October 5, 2008 by Matt Thomas
This old chestnut again. People keep on asking about duplicate content and, more specifically, the fabled “duplicate content penalty.” It really worries people. It seems that some content editors and administrators live in constant fear of being struck down by Google for using someone else’s content or pointing multiple URLs to the same content.
Allow me to try to allay those fears in one sentence: there is no specific duplicate content penalty – at least, not in the way you think.
Feel better? Good.
There are some penalties associated with having the same content as another site, but they’re easily avoided if you refrain from creating numerous pages, domains, sub domains etc. with substantially similar content and avoid affiliate programmes with very little original content. If you must take part in an affiliate programme, make sure that you add value by providing good content that gives people a reason to go to your site in the first place.
As far as having multiple URLs on your domain pointing to the same content, which is what most people are worried about, let me repeat myself. This does not cause penalties – unless Google reasonably suspect that your aim is to manipulate the search engine.
Innocent duplication is pretty common and not against the rules at all. However, It may adversely affect your site’s performance. Let me explain – Google tries to present a variety of answers to a search, not just a range of different URLs to the same content. So, if your content is duplicated Google will pick what they think is the best URL to present to the searcher and then lump all of the duplicate URLs properties together.
The problem is that their idea of the ‘best’ URL might not be the same as yours. Also, if Google fails to find all the duplicates there is a danger of it not being able to consolidate all their properties. That means that your site strength could get split across multiple URLs.
So, in conclusion, it’s best to follow Google guidelines, limit duplication, and give Google a strong idea of which is your best URL. However, in most cases, there’s no need to live in fear of a smiting from Google.
Go in peace.
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