Duplicate Content: Is It Really Serious for SEO?
Posted: Sat Dec 07, 2024 8:56 am
SEO
December 1, 2023
Image created with Dall-E and symbolizing duplicate content on the internet.
Table of contents hide
1 What is duplicate content?
2 How does Google detect plagiarized content?
3 We are talking about duplicate content from one site to another, but two identical contents coming from the same site, is that also duplicate content?
4 If I copy and paste a paragraph, is it considered duplicate content?
5 Are you penalized for duplicate content?
6 If I translate content, is it considered plagiarism by Google?
7 Is a PDF file considered duplicate content compared to a web equivalent?
If you copy and paste text from another site onto yours, mexico whatsapp legend has it that you will be cursed for 13 generations and will never be able to sell anything on the internet!
Like all urban legends, it's obviously false, but even in the most incredible legends, there is often a tiny bit of truth.
Come on, let's sort out the truth from the lies together on duplicate content !
Training offered to learn how to write an SEO blog article
I'll give you some answers about duplicate content, but if you want to know more, I invite you to buy Olivier Andrieu's book, SEO in 500 questions .
What is duplicate content?
Duplicate content , also called duplicate content in English, is two textual contents of one or more identical websites.
A search engine like Google will only consider one of these contents and ignore the other .
Typically, the oldest content will be considered original (or canonical), so this is the content that will receive the expected visibility .
Read also: Optimize your Google My Business listing
How does Google spot plagiarized content?
There are two criteria that come into play for the search engine to detect duplicate content:
The date of first discovery: logically, Google will go to the original page before any possible copies (but this is not always the case with increasingly frequent indexing delays...)
The popularity of the page: the more quality links a page has pointing to it, the more it will be considered the original version by Google (hence the importance of working on your netlinking !)
We are talking about duplicate content from one site to another, but two identical contents coming from the same site, is that also duplicate content?
Duplicate content can be external (from one site to another) or internal (within the same site, from one page to another).
Therefore, avoid taking identical content from your site to feed a new page.
This may interest you: why use the strong tag (bold) in SEO?
If I copy and paste a paragraph, is it considered duplicate content?
A priori, no.
For example, if you copy and paste a paragraph to introduce your services or make a call to action in each of your blog posts, it will not be considered duplicate content.
In practice, it is considered that there must be less than 70% similarity between two texts to avoid duplicate content.
So, if you take 3 sentences from a 1000 word content, there is no chance that it will be considered duplicate content by Google.
To be sure, I advise you to use a verification tool like Plagiarism Detector (you just have to copy and paste your text and the tool will check its percentage of similarity with other texts on the internet).
Be careful though: it remains a tool, sometimes the results are crazy...
Are you penalized for duplicate content?
The question that probably interests you the most and which causes a lot of ink to flow!
And the answer is no: you will not be punished by Google for bad practices .
On the other hand, if you create duplicate content internally, you are wasting Google's time for nothing when it comes to visiting your site (and this can penalize you in terms of visibility).
If it is external duplicate content, you will lose visibility and it will be difficult to position yourself on the first page of Google because you will have little chance of being chosen as the original page.
And between us, it's not very ethical to steal other people's work... Make sure you differentiate between being inspired and simply copying.
If I translate content, is it considered plagiarism by Google?
No, no matter the language, Google will not consider this as duplicate content.
You will have no visibility problems if you want to translate your site into another language.
To discover: can you be penalized by Google for over-optimization?
Is a PDF file considered duplicate content compared to a web equivalent?
Yes, because Google visits and ranks PDFs the same way it ranks web pages. You’ve probably clicked on a search result and landed on a PDF, right?
If you are hesitant, it is better to remove the PDF and re-use its elements to put them on a web page, which is more easily optimized for natural referencing.
December 1, 2023
Image created with Dall-E and symbolizing duplicate content on the internet.
Table of contents hide
1 What is duplicate content?
2 How does Google detect plagiarized content?
3 We are talking about duplicate content from one site to another, but two identical contents coming from the same site, is that also duplicate content?
4 If I copy and paste a paragraph, is it considered duplicate content?
5 Are you penalized for duplicate content?
6 If I translate content, is it considered plagiarism by Google?
7 Is a PDF file considered duplicate content compared to a web equivalent?
If you copy and paste text from another site onto yours, mexico whatsapp legend has it that you will be cursed for 13 generations and will never be able to sell anything on the internet!
Like all urban legends, it's obviously false, but even in the most incredible legends, there is often a tiny bit of truth.
Come on, let's sort out the truth from the lies together on duplicate content !
Training offered to learn how to write an SEO blog article
I'll give you some answers about duplicate content, but if you want to know more, I invite you to buy Olivier Andrieu's book, SEO in 500 questions .
What is duplicate content?
Duplicate content , also called duplicate content in English, is two textual contents of one or more identical websites.
A search engine like Google will only consider one of these contents and ignore the other .
Typically, the oldest content will be considered original (or canonical), so this is the content that will receive the expected visibility .
Read also: Optimize your Google My Business listing
How does Google spot plagiarized content?
There are two criteria that come into play for the search engine to detect duplicate content:
The date of first discovery: logically, Google will go to the original page before any possible copies (but this is not always the case with increasingly frequent indexing delays...)
The popularity of the page: the more quality links a page has pointing to it, the more it will be considered the original version by Google (hence the importance of working on your netlinking !)
We are talking about duplicate content from one site to another, but two identical contents coming from the same site, is that also duplicate content?
Duplicate content can be external (from one site to another) or internal (within the same site, from one page to another).
Therefore, avoid taking identical content from your site to feed a new page.
This may interest you: why use the strong tag (bold) in SEO?
If I copy and paste a paragraph, is it considered duplicate content?
A priori, no.
For example, if you copy and paste a paragraph to introduce your services or make a call to action in each of your blog posts, it will not be considered duplicate content.
In practice, it is considered that there must be less than 70% similarity between two texts to avoid duplicate content.
So, if you take 3 sentences from a 1000 word content, there is no chance that it will be considered duplicate content by Google.
To be sure, I advise you to use a verification tool like Plagiarism Detector (you just have to copy and paste your text and the tool will check its percentage of similarity with other texts on the internet).
Be careful though: it remains a tool, sometimes the results are crazy...
Are you penalized for duplicate content?
The question that probably interests you the most and which causes a lot of ink to flow!
And the answer is no: you will not be punished by Google for bad practices .
On the other hand, if you create duplicate content internally, you are wasting Google's time for nothing when it comes to visiting your site (and this can penalize you in terms of visibility).
If it is external duplicate content, you will lose visibility and it will be difficult to position yourself on the first page of Google because you will have little chance of being chosen as the original page.
And between us, it's not very ethical to steal other people's work... Make sure you differentiate between being inspired and simply copying.
If I translate content, is it considered plagiarism by Google?
No, no matter the language, Google will not consider this as duplicate content.
You will have no visibility problems if you want to translate your site into another language.
To discover: can you be penalized by Google for over-optimization?
Is a PDF file considered duplicate content compared to a web equivalent?
Yes, because Google visits and ranks PDFs the same way it ranks web pages. You’ve probably clicked on a search result and landed on a PDF, right?
If you are hesitant, it is better to remove the PDF and re-use its elements to put them on a web page, which is more easily optimized for natural referencing.