How many times have you heard that duplicate content is the worst thing you can do to your website and that Google will end up penalizing you with a lower ranking for this atrocity?
What if I tell you this isn’t the case?
Duplicate content will not hurt your website rankings. Unfortunately, these rumors are spread by people who don’t know exactly what duplicate content is.
Therefore, as one of the best digital marketing service providers in Edmonton, we believe it is our responsibility to raise awareness about issues that are full of myths and inappropriate practices.
Duplicate content is one of them. Therefore, in this blog we will explain to you what duplicate content is and how adding duplicate content to your website does not affect the ranking.
Also read: How do I get my website to rank higher on Google?
What is duplicate content?
If we look at the definition of duplicate content, it refers to content that appears in more than one place (URL) at the same time. Duplicate content can include anything from a paragraph to the product description to the entire page.
Even if duplicate content doesn’t affect your website’s ranking, it’s better to avoid it. According to Google,
“Duplicate content on a website is not grounds for action on that website unless it appears that the intent of the duplicate content is to deceive and manipulate search engine results.” If your website is experiencing duplicate content issues and you If you do not follow the advice set out in this document, we will do a good job of selecting a version of the content that appears in our search results.”
However, this does not mean that you should not limit duplicate content on your website. This is because duplicate content and URLs can confuse the SEO algorithm, which in turn affects the display of relevant content. This means your audience isn’t seeing the content they want, which will impact your engagement.
Common myths about duplicate content
As mentioned earlier, there are many myths about how duplicate content negatively impacts your website. Some of the most common myths are:
- Duplicate content affects the ranking of your website.
- If you add duplicate content, your website will be penalized.
- Scrapers harm your website.
- Reposting guest posts on your website does nothing to build your authority.
- When dealing with duplicate content, Google can identify who the original content creator is.
None of the above concepts are true. Duplicate content does not harm your website’s ranking and certainly does not result in penalties. Furthermore, scrapers do not benefit your website, but they do not harm it either.
Finally, reposting guest posts is a great way to generate more traffic. You just need to be careful not to add a lot of outbound links.
Unknown facts about duplicate content
Now that we’ve talked about and debunked some myths about duplicate content, let’s move on to some unknown facts that will help you understand duplicate content and find a way around it.
- You can minimize duplicate content by redirecting all old URLs to a new version. This can be done using the 301 redirect.
- Search engines don’t like showing multiple pages with the same content. Therefore, avoid duplicate URLs as it affects link quality and reduces the ability to pass authority.
- URL variations, even minor, can lead to the creation of duplicate content. Therefore, adjust the URL parameters to avoid minor deviations.
- Don’t use repetitive content on your website. This includes copyright notices or legal disclaimers. These are called boilerplate instructions and Google has a policy for dealing with them.
- Your content management system may be creating duplicate URLs without your knowledge. Understand your CMS to avoid such mistakes.
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