How to explain to a client that duplicate content is bad...
-
Afternoon!
An SEO client of ours has copied a load of landing/category page content from other sites. Lots of emails have been sent back and forth asking them to remove it, but they are adamant to keep it up there until we have time to amend it. We have explained to them:
- The Google penalty risks
- The copyright risks
- The short and long-term implications for their brand new business/website
- The money they are spending on our SEO package could be completely wasted if they're caught
I think the above is pretty black and white, but the director of this company will not budge. Does anyone have any different approaches? The director said he's happy for us to amend the content but, in the meantime, the plagiarised content will not be removed.
Cheers,
Lewis
-
The client will not remove the content until we have new content ready to go. He will not leave these pages blank, despite our advice that no content is much, much better than duplicated/plagiarised content.
We don't have the resource to write all this content within a short space of time, so we're going to have to run the risk of a penalty as the client is not budging on this.
-
Thanks!
-
You can use a service like CopyScape to crawl the web looking for your content.
Or, you can copy a unique sentence from your work, paste it into a google search box between "quotation marks" and that will reveal where that sentence has been duplicated.
-
EGOL- Is there a tool you use to find the stolen content?
-
I'd take the approach that you can do a BETTER job with the content,
If you decide to work for this person, then Joey's suggest here is the way to go. Duplicate content is not very competitive. You compete with the original source. If you have unique you get more traffic. If you have quality unique people will share it for you.
Also, if you have duplicated my content I will submit DMCA to Google, submit complaints to Adsense, submit DMCA to your host. I do these things as routine a couple times each week.
-
Is it black and white? It seems to me you are still looking at it as a gray area. He may be adamant, but how hard really is it to just write new content vs. "amending" it? I'd take the approach that you can do a BETTER job with the content, but he needs to dump the plagiarized content first. Nothing else you do will overcome the hit from that. If the content owners are emailing him, that means it's been out there more than long enough for Google to see it too. It's probably already too late.
Wasted money if their caught? It's wasted already. I'm totally with @EGOL on this - this guy sounds like a total wildcard and doesn't deserve any of our time.
-
I would personally approach this from a financial point of view, bring up both pages of content and show your customer the two side by side, then ask them "Why would a customer want to buy from you rather than the other store?" This approach has personally worked for me when all technical avenues have failed, as after all this is the same sort of lines that search engines live by showing the customer the most relevant page.
-
the director of this company will not budge.... the plagiarised content will not be removed.
He is a weasel. He steals content, knows it is wrong and is adamant about continuing to steal and benefit from his theft.
He will cheat you too if he gets the chance. If you amend this content then you have become a participant in his criminal acts.
If he gets caught he is going to blame everything on you.
Does anyone have any different approaches?
Stop working for this criminal. He is going to run up a big bill with you and then say that he does not know you, never did business with you, call you a liar.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
How do I fix my portfolio causing duplicate content issues?
Hi, Im new to this whole duplicate content issue. I have a website, fatcatpaperie.com that I use the portofolio feature in Wordpress as my gallery for all my wedding invitations. I have a ton of duplicate content issues from this. I don't understand at all how to fix this. I'd appreciate any help! Below is an example of one duplicate content issue. They have slightly different names, different urls, different images and all have no text. But are coming up as duplicates. Would it be as easy as putting a different metadescription for each?? Thanks for the help! Rena | "Treasure" by Designers Fine Press - Fat Cat Paperie http://fatcatpaperie.com/portfolio-item/treasure-designers-fine-press 1 0 0 0 200 3 duplicates "Perennial" by Designers Fine Press - Fat Cat Paperie http://fatcatpaperie.com/portfolio-item/perennial-by-designers-fine-press 1 0 0 0 200 1 of 3 duplicates "Primrose" by Designers Fine Press - Fat Cat Paperie http://fatcatpaperie.com/portfolio-item/8675 1 0 0 0 200 2 of 3 duplicates "Catalina" by Designers Fine Press - Fat Cat Paperie http://fatcatpaperie.com/portfolio-item/catalina-designers-fine-press |
On-Page Optimization | | HonestSEOStudio0 -
Blog on server or embedded? Duplicate content?
Wondering what would be best in terms of SEO. Should I install some blog software actually on the website or can I just embed say a blogger.com blog? if I did that would they consider it duplicate content?
On-Page Optimization | | Superflys0 -
Site Duplicated despte redirect
Buon pormeriggio from I can smell Whaler Chips Through the window Wetherby,
On-Page Optimization | | Nightwing
When you Google Thakray Medical Museum 2 sites appear in the SERPS, yikes! Now the .org site is no longer hosted & point to the .co.uk site when clicked on but in a nutshell I wantto get rid of the .org site
as illustrated here: http://s216.photobucket.com/user/zymurgy_bucket/media/two-versions-same-website-yikes_zps182e6e12.jpg.html Actions taken so far:
1: Wembaster tools re index request for the .co.uk site
2: Redirect configured to point .org site to the .co.uk What else is left apart from updating the xml site but ultimating i do not want to see the the .org site but it doesnt exist (well id did a few month back but is no longer hosted so i am told) Any insights welcome,
GRazie tanto,
David0 -
Duplicate lower and uppercase keywords
I get significantly different report cards for the same keywords with and without uppercase letters on the same URL. The only difference between the two sets of keywords is the first letters of every keywords, e.g.: "Air freight" - results in an "F"
On-Page Optimization | | DigiTeamatDSV
"air freigth" - results in an "A" Should I stick to lowercase keywords only - and won't the search engines ignore the case anyway?0 -
Thin content and tabs on page
I am reviewing a site, and the web designer used tabs to impart information. I think the tabs idea looks great, but it leaves the page looking thin. Here is a link to a product page, could anyone chime in please? http://www.aireindustrial.net/spill-berms/foam-berm-drive-over-berms.asp Thanks in advance for your opinion!
On-Page Optimization | | drufast10 -
Page content length...does it matter?
As I begin developing my website's content, does it matter how long or short the actual text found in the is? I heard someone say before "a minimum of 250 words", but is that true? If so, what is the maximum length I should use?
On-Page Optimization | | wlw20090 -
Duplicate meta descriptions
Hi all, I'm using Yoast's SEO plugin and when I run a On Page report card here on SEOMOZ it says there are 2 descriptions tags I've been trying to fix this but can't (I'm new!) Anyone any ideas on this? Thanks Elaine
On-Page Optimization | | elaineryan0 -
Duplicate Page Titles and Keywords
Still new to this SEO world, so please bear with me. I have an eCommerce site so one of the issues is duplicate content and page titles. So what I was thinking was this...for each product that I sell I have 4 or 5 keywords that I have targeted. For example for personalized iPhone cases I have decided on: iphone 4 case personalized, monogrammed iphone 4 case, personalized and monogrammed iphone case, preppy phone case, personalized iPhone case, monogrammed iPhone case For each of my products I was going to a product description (ie: trendy color block diagonal stripes) and a targeted keyword. But I was going to rotate the keywords through so as to try to avoid the duplicate page title issue. Will that help? Thanks much, Shara
On-Page Optimization | | Confections0