Duplicate Content Question

[JimJ]

How do you know if you are being penalized for duplicate content? Will a page lose all PR, or maybe just not recieve too much PR? If you have some duplicate content on one of the pages of your site will your homepage be penalized to? Just how much alike does the content have to be before you get penalized? The reason I ask is that one of my sites is on a template. This template has articles that are just boiler plate articles that are used on probably hundreds of other sites. Should I somehow remove these articles? I think the advanced access sites have a lot of shared articles but seem to be doing fine in the serps. Any thoughts appreciated.

[kyle422]

I don't know the answers to your questions, but I would assume it would have negitive effects if there is similar content to yours all over the web. Here is a good tool. http://copyscape.com/

[JimJ]

I wonder about the effects? Think about all these template sites that rank well and they all have the same articles etc. in their pages. 100% mirror pages. Obviously some of these sites have been polished up but they still have a lot of the same content in them that their sister sites have without any obvious penalties.

[JimJ]

Kyle -

Cool tool thanks. Just like I thought. I checked one of my boiler plate articles and sure enough there are a bunch of people using the same exact article. Weird thing is that the pages do not appear to be getting penalized. They carry PR?

[ResaleBroker]

How do you know if you are being penalized for duplicate content?

Typically your pages will show up in Google's index as only a URL without a description.

Will a page lose all PR, or maybe just not recieve too much PR?

My experience is that there is no PR loss.

If you have some duplicate content on one of the pages of your site will your homepage be penalized to?

Not that I'm aware of.

Just how much alike does the content have to be before you get penalized?

Nobody knows for sure but some of my pages at 65% got nailed.

The reason I ask is that one of my sites is on a template. This template has articles that are just boiler plate articles that are used on probably hundreds of other sites. Should I somehow remove these articles?

It is my understanding that the "penalty" is nothing more than the "page" not ranking in the SERPs. With that said, if you don't care if those pages show up in the SERPs then there would be no reason to remove them.

[ResaleBroker]

If you want to compare any two (2) pages for similar content here is a Similar Page Checker tool.

[ResaleBroker]

I wonder about the effects? Think about all these template sites that rank well and they all have the same articles etc. in their pages. 100% mirror pages. Obviously some of these sites have been polished up but they still have a lot of the same content in them that their sister sites have without any obvious penalties.

Sooner or later Google is going to find them.

[Homesurfer]

I probably know a thing or two about duplicate content.

With web developers that have pretty much the same content from site to site, the original reason for that was to make the site "sticky" -- not to enhance the site for search engines. It was for the benefit of site visitors. To keep them on your site. To keep them interested in you. To show you cared about your visitors. To get them to notice your email address, your lead-generating forms, your phone number.

If someone types "closing costs" into Google, it is my page that comes up number 1, not the numerous authorized copies of that page all over the web (and it is a big number).

But...

...if someone types in "closing costs in Aliso Viejo" the number one answer is Aliso Viejo Realtor Troy Gregory.

Why?

First, he comes up well for Aliso Viejo real estate. Also, his home page has a copy of the "table of contents" for his mass distributed content from his web developer.

I never cared if someone copied the Table of Contents for the articles. I just don't want anyone copying the content. Note: it is the Table of Contents that is coming up in the search engine, NOT the article itself.

Something else...

Additionally, those pages may not come up directly in generic searches but if you have ever played with the PageRank calculator...you probably see value in increasing your number of overall pages, provided they don't "leak" PageRank -- even if they are located off-site.

So perhaps the pages help in that way, too.

(Personal humorous note: this isn't a permission slip to copy my content. But if you are authorized access to the articles, then creating a more personalized table of contents isn't a problem) (I make a living off the content and I don't try to sell real estate. Thanks.)

[JimJ]

Thanks guys. What you have both said makes sense. I like these boiler plate articles for potential clients because most of the articles contain some really good content. I was just a little worried about hurting my serps. Realestateabc....... I will be visiting your site to purchase helpful, quality content.

[JimJ]

Resalebroker.....

For some reason I wasn't notified by email that you two had responded to my post. Do I take this problem to you or to Morgan's team?