The Duplicate Content Myth - Why you Shouldn't Be Afraid of Duplicate Content

I know for several years I've read people fret and worry over duplicate content. You'll see the forum posts all the time.... "I want to post an article that I wrote for an article site on my website but don't want to get hit with the duplicate content penalty. How much should I rewrite to make it different enough so google won't penalize me." Usually this is followed by suggestions of article spinner software or "you should have put it on your site first" or something else that doesn't even question the premise of a duplicate content penalty.

For a long time I've suspected and then known that most people completely misunderstand the duplicate content "penalty" that google has. What they try to do is avoid providing duplicate results from the same site. Think about a blog style site where the same articles may show up under several categories or tags. Maybe a paragraph summery on the main page and that is duplicated on the real post page. They don't want 300 results from your site when they all contain the same text if one result will do.

What it doesn't mean is one site will be penalized if there's a copy of content from another site. That's more of a copyright issue and really out of Google's day to day business in determining. For instance, how would they KNOW if I don't have the rights to republish something on my site that I used a pseudonym to write up for another site. If there were an issue that's for the two parties involved to deal with. Not google!

But how can I prove or show to people that this duplicate content thing is a myth when we talk about multiple domains having similar content....

As I was researching the purchase of a gre psr-300 scanner for review on one of my websites recently.... it dawned on me that this kind of item was a perfect example of blowing up the duplicate content myth. Take some time to look for a product that has boiler plate description from the manufacturer and a list of specs. Now start searching for it. Search for sentences from the boilerplate "our product slices, dices and operates like no other" .... you'll find it copied and pasted all over the internet. Many listings on ebay, amazon, pick a site and it will be the same text.

Now, I guess you could argue that big sites like that are immune to the duplicate content penalty... but the thing is it's not just the big sites like that, it's also small vendors. Everyone seems to copy and paste the stock description and specs. Well... some might say the content is really different because each site has different navigation and "other" stuff on the page as well.

Well, if that's true then WHY should you be concerned about an exact reprint of your article from an article directory on YOUR site. Don't you have different navigation and other "stuff" on the page than the article directory? So..... don't worry about it. If you really want, rewrite it or change it a bit, but the truth is you will not be penalized in the search results for having content on your site that you've also published elsewhere. Oh, and watch out for those that are trying to tell you there is to sell you something....

Now, one other thing I should note is that some sites have a distinct rule that the content you submit should not have been published elsewhere and they have means of checking. That is completely different than what we're discussing with regards to google. For those sites either publish your articles over there first, or write a couple different versions to make sure they're unique.