Is Google able to determine duplicate content every day/ month?
-
A while ago I talked to somebody who used to work for MSN a couple of years ago within their engineering department. We talked about a recent dip we had with one of our sites.We argued this could be caused by the large amount of duplicate content we have on this particular website (+80% of our site).
Then he said, quoted: "Google seems only to be able to determine every couple of months instead of every day if the content is actually duplicate content". I clearly don't doubt that duplicate content is a ranking factor. But I would like to know you guys opinions about Google being only able to determine this every couple of X months instead of everyday.
Have you seen or heard something similar?
-
Sorting out Google's timelines is tricky these days, because they aren't the same for every process and every site. In the early days, the "Google dance" happened about once a month, and that was the whole mess (index, algo updates, etc.). Over time, index updates have gotten a lot faster, and ranking and indexation are more real-time (especially since the "Caffeine" update), but that varies wildly across sites and pages.
I think you also have to separate a couple of impacts of duplicate content. When it comes to filtering - Google excluding a piece of duplicate content from rankings (but not necessarily penalizing the site), I don't see any evidence that this takes a couple of months. It can Google days or weeks to re-cache any given page, and to detect a duplicate they would have to re-cache both copies, so that may take a month in some cases, realistically. I strongly suspect, though, that the filter itself happens in real-time. There's no good way to store a filter for every scenario, and some filters are query-specific. Computationally, some filters almost have to happen on the fly.
On the other hand, you have updates like Panda, where duplicate content can cause something close to a penalty. Panda data was originally updated outside of the main algorithm, to the best of our knowledge, and probably about once/month. Over the more than a year since Panda 1.0 rolled out, though, it seems that this timeline accelerated. I don't think it's real-time, but it may be closer to 2 weeks (that's speculation, I admit).
So, the short answer is "It's complicated" I don't have any evidence to suggest that filtering duplicates takes Google months (and, actually, have anecdotal evidence that it can happen much faster). It is possible that it could take weeks or months to see the impact of duplicates on some sites and in some situations, though.
-
Hi Donnie,
Thanks for your reply, but I was already aware of the fact that Google had/ has a sandbox. I had to mention this within my question. I'm looking more for an answer around the fact if Google is able to determine on what basis if pages are duplicate.
Because I saw dozens of cases where our content was indexed and we linked/ linked not back to the 'original' source.
Also want to make clear that in all of these cases the duplicate content was in agreement with the original sources just to be sure.
-
In the past google had a sandbox period before any page (content) would rank. However, now everything is instant. (just learned this today @seomoz)
If you release something, Google will index it as fast as possible. If that info gets duplicated Google will only count the first one indexed. Everyone else loses brownie points unless they trackback/link back to the main article (first indexed).
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Enable Ecommerce Tracking with Google Tag Manager
Hello all, I am having an issue with tracking the sales on a webshop, and I would like to know how I can enable the ecommerce tracking with Google Tag Manager? Right now I am tracking the pageviews fine, firing a Universal Analytics tag. How can I achieve this? Thank you.
Reporting & Analytics | | renehansen0 -
Tips for migrating Google News traffic?
We are about to relaunch a site that gets a lot of Google News traffic. We are not changing domain, but the site structure is changing greatly, with the URLs of both news index pages and articles being shaken up. Obviously, we've 301-ed every page to its closest equivalent on the new site. We've also got a news sitemap. As we are not changing domain, is there anything further we need to do to help protect our Google News traffic. On a related note, does anyone have a relaible way of measuring traffic from Google News listings in universal search?
Reporting & Analytics | | Dennis-529610 -
How serious are the Duplicate page content and Tags error?
I have a travel booking website which reserves flights, cars, hotels, vacation packages and Cruises. I encounter a huge number of Duplicate Page Title and Content error. This is expected because of the nature of my website. Say if you look for flights between Washington DC and London Heathrow you will at least get 60 different options with same content and title tags. How can I go about reducing the harm if any of duplicate content and meta tags on my website? Knowing that invariably I will have multiple pages with same content and tags? Would appreciate your advice? S.H
Reporting & Analytics | | sherohass0 -
How can you tell if your new content has been indexed?
Other than simply doing a search in each case, is there any way I can tell (in Webmaster Tools, for example) if the 500-1000 new pages of content I have added have been indexed and are now appearing in search results? My traffic hasn't risen much, but I know at least a few of them are in there... How can I tell when they're all in?
Reporting & Analytics | | corp08030 -
How do I find backlinks and/or SERPs for a subdomain
I realize this is probably a very basic question but if I want to find backlinks to a sub-domain of my site, how would I do that? Also, if I wanted to see what search terms were bringing traffic to one specific page of my site, how would I do that?
Reporting & Analytics | | aarnswife0 -
Google Analytics session update question
Hello, With reference to seomoz blog post - http://www.seomoz.org/blog/panda-24-and-analytics-session-update-rolled-out-simultaneously#jtc151292 , i would like clarification about the following - User searches Google for "Product Name" and clicks on your AdWords advertisement. User leaves site and searches a few more times, click on competition and comparing prices and features. User ultimately decides to with your product, Googles "Your Brand + Product Name", clicks your organic listing, and buys the product. This whole process takes less than 30 minutes. "Your Brand + Product Name" will appear in your organic keyword report with 1 visit. My question is whether "Product Name" will also appear in organic keyword report with 1 visit if the visitor is not signed in. ( as search won't be encrypted ) Thanks
Reporting & Analytics | | seoug_20100 -
How to change a url for google analytics account
We recently changed the url of a client's website. Is there a way to change the url on the ga account instead of creating a new account so that we don't lose comparative data? Thanks! Sorry- I know this is a novice question.
Reporting & Analytics | | marketing12340 -
Google Shopping & Keyword Tracking
When tracking Google Shopping using the URL builder is it possible to pull through the Keyword used or will analytic do this automatically?
Reporting & Analytics | | TPSUK1