content, but NOT at the expense of syndicated copies. I said it before, the quality of content is what caused google's reaction, not the AVAILABILITY of it. So if you're writing stuff, put it on your site first, wait for it to get indexed, and then for the love of rainbows, bunny rabbits, and my sisters current weight loss goals, SYNDICATE it.

You guys are missing some point, the guy wants to install wp robot on his OWN site, and not to syndicate his own content.

Now if he was to syndicate then I would agree with Peter Gibson, that it is extremely helpful. But I have to say that thats not the case, and publishing a syndicated content on your own website as per the latest algorithm farm change your site WILL be filtered, it MIGHT be penalized and one thing for sure, you will NEVER outrank or attempt to rank with a syndicated content (thats what the new algorithm was about, to clean up the SERPs from websites ranking with poor content or having 10 results in first page and all are of the same syndicated content = bad search experience).

If you feel like arguing over syndicate, duplicate or whatever you wish, do so. Other ways you can invest that time and figure out what would your visitors (and search engines) prefer, a new, unique, useful and detailed articles (advise) or some rubbish thing that they might have read again..and again..and again...

p.s. a content, syndicated or found on different places of the same site, is still duplicate.

Try to prepare unique content yourself.... copied content definetly hurt your site,,, if not now in future it will hurt you....

It is better to stay away from all duplicate contents for Google has slapped on websites that hosts duplicate contents. It will destroy your website's reputation in long run.

I think If Your Link Back To Original source then duplicate content won't hurt your site

I understand that the main, if not only, focus of SEO is to make money. So while suggesting to write original content can be costly in terms of time that can be spent else where, I think that actually learning new things and writing your own content can be a great learning experience. And in the fast paced world of SEO, consistent learning and a well rounded knowledge is what leads to ultimate success in the long term. Just my two cents.

In my opinion, Duplicate content always have its negative effect. It will definitely affect your ranking on Google and so, Traffic on your site as well. Always keep this thing in mind, Google always loves the uniqueness in your content.

Ive personally tested this as i am a person who likes to get information first hand and i saw my rank increase. still i prefer just getting an article written then outsource to be handspun for up to 1000 articles and use about 200 or so, much cheaper than buying that many original and still get the job done as far as uniqueness and readability in googles eyes. get a good spinner also with a track record, i outsource via odesk.

No point in pasting your post here....

I will only say that no one (myself included) has a "superiority complex"...but I can understand "your trying to get out of the mug with such harsh lines"

As far as your general tone toward this subject its quite obvious you are just another auto hater and regardless of what anyone would tell you that opinion wouldn't change. It wouldn't matter to you if 50, 100 or even 10,000 autobloggers posted here that they disagreed with you, gave evidence to support their views...etc etc...

I would go as far as to say if Matt Cutts himself came in here and said that autoblogging was good for the internet and could offer value that you would still disagree with him, if for no other reason than not wanting to admit you might be wrong...at least on some level.

Point is, no matter what you are told, regardless of who tells you...you would still see no possible good in autoblogging.

Because of your inability to forget the past and see the possibilities that autoblogging offers today this back and forth is useless.

Best of luck with your IM...regardless of which method it involves.
Robert