2 clients. 2 websites. Same City. Both bankruptcy attorneys. How to make sure Google doesn't penalize...
-
Hi Moz'ers! I am creating 2 new websites for 2 different bankruptcy attorneys in the same city. I plan to use different templates BUT from the same template provider. I plan to host with the same hosting company (unless someone here advises me not to). The content will be custom, but similar, as they both practice bankruptcy law. They have different addresses, as they are different law firms.
My concern is that Google will penalize for duplicate content because they both practice the same area of law, in the same city, hosting the same, template maker the same, and both won't rank. What should I do to make sure that doesn't happen? Will it be enough that they have different business names, address, and phone numbers?
Thanks for any help!!
-
If you were planning to use these sites as linking sources for each other, then you would definitely want different hosts for their sites. It will increase the value of the links.
The most important thing is giving them each quality, unique content. If the content is considered duplicate by Google only one of the sites will rank. It is really the only thing that can separate two sites that are so similar, aside from diverse link profiles.
-
Good morning, BBuck!
Good questions, and as others have stated, the template and host really shouldn't be a concern. Just be sure you're not interlinking the sites in some unnatural way or duplicating content, image files, etc. Be sure you're keeping the citation building for each client in two completely separate 'baskets' (e.g. don't accidentally mix up details if you are building citations for both clients at once) and be sure you're writing unique descriptions on the citations. I would be very surprised if Google cared about the template or the host. You should be good to go, provided you treat each project as a separate effort in terms of content development and marketing. Hope this helps!
-
I dint see any problem with that! Using the same hosting company and a template hoster didn’t make much of the difference on rankings. Only thing you should make sure is that the content for both website shouldn’t be that much similar that I come under the thin content area.
Hope this helps!
-
No ethical issue. The first referred me to the second. I'm helping them both compete against the 15 other firms in the area. They both are fully aware that they both are working with me. The second actually referred me to a THIRD, but he won't be ready for several months. SO, I need to figure out how to juggle the 2, and if I can't do the 3rd (google penalty), then I will decline.
Just want to know what I need to do to make Google see that these are all separate firms, and not one firm gaming the system.
Thanks for your reply! Anyone else want to chime in?
Cheers! Have a great weekend! (i'm obviously working ;-(
-
Putting aside the ethical issues of having two clients in direct competition, Google cares far less about the template you use and more about the content and service that you provide. Both will be indexed. Don't duplicate anything that isn't technical in nature. There are hundreds of blogs that share the same templates, hosting platforms, etc. If one gets deindexed, talk to Google directly.
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
-
Rebranding with the same website
Hello, I like to rebrand my site for the same URL - How can i do this?
Local Website Optimization | | signsny
Example: My site URL is www.signsny.com and i used "SignsNY" as brand name and citations and after the website redesign, i decide to go with "Signs NY" so i change the citations and pick the word as Signs NY to use but in google i lost the site links and knowledge graph on **Signs NY **keyword.......... Can you suggest me what to do and how to change the things for better results? Thanks,
Abie0 -
Boost Website Traffic
Tom Beavan Websites is my business where I create and design affordable websites for small businesses in Wordpress. I am looking to improve my traffic to my website as dramatically as possible. At present, my website is a one-page website with limited content - https://www.tombeavan.co.uk. My website ranks #1 for local keywords like: Web design Wiltshire Web design Trowbridge Wordpress developer UK So in terms of keyword position, I am doing well for local business but I only get 200-300 visitors per month. I would like to dramatically improve this to improve the number of enquiries I get. I do tend to get a few enquiries but think if I improve the website traffic, the quantity of website enquiries will increase too? I have a long list of tasks I would like to do for SEO: Add a lot more content to the website Add more backlinks Guest blogging Lots more What would you recommend a good starting place or a place which will increase traffic effectively? Thanks for your advice in advance 🙂
Local Website Optimization | | tombeavan0 -
Google still indexing home page even after with 301 - Ecommerce Website
Hi all,
Local Website Optimization | | David1986
We have a 301 redirect problem. Google seems to continue indexing a 301 redirect to our old home page. Even after months. We have a multiple language domain, with subfolders: www.example.com (ex page, now with a redirect to the right locale in the right country) www.example.com/it/home (canonical) www.example.com/en/home (canonical) www.example.com/es/home (canonical) www.example.com/fr/home (canonical) www.example.com/de/home (canonical) We still see the old page (www.example.com) in Google results, with old metadata in English and, just in some countries (i.e.: France), we see the correct result, the "new" homepage, www.example.com/fr/home in first position.
The real problem is that Google is still indexing and showing www.example.com as the "real" and "trusted" URL, even if we set: a 301 redirect the right language for every locale in Google Search Console a canonical tag to the locale url an hreflang tag inside the code a specific sitemap with hreflang tag specified for the new homepages Now our redirect process is the following (Italy example).
www.example.com -->301
www.example.com/en/home --> default version --->301
www.example.com/it/home --> 200 Every online tool, from Moz to Bot simulators see that there is a 301. So Correct. Google Search Console says that: on www.example.com there is a 301 (correct) in the internal link section of Google Search Console the www.example.com is still in first position with 34k links. Many of these links are cominig from property subdomains. Should we change those links inside those third level domain? From www.example.com to www.example.com/LOCALE/home? the www.example.com/LOCALE/home are the real home page, they give 200 code Do you know if there's a way to delete the old home page from Google results since this is 301? Do you think that, even after a 301 redirect, if Google sees too many internal links decides to ignore the 301? Thanks for your help! Davide0 -
Will hreflang eliminate duplicate content issues for a corporate marketing site on 2 different domains?
Basically, I have 2 company websites running. The first resides on a .com and the second resides on a .co.uk domain. The content is simply localized for the UK audience, not necessarily 100% original for the UK. The main website is the .com website but we expanded into the UK, IE and AU markets. However, the .co.uk domain is targeting UK, IE and AU. I am using the hreflang tag for the pages. Will this prevent duplicate content issues? Or should I use 100% new content for the .co.uk website?
Local Website Optimization | | QuickToImpress0 -
How Google's Doorway Pages Update Affects Local SEO
Hey Awesome Local Folks! I thought I'd take a proactive stance and start a thread on the new doorway pages update from Google, as I feel there will be questions coming up about this here in the forum: Here's the update announcement: http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2015/03/an-update-on-doorway-pages.html And here's the part that will make local business owners and Local SEOs take a second glance at this: Here are questions to ask of pages that could be seen as doorway pages: Do the pages duplicate useful aggregations of items (locations, products, etc.) that already exist on the site for the purpose of capturing more search traffic? I think this will naturally lead to questions about the practice of creating local/city landing pages. At this point, my prediction is that this will come down to high quality vs. crummy quality pages of this type. In fact, after chatting briefly with Andrew Shotland, I'm leaning a bit toward seeing the above language as being strongly geared toward directory type sites and large franchises. I recommend reading Andrew's post about his take on this, as I think he's on the right track: http://www.localseoguide.com/googles-about-to-close-your-local-doorway-pages/ So, I'm feeling at this point that if you've made the right efforts to develop unique, high quality local landing pages, you should be good unless you are an accidental casualty of an over-zealous update. We'll see! If anyone has thoughts to contribute on this thread, I hope they will, and if lots of questions start coming up about this here in the community, feel free to link back to this thread in helping your fellow community members 🙂 Thanks, all!
Local Website Optimization | | MiriamEllis9 -
Where does analytics pull information from for general keyphrases that do not list a city? Ex: Restaurants, Playgrounds, Librarys
I have heard that when doing a general search, the search engine will pull the results based on IP address. But what if that information is not available? Where does analytics pull that keyword information if there is no location associated with the keyphrase?
Local Website Optimization | | seomozinator0 -
Has anyone had any success buying a local domain website, getting it on first page and then selling it to a local business? I have found some good domains that this might work for but I am wondering if anybody has tried this before.
I would like to buy a local domain like scottsdalepaintingcontractor.com and then seo it to first page before I sell it. Has anybody tried such strategy?
Local Website Optimization | | BWoods3 -
How slow can a website be, but still be ok for visitors and seo?
Hello to all, my site http://www.allspecialtybuildings.com is a barn construction site. Our visitors are usually local. I am worried about page speed. I have been using Google Page Insight, and Gtmetrix. Although I cannot figure out browser leveraging, I have a 79 / 93 google score and for gtmetrix 98/87 score. Load times vary between 2.13 secs to 2.54 secs What is acceptable? I want to make sure I get Google love for a decent page speed, but for me these times are great. Bad times are like 7 seconds and higher. I have thought about a CDN, yet I have read horror stories too. I have ZERO idea of how to use a CDN, or if I need it. I just want a fast site that is both user and Google speed friendly. So my question is, what is a slow speed for a website? Is under 3 seconds considered ok? or bad for seo? But any advice is greatly appreciated.
Local Website Optimization | | asbchris0