Question about copying content

[Paul78]

Hi there,

I have had a question from a retailer asking if they can take all our content i.e. blog articles, product pages etc, what is best practice here in getting SEO value out of this?

Here a few ideas I was thinking of:

1. I was thinking they put canonical tags on all pages where they have copied our content?

2. They copy the content but leave all anchor text in place?

Please let me know your thoughts.

Kind Regards

[Paul78]

Hi Adam,

Thanks for your reply.

I suppose what I could do is mention to them that if they are taking content from our website, they must have at the bottom of each page 'Text supplied by Company Name' the company name supplies a keyword that we target.

I have actually just noticed that there are many retailers out there who are copying our content from our product pages without me knowing, I noticed this by copying a pasting the first paragraph of a number of my product pages, however what is strange that these websites come above my product pages, is this something to worry about? is Google giving me full credit for these pages?

Kind Regards

[Adam.Whittles]

I have had a question from a retailer asking if they can take all our content i.e. blog articles, product pages etc, what is best practice here in getting SEO value out of this?

Well firstly, there is no SEO benefit to either party here unless the retailer provides a link to your site. This can actually cause damage to the retailer's site with regards to duplicate content issues. Forget about canonical tags here, they are not designed to avoid duplicate content issues when copying someone else's content.

My advice would be to advise the retailer to create their own unique content rather than copying your content. They can provide links to product pages on your site but they should try to create unique descriptions for the products rather than copying your content.

With regard to other retailers copying your content, they do so at their own risk as Google could decide to penalise these sites (assuming they haven't already done so). It is best practice to create unique content rather than copying other people's content.

Hope this helps.

[Paul78]

Hi Mat,

Thanks for your reply.

Yes, there is a lot of work that goes into the content for product pages, blog posts etc.

I think most of the content that they want is for our products they are going to be selling on their website, so they are in need of content for these pages, but not really sure on how to handle this best (SEO benefit)

I had recently stumbled upon retailer websites who have copied our content without actually asking us, however some of those websites have kept the anchor text, we are getting some benefit, right?

Kind Regards

[matbennett]

Canonical might work. However I wouldn't let them have it.  If the content is good then it has too much value.

Maybe instead you could suggest that you do a regular guest spot for them, including your link in the profile.