As an SEO expert, I have encountered numerous websites with duplicate content issues that negatively affect their rankings. Duplicate content refers to identical or nearly identical content that appears on multiple URLs, either within the same website or on different ones. This can confuse search engines and make it difficult for them to determine which version of the content is the most relevant and trustworthy. In this article, I will discuss the impact of duplicate content on SEO and how to address this issue. Siteimprove, a tool used by advanced SEO users, utilizes machine learning to discover the similarity of content on a website.
It presents the pages found with duplicate content, the percentage of similarity between the pages, and statistics of page visits. Duplicate content can also refer to material that appears in more than one place on the internet. This can happen due to poor site architecture or when a spam site copies content from another website. One of the main reasons why duplicate content is a concern for SEO is because it makes it difficult for search engines to determine which version of the content to include higher in search results. This can result in lower rankings for both versions of the content.
To address this issue, a canonical link can be used to indicate a preferred URL to be indexed when multiple pages have the same or similar content. Google Search Console (GSC) also offers a free way to identify duplicate content issues through its indexing reports. These reports can help website owners and SEOs identify and address any duplicate content on their site. However, it is important to note that duplicate content from a site is not necessarily a reason for taking action unless it appears that the duplicate content is intended to deceive and manipulate search engine results. As a reader, you may not care if you keep getting the answer you were looking for, but a search engine has to choose which page to show in the search results. This is why it is important for website owners and SEOs to address any duplicate content issues on their site.
The Google Search Console index coverage report is also useful in identifying duplicate content on a website. One of the most common forms of duplicate content is when multiple pages on a website have very similar or exactly the same content. This can happen when different versions of the same page are indexed by search engines. To address this issue, implementing 301 redirects from non-preferred versions of URLs to preferred versions is recommended.
