Ecommerce Duplicate Content

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Hello Everyone

I would like to launch an ecommerce website. Most of the competitors in the same market are using some duplicate content for their product description

• What should I do?
• Use the same duplicate content knowing that everyone else is doing the same or rewrite it.
• Will I get penalized by Google if I use duplicate content?
• If I don’t will I get a better ranking that my competitors?

Thanks for your help

Joel

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Thanks for your answer

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Thanks for your answer

[BenRWoodard]

Alice is right.  Taking the time to invest in unique content, descriptions, image file names, alt tags and URLs are going to be make a big difference on an ecommerce site.

We sometimes assume that because we didn't rank for something it is a penalty when in reality it was just never indexed like we wanted it to.  You product and category pages may do a little Google wiggle in the beginning but that is common.  Usually it take me a few weeks to see have a good idea of where my product pages will rank and then optimize from there.  Don't assume that because you showed up in the top of the rankings at first and then dropped back that it is a penalty.  It is usually just the algorithm's way of evaluation the place of the page in that SERP.

Created quality unique content for a researched keyword, watch the results, analyse the data and then rinse and repeat.

[gcdtechnologies]

Hi Joel.

Where possible it's always beneficial to write unique product descriptions. It can be tempting just to copy and paste the manufacturer's nice, professionally written description, but unfortunately this is problematic from an SEO perspective.

Penalisation for using the manufacturer's descriptions is unlikely, but pages containing duplicate content aren't likely to rank well. If you want to rank above your competitors (and hopefully gain some deep link juice to those all-important product pages), you have to offer something unique.

In an ideal world you'd have completely unique, appealing descriptions for every product. At the very least, focus on producing great descriptions for your best sellers or best earners.

It's definitely worth harnessing the potential of user-generated content through reviews and questions and answers. This is a great, low-cost way to add unique and useful content.

Good luck!

Alice