What is considered duplicate content?
-
Hi,
We are working on a product page for bespoke camper vans: http://www.broadlane.co.uk/campervans/vw-campers/bespoke-campers . At the moment there is only one page but we are planning add similar pages for other brands of camper vans. Each page will receive its specifically targeted content however the 'Model choice' cart at the bottom (giving you the choice to select the internal structure of the van) will remain the same across all pages.
Will this be considered as duplicate content? And if this is a case, what would be the ideal solution to limit penalty risk: A rel canonical tag seems wrong for this, as there is no original item as such. Would an iFrame around the 'model choice' enable us to isolate the content from being indexed at the same time than the page?
Thanks,
Celine
-
Hi Celine,
Google is very smart at finding content these days, so I would avoid any possible ways of trying to hide it, but looking at what is there, I wouldn't worry too much.
When looking at the model choice at the bottom of the page, it is the same for a reason, and there is no way around it. However, I wouldn't think that Google would see that as duplicate content. Lists in this manner don't normally cause issues and as mentioned above, it is more often larger 'chunks' of content that causes issues.
There are other considerations that you might want to think about before releasing a lot more pages in this manner, and one if them is making sure Google won't see the pages appearing for no other reason that to draw in search traffic for particular phrases.
Keep the pages well stocked with unique relevant content and you should be good to go.
-Andy
-
A quick way to figure this out.
Copy a entire paragraph from the content in question. Paste the whole paragraph into Google search.
any close matches? Then It is duplicate.
Thanks,
- Mike Bean
-
This type of duplicate content is common on ecommerce websites, and it isn't necessarily a big problem. However, given the fact that there will be a higher percentage of duplicate content than unique content, you run the risk of some of your pages being omitted from search results for certain queries. If that is the case, searchers will see "In order to show you the most relevant results, we have omitted some entries very similar to the (# here)already displayed. If you like, you can repeat the search with the omitted results included."
This isn't really a penalty. It's just Google being efficient with their algorithm. It shouldn't be a problem for highly targeted searches, but you may lose a little search visibility for more generic searches.
My advice is to get creative and find new ways to add more unique content to your product pages. Add testimonials, user-generated reviews, camper van adventure stories, etc.
You are right that canonical tags are wrong for this situation. Using an iframe doesn't make much sense either. Google has stated that they try to associate iframe content with the page it's embedded on anyway.
Further information:
-
Hi there,
If the higher percentage of content on each page is different from any other you should be OK. However I'd be worried about producing a whole bunch of pages like this. -
According to Google: "Duplicate content generally refers to substantive blocks of content within or across domains that either completely match other content or are appreciably similar."
The example you give is a bit in between: it contains a part which is unique - however the tabulated content which would appear on each page contains more content than the unique part. Personally I don't think that these pages would be considered duplicate content. However, if you want to be on the save side you could make a separate page with all possible configurations. This would also have the advantage that you could do without the tab's (end of of 2014 John Muller indicated that hiding content under tabs is not the best seo strategy (https://www.seroundtable.com/google-hidden-tab-content-seo-19489.html).
I wouldn't go for the iframe solution - it's a bit an outdated way to present information.
Hope this helps,
Dirk
-
Hi Celine
Good news, as you haven't made all the pages yet, now is the easiest time to implement new things! : -)
The best way I would recommend is utilising HTML Semantics http://www.w3schools.com/html/html5_semantic_elements.aspYou would have your main content inside the
and any supporting but repetitive content in <inside>tags.
Hope that helps!
King Regards
Jimmy</inside>
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
-
Tools to scan entire site for duplicate content?
HI guys, Just wondering if anyone knows of any tools to scan a site for duplicate content (with other sites on the web). Looking to quickly identify product pages containing duplicate content/duplicate product descriptions for E-commerce based websites. I know copy scape can which can check up to 10,000 pages in a single operation with Batch Search. But just wondering if there is anything else on the market i should consider looking at? Cheers, Chris
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | jayoliverwright0 -
Duplicate content issue with pages that have navigation
We have a large consumer website with several sections that have navigation of several pages. How would I prevent the pages from getting duplicate content errors and how best would I handle SEO for these? For example we have about 500 events with 20 events showing on each page. What is the best way to prevent all the subsequent navigation pages from getting a duplicate content and duplicate title error?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | roundbrix0 -
A/B Testing - Should I add product descriptions on my category landing pages as well as on product pages and if so . how to do this to avoid duplicate content
Hi All, I recently relaunched a new design on my tool hire eCommerce website and now display my products in grid form on my category landing pages as opposed to just a list view which we previously had on the old design. My bounce rates are alot higher than they use to be and my gut instinct is telling me maybe this is wrong . I want to do some a/b testing using a list view. My question is , previously in our list views we just showed the images and pricing and had on page content on the bottom of the page. The user would click on the product image and they would then we taken to the product page which has the product description , t&c, etc etc.. If I was to do this in my a/b testing but change it so we also displayed the product descriptions as well on the category landing pages . Is there a special way to do this as in effect, we would have duplicate content as the product descriptions are also on the product page?. Does anyone have any thoughts on this as to whether its a No No from an SEO point of view ?... Heres a short url link to one of my category pages - http://goo.gl/QJv5gw Historically we use to rank well for the category landing pages and not for the product pages.Our Rankings are down , bounce rates are higher so I am trying to sort both. We have good content on pages etc. Any advice greatly appreciated as always thanks Pete
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | PeteC120 -
Duplicate Page Content Issues Reported in Moz Crawl Report
Hi all, We have a lot of 'Duplicate Page Content' issues being reported on the Moz Crawl Report and I am trying to 'get to the bottom' of why they are deemed as errors... This page; http://www.bolsovercruiseclub.com/about-us/job-opportunities/ has (admittedly) very little content and is duplicated with; http://www.bolsovercruiseclub.com/cruise-deals/cruise-line-deals/explorer-of-the-seas-2015/ This page is basically an image and has just a couple of lines of static content. Also duplicated with; http://www.bolsovercruiseclub.com/cruise-lines/costa-cruises/costa-voyager/ This page relates to a single cruise ship and again has minimal content... Also duplicated with; http://www.bolsovercruiseclub.com/faq/packing/ This is an FAQ page again with only a few lines of content... Also duplicated with; http://www.bolsovercruiseclub.com/cruise-deals/cruise-line-deals/exclusive-canada-&-alaska-cruisetour/ Another page that just features an image and NO content... Also duplicated with; http://www.bolsovercruiseclub.com/cruise-deals/cruise-line-deals/free-upgrades-on-cunard-2014-&-2015/?page_number=6 A cruise deals page that has a little bit of static content and a lot of dynamic content (which I suspect isn't crawled) So my question is, is the duplicate content issued caused by the fact that each page has 'thin' or no content? If that is the case then I assume the simple fix is to increase add \ increase the content? I realise that I may have answered my own question but my brain is 'pickled' at the moment and so I guess I am just seeking assurances! 🙂 Thanks Andy
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | TomKing0 -
Is a "Critical Acclaim" considered duplicate content on an eCommerce site?
I have noticed a lot of wine sites use "Critical Acclaims" on their product pages. These short descriptions made by industry experts are found on thousands of other sites. One example can be found on a Wine.com product page. Wine.com also provides USG through customer reviews on the page for original content. Are the "Critical Acclaim" descriptions considered duplicate content? Is there a way to use this content and it not be considered duplicate (i.e. link to the source)?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | mj7750 -
Bi-Lingual Site: Lack of Translated Content & Duplicate Content
One of our clients has a blog with an English and Spanish version of every blog post. It's in WordPress and we're using the Q-Translate plugin. The problem is that my company is publishing blog posts in English only. The client is then responsible for having the piece translated, at which point we can add the translation to the blog. So the process is working like this: We add the post in English. We literally copy the exact same English content to the Spanish version, to serve as a placeholder until it's translated by the client. (*Question on this below) We give the Spanish page a placeholder title tag, so at least the title tags will not be duplicate in the mean time. We publish. Two pages go live with the exact same content and different title tags. A week or more later, we get the translated version of the post, and add that as the Spanish version, updating the content, links, and meta data. Our posts typically get indexed very quickly, so I'm worried that this is creating a duplicate content issue. What do you think? What we're noticing is that growth in search traffic is much flatter than it usually is after the first month of a new client blog. I'm looking for any suggestions and advice to make this process more successful for the client. *Would it be better to leave the Spanish page blank? Or add a sentence like: "This post is only available in English" with a link to the English version? Additionally, if you know of a relatively inexpensive but high-quality translation service that can turn these translations around quicker than my client can, I would love to hear about it. Thanks! David
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | djreich0 -
Having a hard time with duplicate page content
I'm having a hard time redirecting website.com/ to website.com The crawl report shows both versions as duplicate content. Here is my htaccess: RewriteEngine On
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | cgman
RewriteBase /
#Rewrite bare to www
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^mywebsite.com
RewriteRule ^(([^/]+/)*)index.php$ http://www.mywebsite.com/$1 [R=301,L] RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME}.php -f
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ $1.php [NC,L]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} !^.localhost$ [NC]
RewriteRule ^(.+)/$ http://%{HTTP_HOST}$1 [R=301,L] I added the last 2 lines after seeing a Q&A here, but I don't think it has helped.0 -
Removing Duplicate Content Issues in an Ecommerce Store
Hi All OK i have an ecommerce store and there is a load of duplicate content which is pretty much the norm with ecommerce store setups e.g. this is my problem http://www.mystoreexample.com/product1.html
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | ChriSEOcouk
http://www.mystoreexample.com/brandname/product1.html
http://www.mystoreexample.com/appliancetype/product1.html
http://www.mystoreexample.com/brandname/appliancetype/product1.html
http://www.mystoreexample.com/appliancetype/brandname/product1.html so all the above lead to the same product
I also want to keep the breadcrumb path to the product Here's my plan Add a canonical URL to the product page
e.g. http://www.mystoreexample.com/product1.html
This way i have a short product URL Noindex all duplicate pages but do follow the internal links so the pages are spidered What are the other options available and recommended? Does that make sense?
Is this what most people are doing to remove duplicate content pages? thanks 🙂0