A Technical Solution To Content Duplication

A Technical Solution To Content Duplication Sophie Brannon Absolute Digital
Media Head of SEO @SophieBrannon

@SophieBrannon 2

Duplicate content refers to content that is the same or
very similar across the same domain or multiple

@SophieBrannon 4 Same Domain Duplicate Content Can Include…

@SophieBrannon 5 URL Variations

@SophieBrannon 6 HTTP & HTTPS

@SophieBrannon 7 Boilerplate Content

@SophieBrannon 8 Cross-Domain Duplicate Content Can Include…

@SophieBrannon 9 Scraped Content

@SophieBrannon 10 Website Migrations

@SophieBrannon 11 Competitors

@SophieBrannon 12 Duplicate content won’t lead you into a penalty

@SophieBrannon 13 But…

@SophieBrannon 14 It can significantly hurt your search rankings

@SophieBrannon 15 Search engines won’t always know which page to
rank

@SophieBrannon 16 Search engines won’t know how to split authority

@SophieBrannon 17 And they won’t know which version of a
page to show for a relevant search term

@SophieBrannon 18 If content duplication is so bad, then why
does it happen?

@SophieBrannon 19 Up to 29% of the internet is duplicate
content

@SophieBrannon 20 And most of it is a complete accident!

@SophieBrannon 21 URL variations are one of the common causes
of content duplication

@SophieBrannon 22 URL variations include: • Click tracking & analytics
codes • Session IDs • Printer-friendly URLs

@SophieBrannon 23 But there are also lots of other types
of common content duplication causes

@SophieBrannon 24 How To Fix Your Content Duplication Issues

@SophieBrannon 25

@SophieBrannon 26

@SophieBrannon 27

@SophieBrannon 28 There are a number of different solutions to
consider but understanding the reason the issue exists will help you to find the best solution rather than a blanket fix

@SophieBrannon 29 Canonicalisation

@SophieBrannon 30 Questions to consider...

@SophieBrannon 31 Are the pages exact duplicates?

@SophieBrannon 32 Is one of the pages generating more traffic
/ has more visibility?

@SophieBrannon 33 Does the page offer additional value that may
not translate to SEO value?

@SophieBrannon 34 If you answered yes, yes, yes…. Then canonicalisation
may be your best bet.

@SophieBrannon 35 No Index

@SophieBrannon 37 Are your crawl stats suggesting Google’s wasting a
lot of valuable time crawling these pages?

@SophieBrannon 38 Do you need these pages showing in Google
search results?

@SophieBrannon 39 Does the page offer valuable information to users?

@SophieBrannon 40

@SophieBrannon 41 If you answered yes, no, yes, then you
may want to noindex if canonicalisation isn’t an option

@SophieBrannon 42 Redirects

@SophieBrannon 44 Does the page need to exist at all?

@SophieBrannon 45 If the answer is no, then redirect it!

@SophieBrannon 46 Rewrites Questions to ask....

@SophieBrannon 47

@SophieBrannon 48 Can you target the page with a new
search intent?

@SophieBrannon 49 Do you have the resource to rewrite?

@SophieBrannon 50 If you answered yes to both, then rewrites
may be the better option.

@SophieBrannon 51 Or should you just live with it?

@SophieBrannon 52

@SophieBrannon 53 If you can implement a resolution, then that
is often better choice for long-term SEO success

@SophieBrannon 54 Redirects • HTTPS / HTTP domains • Pages
that are not valuable, are outdated and irrelevant • Non-www / www. versions

@SophieBrannon 55 Canonicalisation • Exact duplicate pages that offer user
value and so need to remain • Pages that cannot be rewritten

@SophieBrannon 56 Canonicalisation • One page generates more traffic /
visibility than the other • You can’t redirect because of technical restrictions

@SophieBrannon 57 Content Rewrites • You can target different key
terms and search intent within the copy • You have the resource to implement

@SophieBrannon 58 NoIndex • If you absolutely need to keep
the page, but it holds no SEO value. • Bots are wasting valuable crawl budget & 301 redirects aren’t an option.

@SophieBrannon 59 Some other considerations for content duplication

@SophieBrannon 60 Block crawling of parameterized duplicate content with the
URL Parameter Tool

@SophieBrannon 61 Keep your internal linking consistent /page/ /page /page/index.html

@SophieBrannon 62 For country- specific content, Google advises the use
of CCTLD’s & hreflang.

@SophieBrannon 63 Avoid the resource issues with content automation using
OpenAI & GPT-3

Thank You Follow me - @SophieBrannon

@SophieBrannon 65 Resources https://developers.google.com/search/blog/2009/12/handling-legitimate-cross-domain https://developers.google.com/search/blog/2009/10/reunifying-duplicate-content-on-your https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/crawl-url-parameters https://twitter.com/BillieGeena/status/1428059594144817157 https://twitter.com/SophieBrannon/status/1427905326683148290

A Technical Solution To Content Duplication

A Technical Solution To Content Duplication

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