Am I being penalised for duplicate content?

[tabish]

Hi Masters,

I have one "Master" website with 500000+ users. I have made two other websites to share some load on other server.

For example, my main website is "Global" but two sites I made is of two different countries, and they share users and data of those countries only. But also my main website too shares those data, so basically you will get all the data of those two particular countries on Three of my websites.

The day when we made these sites, traffic on main website started decreasing, and now Panda hit us completely and seeing 90% drop.

What you guys will suggest?

I have few hundreds of hits on those two sites that are sharing content of my main website.

Regards

[tedster]

Are the two new sites both using a ccTLD?

[seoskunk]

I think you need to go back to one website and look at load balancers and solving hotspots on your site but hey well done sounds like a great site

[Sgt_Kickaxe]

I think you need to embrace that there is nothing you can do until Panda is run again. Some sites changed nothing and came back stronger than before. It's almost as if all sites are being timed out in rotation in order to encourage people to make changes/improvements. Your best bet is to forget about Google and build as if they do not exist, they aren't your friend right now.

I suggest you wait until another iteration is run and see if you remain pandalized two in a row.

[tabish]

@tedster No buddy, those are .com domains.

@Sgt_Kickaxe your idea seems good. I am also noticing that Google is working on some kind of time rotation now. For few weeks you are down then again you are on top. They are giving chance to everyone. And yes, I am trying to work that way only, Will work like Google doesn't exists.

[tedster]

If they are both .com domains, then how are you focusing those helper sites on "two different countries"?

[martinacastro]

The sites are in different language?

[tangor]

If the site content is the same across all, there's no reason to split... but there might be a reason to upgrade your hosting to accommodate traffic, or as suggested above, take steps to level server loads on the existing host. The LAST thing you want to do is split your pie... it's worth more WHOLE than in slices.

[tabish]

@tedster no buddy, but the country keyword is in domain. Also those sites are being promoted with those country specific keywords only.


@tangor so you mean to say, I should merge the site altogether?

[tabish]

If I put rel="canonical" to those site pages, will that help?

[tedster]

Yes, that's a good cross-domain use of rel="canonical". Also, you can choose a geographic target for those other supportive domains in Webmaster Tools.

[martinacastro]

@tabish the sites are of different languages?

[tabish]

@martinacastro No bud, all are in English.

[tangor]

I should merge the site altogether?

More interested in why you think you need to split it apart. I wouldn't diffuse rank or link juice unless there was a very good reason.

[tabish]

And the very Funny thing is: one of these site has actually gained and still gaining in this Panda update, while the main "Original" site is loosing and loosing day by day :)

So, I am confused, do not know what algorithm is actually working in this update.

1) If you say that duplicate contents are being penalized, then this site should not pick.

2) If you say that dividing content into multiple domain is an issue, then sites that do not have any "mirror" domain are also going down and down (of same niche, top websites and 2 of my friends)

I don't know if the traffic gain on this mirror site will remain as it is or this is just for a glance. will keep updated.

[tangor]

I will say that google is not "INSTANT" and that what works Tuesday will fail on Wednesday, and sites that "COME BACK" on Monday disappear forever on Friday. There is no rhyme or reason these days. Five, six years ago changes could be made and results would show in 24 hours, but no longer... THAT'S PANDA.

And if a new one is showing now, that's the Google Hello (a boost for a new DOMAIN/URL) that lasts about 12 seconds. Next week will be a different story.

Still curious as to why one splits a performing website into three parts if the content is the same, the language is the same and... ?

[tabish]

@tangor you are right buddy.. and also that was my biggest mistake to split site into 3.. one site will be dissolved by tomorrow and another one in few days too. I am working on it now.

[azn romeo 4u]

I did the same thing. Put noindex, nofollow on all duplicate pages, including user pages.