Competitors and Duplicate Content
-
I'm curious to get people's opinion on this.
One of our clients (Company A) has a competitor that's using duplicate sites to rank. They're using "www.companyA.com" and "www.CompanyAIndustryTown.com" (actually, several of the variations). It's basically duplicate content, with maybe a town name inserted or changed somewhere on the page. I was always told that this is not a wise idea. They started doing this in the past month or so when they had a site redesign. So far, it's working pretty well for them. So, here's my questions:
-Would you address this directly (report to Google, etc.)?
-Would you ignore this?
-Do you think it's going to backfire soon?
There's another company (Company B) that's using another practice- using separate pages on their domain to address different towns, and using those as landing pages. Similar, in that a lot of the content is the same, just some town names and minor details changed. All on the same domain though. Would the same apply to that?
Thanks for your insight!
-
The only long lasting way to rank for local specific pages is to offer truly unique content on those pages, and build unique links to those pages.
The two methods you mentioned here, using near duplicate sites and pages, may work for a short time or in non-competitive niches. It may also work somewhat if a very strong link profile is backing it up... but in general these sorts of tricks usually result in a drop in rankings. If not now, then during an upcoming algorythm change.
Often times, misguided webmasters think they are doing the right thing in launching these sites and pages, and no ill intent is intended. Unless the pages are obviously spam or doorway pages, then in my opinion it's probably not worth it reporting them to Google, but that decision is of course best left to each individual.
Read more about doorway pages: http://support.google.com/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=66355
Consider how Yelp has 100s of pages about dentist, at least one page for every major city in America. Although the pages are similar, they are each filled with unique content and all have unique links pointing to them. Each delivers a similar message, but provides unique value based on that particular location.
Add unique value to each location specific page, and you're doing great.
-
Unfortunately, this isn't a method likely to work.
Most of the time, if you insert canonical tags on near similar pages, and Google interprets those canonical correctly, then they tend to index and rank the page that the canonical points to. So all of those other pages would have little or no search engine visibility whatsoever.
Not a good technique if you're trying to rank individual pages.
-
So ARE you suggesting that for local city pages that you add the canonical tag to point to the home page?
I guess I'm a little confused on this as Adam is?
Can you explain your thoughts behind this?
-
So let me clarify then, if they have (on same domain) multiple pages with near duplicate content, mostly changing names of cities, but use rel:canonical, they will still have the SEO benefit of ranking for different towns, but it won't be seen as duplicate content?
And then the multiple domain situation...that's just a wait and see.
-
The pages with the city specific information but similar content are pretty much the perfect space for a canonical tag. If you feel that they haven't been penalized, then this is probably the method they are using for hosting the same content.
-
here is an example of sites that have been using duplicate content with a few word changes
http://www.seomoz.org/q/duplicate-exact-match-domains-flagged-by-google-need-help-reinclusion
-
Having multiple sites with duplicate content is a bad idea as it affects your search engine rankings. The company is likely to be using bad SEO practice and soon google bots will pick this up and the domain will get penalised.
You can report to Google, but in most cases Google picks up sites that are using bad SEO techniques.
There is no harm in using separate pages on domains name to address they operate in different towns as this helps the site being found for local searches, but having content that is again duplicated and only a few words changed Google will pick this up.
Always remember Content is KING!
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
-
Negative SEO - Spammy Backlinks By Competitor
Hi Everyone, Someone has generated more than 22k spam backlinks (on bad keywords) for my domain.Will it hurt on my website (SEO Ranking)? Because it is already in the top ranking. How could I remove all the spammy backlinks? How could I know particular competitior who have done this?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | HuptechWebseo0 -
Duplicate Content does effect
Hey there, I am Doing SEO For one of my client For mortgage Company. As i have Checked in Other mortgage sites, they used to have Same Content/Details, In all Websites, & my client site have also Some of them, So my Question is as per Google If there Duplicate Content, it will be Got penalize, But as i see Ranking & traffic For competitor site, They have Duplication, then also Rank For 1st page,. what is Reason behind? so i also Implement/Execute our site With that same content?? or i'll Got penalize?? Thnx in advance
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | iepl20010 -
Content placement in HTML and display
Does Google penalize for content being placed at the top of the page and display for users at bottom of the page? This technique is done by CSS. Thank you in advance for your feedback!
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | Aerocasillas0 -
Can I use content from an existing site that is not up anymore?
I want to take down a current website and create a new site or two (with new url, ip, server). Can I use the content from the deleted site on the new sites since I own it? How will Google see that?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | RoxBrock0 -
Can I report competitor for asking to guest post?
I just had an email from one of my least preferred competitor's SEO company asking about guest posting. They are already totally dominating the SERPs where they have no natural reason for being. Is there anywhere to bring this to the attention of the search engines?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | Cornwall0 -
Competitors Developing Spammy Link For My Website
Well Guys there are lot of discussions in almost all the communities, blogs, forums about Post Penguin impact. Google says that if find that you're involved in any link building activities, we may penalize you. People out there have already started their developed links. But what if our competitors would have developed those links. Initially it was okay to develop one way links, I even developed lot of quality, but deliberately, links. around 95% links are placed manually, if return to some favor or money but all links looks natural. Most of the links I developed through content only, like articles, blog comments, PR submission, etc now really skeptical about the quality (after hearing lot of talks and reading n number of posts). Now, can I also submit my competitor's websites in 1000 topic directory (obviously not in any spammy directory), would it effect that website adversely? What if I spun an existing content and submit it into 500 article directories and give backlink to competitor site from using only one anchor text (which is obviously the main keywords - highest sales generating keyword) I look forward to some experts comments.
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | Khem_Raj70 -
Does the site have duplicate, overlapping, or redundant articles on the same or similar topics with slightly different keyword variations?
Hi All, In relation to this thread http://www.seomoz.org/q/what-happend-to-my-ranks-began-dec-22-detailed-info-inside I'm still getting whipped hard from Google, this week for some reason all rankings have gone for the past few days. What I was wondering though is this, when Google says- Does the site have duplicate, overlapping, or redundant articles on the same or similar topics with slightly different keyword variations? I assume my site hits the nail on the head- [removed links at request of author] As you can see I target LG Optimus 3D Sim Free, LG Optimus 3D Contract and LG Optimus 3D Deals. Based on what Google has said, I know think there needs to be 1 page that covers it all instead of 3. What I'm wondering is the best way to deal with the situation? I think it should be something like this but please correct me along the way 🙂 1. Pick the strongest page out of the 3 2. Merge the content from the 2 weaker pages into the strongest 3. Update the title/meta info of the strongest page to include the KW variations of all 3 eg- LG Optimus 3D Contract Deals And Sim Free Pricing 4. Then scatter contract, deals and sim free throughout the text naturally 5. Then delete the weaker 2 pages and 301 redirect to the strongest page 6. Submit URL removal via webmastertools for the 2 weaker pages What would you do to correct this situation? Am I on the right track?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | mwoody0 -
Hi, I found that one of my competitors have zero backlings in google, zero in yahoo but about 50.000 in Bing. How is that possible?
Hi, I found that one of my competitors have zero backlings in google, zero in yahoo but about 50.000 in Bing. How is that possible? I assumed that all search engines would finde the backlinks. Besides that he ranks fair well and better than I do with only a single site and with only one article of content while I have a lot of content and sites. I do not undersdtand why he is ranking better in google, while google assumingly does not see any backlinks of the 50.000 bing is finding. Thx, Dan
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | docschmitti0