Google penalises duplicate web content
80A Google algorithm (as of today with no official name) update on January 28, 2011 will mean sites with duplicate content will find it even harder to rank highly in search results, according to many SEO and Search Engine Analytics experts recently. The change, according to Matt Cutts, who heads Google’s webspam team said the change “primarily affects sites that copy others’ content and sites with low levels of original content”.
Cutts added: “This was a pretty targeted launch: slightly over 2% of queries change in some way, but less than half a percent of search results change enough that someone might really notice. The net effect is that searchers are more likely to see the sites that wrote the original content rather than a site that scraped or copied the original site’s content.” This change is going to have a big affect on certain industries. Especially, Holiday, Travel, Airlines, Hotels, Tours...any kind of white label sites that scrape information from other sites and reproduce or copy it. "EBookers" is one such example. Any kind or comparison site that lists prices or information in any way or duplicates content from elsewhere will be penalised. However there are other people who are affected. Including Bloggers and even HubPages writers who put versions of their hubs on other sites similar to Hub Pages, where articles can be submitted and income can be made from them via Google Adsense ad placement.
This latest algorithm update comes after 2010's so-called Caffeine and May Day changes which were designed to increase the speed with which Google is able to index pages.
With Google Caffeine, the Google algorithm was taking stock of how fast pages upload, while May Day algorithm penalised sites that had poor SEO. Somewhat unfair, you may think, since not everyone is an expert on Search Engine Optimization. But this resulted in a reduction in the importance of anchor links and dominion authority of sites for Google ranking.
Instead, on site SEO increased in importance as did user signals - or how other people refer to a site on social media (ala twitter, Facebook, Linked-in, etc) - while links diminished in importance yet overall remained a dominant aspect. It is thought this trend is due to continue.
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Due to this downgrading of domain authority by Google, sites with many pages containing similar content to other sites linked from the home page will no longer rank so highly. Individuals and companies are encouraged to integrate user-generated reviews into things like "product pages" and maybe go further and include links on the pages to make them more amenable to Google spiders.
Web authors and Hub Page writers who like to put similar or the same versions of their hub pages articles on sites like Squidoo or eHow or ArticleBase or similar sites need to heed this change as it will affect them.
Likewise, in a world of Internet syndication where articles, information and news are increasingly rebroadcast and repeated or replicated for whatever reason - this too will cause a shift in the global paradigm of information sharing across the net without apparent penalty. Because of Google News' Algorithm change, and which blocks the publishers of duplicate content / non-relevant content, one upside is that local media outlets can now compete more fairly for those all important audiences and readers thanks to syndicates like Yahoo! News and even Google News. It will affect how some companies get "top Stories" in certain areas where certain subjects are "trending" (as seen in Twitter for instance).
So organisations that steal headlines from other sites and who clip news so that they can grow their readership will be affected. Writers who write for News and Current Affairs sites and web businesses will have to adjust their habits, as these new rules diminish their ability to reach a broad audience. Hub page authors will need to be wary of this.
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It will affect the rules of web-based "first publishing rights", and many news gossip sites will be barred by Google's new change. News breakers like BBC, Reuters, Associated Press and others will not be affected. But if you retweet some of their news items, just don't be surprised if they don't increase your underlying effectiveness in Google rankings. Though they may still get you more readers, followers and traffic, since readers don't measure the news you redirect their way the same as Google. Just be aware of this. For cash strapped media and news sales people who are struggling to keep readers on-line ...this will be a challenge for them. Some sites bizzarely may benefit from this. One being Wikileaks, who have virtually no one competing against them in their effort to bring so-called original scoops to the attention of the world, and the U.S. Government. Google is the least of their problems.
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The reason I have written this hub is to make people aware of the recent change to the Google News Algorithm. It will have an impact on even how Hub Pages will be considered in the "relevancy stakes". The rule of thumb is that original content will rule over most other content. It will be hard to judge how it will affect article writers in the long term, but it is so far considered a good thing, as it will do away with a lot of "dross" and second rate items that appear on the web.
I have added a link for those who wish to know how to avoid international duplication across borders. Please comment below and let me know what you think about this hub and the Google changes. Thanks. And feel free to rate my hub too.
Copyright (c) 2011 Cheeky Girl. All rights reserved.
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SEO Consult - avoid duplicate content...
- How To Avoid Duplicate Content Across International Websites | SEO Consult Blogs
How to avoid duplicate content when you have multiple versions of a website in different countries. - Search Engine Optimisation (Optimization) Advice from SEO Consult.
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Hello Singular Investor: thanks for the comment. It just shows how much Google can influence things and have an effect on internet news and article providers. You could always mention those other things if you liked. Would get a laugh! Cheers! :)
Interesting and informative Hub. I think original content SHOULD rule. We'll see what happens. Rated up! Thanks.
Very interesting. I liked what you said about Wikileaks and their having little to worry about. I think of myself as an originator of content, but I'm also now mindful of how many times I post my content which obviously will now have an effect.
I'm writing and drawing an original animated story and planned to post it here on Hubpages for feedback. Should I be careful as I also planned on posting it on one of my webpages and possibly Youtube as well? If so, I'm still inclined to post it here first as I've been pleasantly surprised at the positive responses to my poetry and art.
Anyway, a wonderful article. I'll get you a thumbs up for this one for sure. Nice job!
Thanks,
Will.
Good morning from here, Suziecat, glad you found this Google hub on duplicate content informative. Yes, I agree, original content will benefit on the long term, and there will be less duplicate results in searches in the future. Thanks for the rate up. Cheers!
I wish the buggers would just leave things alone, their October change buggered me up plus their drop of revenue in the cpm rate for January and February.
Still what can you do, keep writing and hope the cpm gets better in March, which I think it will. Great hub xoxo
Hy Art! Yes, the buggering around with the algorithms is annoying and knocks back the whole thing. But I think it will improve too, Art. Lets hope things get better for us all! Cheers! Thanks for this! XOX :)
All my articles are original. So I guess it should help me, especially to sink the nong who copied a big chunk of one of my hubs and claimed it as his own.
Since Google will be detecting plagiarism, it would be nice if they also provided a tool to see who copied your stuff!
I also note that Wikipedia words are duplicated all over the place but it's not clear to me who copied.
One thing I think is missing and will become more relevant as a result of this change is an easy way to determine the date of an article. It would be nice to have an automatic way of displaying the date of uploading.
Hello dear girlfriend, I alway enjoy reading your hubs, you write with such authority and also give the best advise. Maybe you can write about RSS feeds, I don't understand how they work or all the ways it can be used. Love you to pieces....love & peace darski xoxox rate up
This article was informative and gave me the whole picture. It will take time to see how this goes.
Hi,
This is a great hub and useful for me as i am still a newbee when it gets down to the details such as RSS feeds etc.
Thank you for sharing this easy to understand hub.
take care
Eiddwen
From this I realize that I have to change the way I do things, I write original content at Hubpages, but post it again on another site. Thanks for the advice.
Hy manna, yes copying is getting to be a big pain for many web content creators, and Google are acting on it. It looks like the Google machine change the way duplicate content is ranked and demote items that get copied and pasted. Or just ripped from one site to another. As for Wikipedia, it is copied a lot. I have seen content on certain hubs that is copied and pasted. Hoo boy! Yes, having the dates of material posted would be an excellent idea! Thanks for the ideas here! Cheers!
Hy Darlene! Glad you are liking my hubs! You always do, honey! :) You are a great loyal fan! Thanks you lots! Mwah! Hey, the RSS idea for a hub sounds like a challenge! I will check this out! H'mm! Interesting! Cheers! Nice suggestion for this Cheeky Girl! Heh! Have a great day, Daski! Love and peace always! Hope you had a nice Valentines! XOXOX :)
Hello Eiddwen! Thanks for checking out my hub on duplicate content. Gee, quite a few people asking about RSS feeds lately! I may do a hub and cover this! Eiddwen, feel free to check out my hubs on Google Adense and Clickbank and Amazon too, if you like. They have videos and are easy to follow! Newbies love them! You will enjoy them too! Thanks for the comments! You take care too, my friend. Have fun on your hubs! :)
Hello Luis, wow - maybe doing something about the duplicate stuff would be the order of the day right now, as they will penalise. I have read bloggers who have complained about pages being rated down. There are really good Hubs writers like yourself who write great articles, and yes, we are all trying to "make a buck"...but Google are trying to reduce the amount of repeat identical results appearing on search pages. Bummer. Thanks for reading me here, and spread the word please. Thanks!
Thanks I started checking into my other postings at other sites.
Cheers, Luis! You are doing the right thing! Praise you! :)
Awesome hub moi friend! Everything changes and everything updates. What's best to do is be aware..like read your new latest hub ;) be original, expect the unexpected and be observant..What can I say more hmm I repeat, this is awesome! I just hope Hubpages will remain awesome no matter what ;) Cheers!
Hey Fehl / 25! Thank you for the Hub Love! :) Yes, I agree. Being aware of the latest things is a useful thing. It does require keeping up with trends, but what the hey. Some folks read magazines on hobbies, some folks check out other stuff they love....
Me, I like trends and changes in web content and related stuff, cos it affects us all in the end. And I want to avoid the crush! LOL! I am trynna make sure I don't recopy my own content to my blogs or whatever. It's a bit more hassle, but it is a necessary evil too I think!
Google, we love them or we hate them, but they always change things, and keep us on our toes! Heh! And Apple just introduced subscription services on my damn iPhone! Should have bought an Android! LOL! Have a great day, Fehl! Cheers! XO
My seventh hub was copied with other site without edited at all. I don't know why they did this. But I hope the more creative to make a content. Thanks for writing this. Cheers...
Prasetio
Hy Prasetio, gosh, did someone "nick" your hub? That is scandalous! Well Google present a problem to the person who has been copied without their knowing. The best thing to do is to bring the duplicate content to their attention, and ask for advice. By and large they will understand, I guess. Google do penalise duplicate content now, but you have demonstrated there are exceptions to the rule. Some websites have also tried to deliberately rip off hub writers content also. We know their names, and they have been mentioned in the forums...
Yes, the more creative we are - the better, but creativity on the very public internet is not without those problems, Prasetio. Thanks for the excellent points. Cheers!
Comment from "givingfairy":
"I love this hub. It offers great insights. Thanks for the update on Google happenings."
Reply: thankyou for the comment, sorry for replying this way as I don't want links in my comments. Nothing personal. I am happy of course to offer any insights, you are right to be looking for answers to questions as there are many people asking, and not all are getting honest answers. I will be publishing another follow up hub to my recent "Google" hubs very soon. It will delve more into Google's recent changes. Cheers!
Great hub and useful article
Hy Danmit, thanks for the comments! Cheers!
cassy - you always bring professionalism to your hubs. Thumbs up and as usual a HUGE HUG.
Hey Neil, I try to do moi cheeky best! I hope things are good with you. Thumbs up are much appreciated too! And big hugs right back at ya! LOL! :)
how can i get original keyword
should i use others keyword or competitors keywords is that good for my site or not
Hy sushil, I am not sure there is a definitive original keyword. I presume you are looking for the best keywords. Check out adwords.google.com/ - and use the new tool they have for finding keywords or keyphrases, it is really excellent. Some people copy their competitors keywords if they are drawing lots of traffic, the keyword tool will tell you what keywords get most searches. I would be unsure how to suggest here, as I don't know about the site in question.
Basically your original keywords will be there right inside your own original (written) content. I write the thing out, and then see what words might work, or find words like them that mean the same but are high-searched keywords.
There are other ways too, you could plan the article or content around your chosen words, and write it that way, just check the tool to see the words do get high numbers of searches. Hope this helps somehow.
A lot of useful information here that I knew nothing about. Thanks for writing this. Voting this Up and Useful.
Hey alocsin: thanks for checking out my hub on how Google penalized duplicate content. Glad you found it useful! Cheers! :)
Singular Investor Level 1 Commenter 15 months ago
Yeah this will be interesting to see how it turns out. For the average joe it will be a good idea to stick in some original thoughts and ideas into anything he/she has copied from elsewhere, possibly random rambling about the state of the nation and the price of tomatoes etc... whether Sarah Palin is an alien and whether Mr Obama really does like basketball or is he just faking it ? That sort of stuff.