Very nice post on SEO, Duplicate Content problem is really a pain for SEO. No matter how good your content is, avoid Duplicate Content technical problem will always benefit the website ranking.
I have products on my sites for say “Kids Tousers” in “Kids” Category, but then I duplicate this product and add it in a second category Called “waterproof trousers it is the same product but in 2 categories…am I a naughty boy for this.
[quote name=‘johnbol1’]yeah exactly what does it consider…“duplicate”
I have products on my sites for say “Kids Tousers” in “Kids” Category, but then I duplicate this product and add it in a second category Called “waterproof trousers it is the same product but in 2 categories…am I a naughty boy for this.
JOhn”[/QUOTE]
That is surly duplicate as exactly same product can be accessed from more then one link. But I do not think you would get penalty for this.
However is speaking of category or a subcategory it can be accessed with many links as +currency, languages, session ids, shopping options (free shipping, price range, features) generate hundreds of links to same list products.
But what really interests me is for example
You sell products for kids, so you have features, details unique for each product. But what if you got block below added to each and every product explaining information about fabrics, safety, explanation about sizes and similar. What about such partly duplicate pages?
Duplicate content is a term google likes to put out simply because to most people with common sense it means one thing but to them it means another or rather others as they often tend to cloud any subject if it helps their aims (pr).
This is duplicate content, the are other ways and google is supposed to have ways of filtering content to class that content duplicate or not. To my mind if you play the fair game and don#t try to cheat your way into google you have no need to worry.
It’s like the old www or not, or indeed /index.html or leave it off. I know if I had spent millions of dollars on code for a search engine like google then I would want it to understand and deal with all forms of path and so I supect google does do that or rather should if it worked.
But the big thing that most people don’t realise is google is not perfect, in fact it’s pretty rubbish as a search engine and google puts out all these thories to put people off finding that out. I mean if you can blame the owner why worry about training the dog
Moral of the story is make good content, get people to like it - the will tell other, traffic will flow and google will love you - even more if you host their adverts.
One of the primary issues in cs-cart for causing duplicate content is the use of SEO and non-SEO naming. I.e. one link with href=“?dispatch=pages.view&page_id=1” and one link of href=“contact-us.html” will result in duplicate content. I.e 2 href’s that point to a page with the exact same content by two different methods.
Having clothing/pants/big_pants.htm and having bug_pants.html both point to the same page is just fine.
At least that’s my understanding of what constitutes duplicte content. So the biggest problem one is going to run into is when they first install the cart and SEO is not turned on. Stuff like quick links are non SEO and so are all the other standard links. Then one turns on SEO and creates a new link in a sidebox or something to use “contact-us.html” instead of “?dispatch=pages.view&page_id=1”.
So once you make the change to SEO, try to update all your internal links to their SEO names.
Duplicate content by Goggle is a “Myth” from the past. Nowadays Google’s algorithms can select sites built with a CMS and you won’t get a penalty, if e.g. a product has 10 different links. Google will just take the most relevat one to be listed in the serch results. You will get a penalty, if you would make 10 web sites with 1:1 content.
In fact, after 3 years of using CS-Cart, I’ve NEVER seen a single duplicate content caused by URL rewriting.
This is not the case with our colleagues and friends such as in Magento and PrestaShop where the rewriting module is not perfect!
Summary:
Of course, if you create two similar URLs with CS-Cart, you will go in trouble.
For example, one first [COLOR=“Blue”]product[/COLOR] named “[COLOR=”#0000ff"]Product.html[/COLOR]’ [COLOR=“Red”]PLUS[/COLOR] another second [COLOR=“Green”]product[/COLOR] named “[COLOR=”#008000"]Product.html[/COLOR]".
In this way, CS-Cart can’t handle two similar URL, however, this is basically not its fault, it’s yours.
Check carefully your URLs when you create them, and everything will be good.
“The duplicate content issue began as a rumor a few years ago when Google search results would state that certain results were omitted because they were very similar to results already shown. Some webmasters deducted from this that Google was applying a ‘duplicate content penalty’ to these results, and started to spread fear and panic amongst site owners everywhere, fearful that their site might become the next to get hit with this ‘penalty’.”
Google tries to always return the “best†version of a page.
If Google finds several pages offering exactly the same content, it will select that which offers the best information required. It may sometimes, list two or three pages that show exactly the same content.
What Google doesn’t like is having the same main content twice in its index. So if you’ve written an article about widgets on your site, and you’ve put the same article on someone else’s site, Google only want to list it once (because searchers will only want to read it once). What they’ll do is list one version and not list the other. You have no control over which one they list, sod’s law says they’ll list the one you don’t want!
[SIZE=“3”]1 - You have NO duplicated content, like in CS-Cart, youDONOTsplityourPageRank.
2 - You have some duplicated content, like with CS-Cart’s competitors, yousplityourPageRankbetweenallyourduplicatedpages.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=“4”]This is THE biggest Google penalty about internal duplicated content.[/SIZE]
What is Good? 1 or 2?
Yes, duplicated content IS a BIG issue.
Yes, with a duplicated content you get a Google Penalty. Because, you have the same page X times. So, with duplicated content you split your PageRank. Here is another reason to choose CS-Cart, because CS-Cart does NOT have duplicated content, so you DO NOT split your PageRank with X times the same page.
Of course, PageRank is dead
In this post of Matt Cutts about “Google incorporating site speed in search rankings” (Site Speed is another Myth, isn’t it Indy :lol: this is why I’ve written a few threads about “How to Speed Your Cart Up” with dozens of thanks), you can read this comment:
[QUOTE]my pagerank dropped from 5 to 3 last week …[/QUOTE]
If you get X time the same page with your cart - or CMS - (because a duplicated content issue) you split your PageRank, and your page’s PageRank will drop down.
It’s sort of Google penalty.
Because…
[SIZE=“3”]To Split PageRank (with duplicated content), or NOT to Split PageRank (without duplicated content), that is the question![/SIZE]
The kind of duplicate content that indy0077 is talking about is content IN google.
For example if your site phase is mentioned on more then one page of the same domain google will only show the first it finds.
The is also google’s sub-system where they have indexed your content but not yet rated or rated not good enough for the main index so it only shows if people click show all.
I believe duplicated content on a site is harder to do by mistake then people think. SEO “experts” talk a lot of ways of doing it by mistake including site sessions but none are proven. I repeat NONE are proven. It’s like saying the is a monster fish in that pond, till someone finds it it’s not there.
So I say spend your time on good content and relevant links back to your site and don’t do silly things like signing up for massive link back programmes that cause more harm then good. The key is and always will be good content and traffic.
Google solved the duplicate content created by CMS, CCK and Cart software by accepting the canonical tags. It is something to be conscientious of with any website you work with. If you add the same product to your catalog twice then use the second category function on the product page through backend.
