There's so much confusion about duplicate content and whether it can hurt in terms of SEO. Great answer here by John in the Dec 31 help hangout.
Google doesn't demote for duplicate content...but they may not show all of it to searchers.
youtube.com/watch?v=MrgtKt
#SEO
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Thanks for sharing Marie. Do you think there is a glass ceiling effect of duplicate content i.e. if Google isn't sure what page to show for a term, it will "pick maybe one or two pages to show", does that then, in turn, have an effect on site quality overall?
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I do think that if a site has a lot of content that's duplicated from other sources, it can affect G's perception of overall site quality.
But if G's not sure what to show from your site, I think the answer is to make it more clear and have a good solid page as an option.
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This was mentioned by him in another hangout a good six months ago as well, and you had shared this then as well.
Shows how the confusion has been around about this, besides ofcourse some agencies/professionals misguiding their clients for particular interests. Thanks as always.
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Yes, we have seen that past. Competitors copying our web content (#duplicatecontent) and they are getting ranked. To avoid this, what can be our solid strategy? any suggestions?
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John has said in the past that if this is happening it could mean that there are quality issues with your site.
Still, have you tried DMCA?
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What is the thought on duplicate meta descriptions?
If you offer the same service at multiple locations, you put location info. in the title. Description list services and features, which are the same for all.
Better to re-write one for each location?
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Maybe a reason for confusion is that if doorway pages violate the quality guidelines that could harm the site. Does J's answer mean near duplicate product pages are never seen as doorway pages?
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So, this all leaves out a major aspect of duplicate content. If your site has 1000s or millions of pgs, and a significant number of pages are dupes, then you have diluted your PageRank unnecessarily.
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