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But other search engine experts say that occupying multiple slots in search rankings may simply be smart marketing. Greg Boser [webmasterworld.com], the founder of WebGuerrilla.com [webguerrilla.com], a search-engine marketing consultancy, likened the Gift Services sites to GMC and Chevrolet. "They have different logos and different TV commercials," he said, "but a Chevy truck is exactly the same thing as a GMC truck."
But other search engine experts say that occupying multiple slots in search rankings may simply be smart marketing. Greg Boser, the founder of WebGuerrilla.com, a search-engine marketing consultancy, likened the Gift Services sites to GMC and Chevrolet. "They have different logos and different TV commercials," he said, "but a Chevy truck is exactly the same thing as a GMC truck."
It may be smart marketing for the search spammer, but that doesn't mean it's good for users or the search engine.
The analogy doesn't really work anyway. General Motors can't crank out a hundred identical car brands and distribute them in the marketplace at virtually no cost. And even if it could, it wouldn't be able to rely on the media to give free publicity to those hundred identical car brands at the expense of its rivals.
If ATW can do it, why can't Google.
If sites have the same content, only one should be shown. Whether that means banning all but one or it means randomly choosing one I don't care. Personally, I would randomly choose one site since this would ensure that offenders had to maintain multiple sites or risk being dropped altogether.
Banning all the sites would be wrong since users may find one to be useful. However, multiple identical sites in SERPS are not good for users and should not be tolerated. Once a filter has been tripped, an email should be sent out automatically with a warning, a copy of the webmaster guidelines and a threat that further breaches will result in a total ban.
Kaled.
PS
The sites that ATW apparently banned serve identical content disguised in different colors and graphics, etc.
I am quite amazed that a NYTimes reporter could see this as news. It reads like a blog entry.
It reads like a blog entry.
Exactly. My response to this article was, "Again?"
I expect the news to reach Danish newspapers in half a year or so.
However, multiple identical sites in SERPS are not good for users and should not be tolerated. Once a filter has been tripped, an email should be sent out automatically with a warning, a copy of the webmaster guidelines and a threat that further breaches will result in a total ban.
It isn't that simple. What about syndicated content? The same AP story or NEW YORK TIMES column may appear on a hundred or a thousand different sites. Are you suggesting that the editor of the DES MOINES REGISTER should get a warning of a total ban if a Maureen Dowd column from the NEW YORK TIMES appears on its editorial page?
And don't forget boilerplate advertising copy. Every PC software vendor on the Web may have the same manufacturer's copy and photo for Norton AntiVirus or an H-P inkjet printer, but should all but one of those sites be banned for duplicate content?
Of course, you could argue that Google could simply ban duplicate pages as opposed to duplicate headlines and body text. But if that happened, spammers could simply use different page layouts as containers for their duplicate content (as some of them are already doing).
I agree that duplicate content is a problem, especially for things like hotel listings and product blurbs where boilerplate e-commerce or affiliate pages can clutter search results. But the problem won't be solved with a simple ban of duplicate content.
Article: Indeed, Ms. Wiesel of Cesta Gift Baskets said last week that she had resorted to a new strategy: purchasing advertising on Google. "Now we've become a sponsored link," she said, "just to stay in the game."
Hmmm Google-crack! ;)
Too many eggs in the one gift basket i guess.
Brett: I am quite amazed that a NYTimes reporter could see this as news.
Its not news to us - we deal with it every day. Astronomers probably say the same thing each time a "Comet came within ****xxx million km of Earth" story hits the headlines - thats news to the public, but not to those in the industry.
I think the general consumer needs to become much more aware of the dynamics of search engine rankings - how many would you say still take the number one listed site as being "the best"?
"well Google say it's the best..."
Article: Or is the consumer at risk of being ill served, or worse, deceived?
This is the key issue - are SEOs best serving their customers (clients) by churning out multiple sites? Are companies best serving their customers (users) by churning out multiple sites?
I dont know. Something just doesnt sit right with me when companies feel the need to churn out different sites in order to succede - be it to capitalise in the SERPs or to cover past indiscretions. It's like saying that the core of the company isn't worth that much - no value to users there.
If I opened 5 shops on a street, one after another (same products), would i want to make them appear to all be competitors or would i consolidate them?
I would probably open them all under one umbrella brand. But then the local monopolies commission may want to have a word with me! ;)
Perhaps Google should employ a monopolies commission to ensure fair play in the SERPs? :)
Scott
Please read my post. You should note that I talk about duplicate sites not the odd duplicate page. Since this was the subject of the NYT article, my post was relevant, with respect, your reply was not.
Kaled.
Please read my post. You should note that I talk about duplicate sites not the odd duplicate page. Since this was the subject of the NYT article, my post was relevant, with respect, your reply was not.
Sure it was, because Google doesn't index sites: It indexes pages.
Also, if Google were to index sites and eliminate those that were duplicates, it would be very easy for owners of multiple sites to make slight changes so that their sites weren't duplicates (e.g., by using slightly different page templates, by varying directory names, and by removing or replacing just enough pages in each site to trip up Google's filter).
As I said earlier: Eliminating duplicates sounds good in theory, but it isn't that simple.
Kaled.
Google may index pages but it bans sites n'est ce pas?
Yes, but such bans are applied manually, which means that spammers with duplicate sites are like speeders on the highway: Most of them go unpunished because they don't get caught.
Banning is easy. Detection is the hard part!
Anyone who steals business from others by playing on Googles faults deserves to be banned. SEO is one thing. Even GoogleGuy has said that not all SEO is bad. He said something along the lines that SEO can simply be making Google's life easier. Creating duplicate sites is not SEO its just plain cheating and if other people loose business as a result, so far as I am concerned, it is theft.
I would be happy to see the guilty banned for life from operating websites, however there is no way that this could be achieved.
Kaled.
Anyone who steals business from others by playing on Googles faults deserves to be banned. SEO is one thing. Even GoogleGuy has said that not all SEO is bad. He said something along the lines that SEO can simply be making Google's life easier. Creating duplicate sites is not SEO its just plain cheating and if other people loose business as a result, so far as I am concerned, it is theft.
Funny thing is, I don't do any duplicate content or stuff like that, but a couple competitors who rose above me do. If Google is devaluing internal links then the losers are normal sites with lots of internal pages and the winners are people who run multiple domains with duplicate content.
Kaled.
You guys think it is bad now wait until google goes public. Unless you have a bankroll in the millions you will no longer be able to afford to compete. Google has a strangle hold on small business and they know this, they will do what ever makes them more money not what makes webmasters happy or the general searching public entertained.
Look at all the scandals in the news you know google and overture are next to screw us all, they say they have filters to prevent people from clicking on payads all day, give me a break they love it when you click the payads all day its more money for them and to boot its easy money they just sit back and watch it roll in, 15 to $20 a click for web hosting thats got to be $100,000 a day easy for google. They are going to tell us what ever we want to hear and do the total opposite. You guys wait and see we will all suffer from google in the end in one way shape or form.
Good luck to us all
Steve
(Reuters) Growth in Google's main revenue engine seen slowing [reuters.com]
It is fair to say that there is an optimum quality for maximum profits and that if the quality of results was perfect, fewer people would click on adwords. However, I do not believe Google are in danger of exceeding that quality threshold.
If Google are deliberately reducing the quality of their search results to generate more income prior to flotation, then I predict that it's a policy that will turn round and bite them on the bum. (English metaphor - sorry).
Before flotation, the last thing any company needs is a whiff of bad publicity. Poor search results = bad publicity.
Kaled.
2. The story's a week late. With the Google update, Cesta is now #10 for the search mentioned in the article, and the company they were whining about seems to be out of the top 10, but it's hard to tell for sure.
3. Cesta's site is not some innocent mom and pop site, it's very optimized. They're just whining to reporters because they were out-optimized.
Sheesh, they ain't shy.
They're just whining to reporters because they were out-optimized.
Creating duplicate sites is NOT optimization.
http://www.google.com/webmasters/guidelines.html
Don't create multiple pages, subdomains, or domains with substantially duplicate content.
Seems clear enough to me.
I'm not generally keen on the idea of banning sites or even applying penalties. Generally, I think that if a site breaks the rules the benefits gained should simply be eliminated. e.g. hidden text should be simply ignored. However, creating duplicate domains is taking cheating to a higher quantum level. It absolutely should not be tolerated.
Kaled.
We have seen exact, duplicate websites for the exact same term in Google for some of our client's top keyword phrases.
Example - keyword "buy [product name]" results in #2 through #12 as the same site, same company for one of their terms.....
oooo, oooo, what's that? type in another term "buy [product name]" and you get yet another #2 through #8 as their sites....even close to the same URL on all of them.
I've discovered almost 20 occurrances of this happening and all for this same company. I'm sure there are way more.
Perhaps, in our opinion, as the biggest "flop" in Google indexing in some time.
You guys need to know that google is thinking green now! The adwords program generates billions of dollars for them free listings generating next to nothing, if you were at google what do you think you would be thinking? How to improve no profit free listings or how no manipulate the free listings so you no longer come up and you are forced to pay adwords in order to survive.
Conspiracy theories may be cathartic, but they're seldom based on facts or logic.
Fact is, search results are Google's core product. Without quality search results, people won't visit Google, and there won't be any audience or clickthroughs for AdWords on SERPs. (And let's not forget that AdWords on SERPs earn Google a higher profit than Adwords/AdSense ads on partner sites.)
but I have a suspicion that WG's comment may have been shortened or taken out of context to fit the editorial slant.
That's the understatement of the week. An hour long interview, and that's what she came up with. It's kind of sad when you think about it. But even though it really is a non-story, I think there are some educational lessons buried in there.
The first is the realization that search engines won't invest much time in removing "cheaters" unless they honestly feel the cheating is impacting the user experience. When you find this kind of search engine content in your own space, it is very easy to convince yourself that the consumer is getting screwed because you are missing. But when you step back and try and look at it from a searchers perspective, you often see a different picture.
I spent quite a bit of time looking at the different gift basket sites. They were not carbon copy sites with just a couple words changed. And I can honestly say that if I was looking to buy a gift basket and have it delivered to my Mother, I probably wouldn't have noticed that these sites were owned and operated by the same company.
The reality is that this kind of content exists because Google's algorithm allows it to exist. And that fact isn't going to change anytime soon. So if you are a local, independent business that has been pushed out by a big company with lots of web sites, you really have two chocies:
1. Spend two months complaining to Google about how unfair it is.
or
2. Spend two weeks getting a solid understanding of why those techniques work and then develop a strategy to get back in the game.
If I was a local gift basket company, I would have spent my time contacting all the other local independent gift basket companies and ask them if they would be interested in starting an online association. We'd build a directory and we'd put up a bunch of content explaining why you are better off using a gift basket company that actually does business in the city you want to deliver to. We'd then leverage the linking power of all those unique IP's.
Having worked in similar situations before, I can guarantee that the little mom & pops would regain their rightful place at the top of the SERPS. All it takes is a mindset open to adaptation and a little sweat equity.
I was aware of a call for gift basket webmasters to join together for a class action against Google over the spam that the disgruntled ones belived infected their SERPS - given Google owes no one and Google is free, it has no chance of getting off the ground. But maybe as a result of this, the industry got organised --> NY Times took notice --> maybe Google will take more notice now. You have to give them credit for the PR effort.
I doubt that ATW banned two sites as a result of a complaint, it was almost certainly due to duplicate content detection.
Or could it be because alltheweb is (a) a different search engine with a different algorithm, (b) alltheweb is not as good as google and simply missed the additional pages, or (c) complete coincidence?
If sites have the same content, only one should be shown.
Syndicated content?
Once a filter has been tripped, an email should be sent out automatically with a warning, a copy of the webmaster guidelines and a threat that further breaches will result in a total ban.
Woudl wind up banning half the pages and sites on the internet.
Anyone who steals business from others by playing on Googles faults deserves to be banned.
And who judges this? When does "healthy competition" move over into "stealing business"?
If I opened 5 shops on a street, one after another (same products), would i want to make them appear to all be competitors or would i consolidate them?
No, but you might print 5 different flyers to attract different consumers, or sponser a dozen different teams in a ports event to overwhelm the competition. Is any of this bad?
I probably wouldn't have noticed that these sites were owned and operated by the same company.
And as a consumer, who cares? In this example, I want a good gift basket. Do I care who sells it to me?
Creating duplicate sites is NOT optimization.
I'm not generally keen on the idea of banning sites or even applying penalties. Generally, I think that if a site breaks the rules the benefits gained should simply be eliminated. e.g. hidden text should be simply ignored. However, creating duplicate domains is taking cheating to a higher quantum level. It absolutely should not be tolerated.
Who is getting cheated? The customer presumably finds what he wants or finds another place to get gift baskets. The competition deserves to lose out if it cannot compete. As a consumer, I could not care less where a company appears in the listing - I just want my basket. Remember, ethics has nothing to do with SEO. The two words do not even belong on the same page as each other. It's liek saying "ethical spamming" or "ethical adult web sites" or other such silliness. SEO is about competition, and competition is, by definition, competing - getting more business than the other guy. Being a smarter advertiser (by cleverly creating different sites with similar products) is most definitely jsut good competition. Deal with it, get smarter and out-do them instead of complaining about it.
Because search engines like Google give weight to sites that are linked to other sites, companies set up networks, creating or encouraging others to create large numbers of sites that sell the same products and then linking them together. If the strategy works, what the searcher sees is a list of links that lead back to the same product or company.
I don't think duplicate content is the issue here. Rather, it was the fact that Gift Services cross linked its affiliated sites.
I'm still unsure as to how legit that is, or if we even have enough precedent or rules to say if it's legit or not. More importantly, how can Google tell if it's legit or not?
<added> I guess the question is whether the cross-linking it is beneficial to the customer </added>
In addition, I just checked to see if Google had banned the site that I reported (mentioned earlier in this thread). I can report that the site has indeed vanished. That took less than 48 hours. So if it was banned as a result of my complaint, I have to give Google 10/10 for speed. All I have to to now is find all the duplicates and report them too. Then I guess I'll have to dodge a few bullets - turns out they're all hooked up to russian porn!
Kaled.
