Internal duplicated content on articles, when is too much?

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Internal duplicated content on articles, when is too much?

markovald

2:25 pm on Jul 27, 2015 (gmt 0)

I have an automotive rental blog with articles that explain the pros of renting a specific model.

So in this articles the advantages of rental versus the buying of a new model.

This advantages are a list with bullets like this:
Rental | Buy new car
Rental:
Free car insurance
Free assistance
etc.
Buy new car
You have to pay insurance
You have to pay assistance
etc. etc.

I want to do this because i want to make all articles like landing pages...
This "advantages box" have 100 characters. The general length of articles on my blog is 500/600 characters. So i have an average of 15/20% internal duplicated content on all my articles.

Is this bad for seo? Any alternatives?

TheMadScientist

5:53 pm on Jul 27, 2015 (gmt 0)

It depends a bit, but it'll most likely be detected as "boilerplate content" and be ignored -- If you want to make it a bit more obvious, wrap it in an <aside></aside> to explicitly state in the source "it's tangentially related to the information presented, but not the main content of the page".

BTW: Welcome to WebmasterWorld!

markovald

6:47 pm on Jul 29, 2015 (gmt 0)

Thank you!

So it's not a problem to have some duplicated content with some content useful for your niche?

Example, in the duplicated content i will insert keywords like insurance, long time rental, etc. etc., that can drive to me some long tail traffic

p.s. i'm from france and google.fr it's more a little different from google.com :-)

Johan007

8:39 am on Aug 9, 2015 (gmt 0)

Interesting to know if Google will bother with understanding aside tag. If it does the aside tag has to be inside the article according to the latest on HTML5 to belong to the copy otherwise it will be related to site.

I don't think panda would care and personally I would avoid all duplicate content... even if useful for users!

If you are a top brand this is irrelevant.

TheMadScientist

9:12 am on Aug 9, 2015 (gmt 0)

Interesting to know if Google will bother with understanding aside tag.

They've been bothering to understand breadcrumbs, footers, headers and boilerplate content for years without specific markup in many cases, and in others with nothing more than class=footer, class=breadcrumb, etc., so, imo, there's no reason to think they "wouldn't bother" with using an actual element if it's present, and even if not right now today, then in the future.

If it does the aside tag has to be inside the article according to the latest on HTML5 to belong to the copy otherwise it will be related to site.

Please provide a link and quote -- I've read both the current release and the editor's draft of 5.1 on the elements of HTML [more than once] and haven't ever seen where you're getting that info.

And, if you're correct, then this example directly from the Docs is incorrect, since it's outside an <article> element, but also very clearly states the <aside> indicates content tangentially related to the page, rather than saying it must be related to the entire site since it's not within an <article> element.

<body>
<header>
<h1>My wonderful blog</h1>
<p>My tagline</p>
</header>
<aside>

<nav>
<h1>My blogroll</h1>
<ul>
<li><a href="http://blog.example.com/">Example Blog</a>
</ul>
</nav>
<nav>
<h1>Archives</h1>
<ol reversed>
<li><a href="/last-post">My last post</a>
<li><a href="/first-post">My first post</a>
</ol>
</nav>
</aside>
<aside>

<h1>Twitter Feed</h1>
<blockquote cite="http://twitter.example.net/t31351234">
I'm on vacation, writing my blog.
</blockquote>
<blockquote cite="http://twitter.example.net/t31219752">
I'm going to go on vacation soon.
</blockquote>
</aside>
<article>

<h1>My last post</h1>
<p>This is my last post.</p>
<footer>
<p><a href="/last-post" rel=bookmark>Permalink</a>
</footer>
</article>
<article>
...

http://www.w3.org/TR/html5/sections.html#the-aside-element

EditorialGuy

2:06 pm on Aug 9, 2015 (gmt 0)

Google is certainly capable of recognizing aside tags, but that doesn't mean using aside tags will keep Google from treating boilerplate content as boilerplate content. Ultimately, it's about what the user sees.

TheMadScientist

4:06 pm on Aug 9, 2015 (gmt 0)

Uh, it would be best/most-likely treated as boilerplate content, which is ignored.
The <aside> was more of a "fallback" if they didn't get it.

See Post #2 ITT.

Johan007

5:50 pm on Aug 9, 2015 (gmt 0)

@TheMadScientist a quote html5doctor website:

The spec has changed to allow aside to be used for secondary content, changing its context depending on whether it's contained within an article.

here [html5doctor.com...] I first read about this relationship in 2009 in the above article.

I had a look at the current W3C website editors draft and there are plenty of examples in the comments on the third code block on this page: [dev.w3.org...] (too much to quote here).

For my own website I have a move reviews and placed cast details inside an <aside> tag inside the <article>. I then placed my blog roll in an <aside> tag outside of my review/article tag. This year I deleted the cast details because I saw it as duplicate content that can be found on bigger sites like iMDB. I could be barking up the wrong tree but I can not risk it not being a large brand.

TheMadScientist

5:59 pm on Aug 9, 2015 (gmt 0)

here [html5doctor.com...] I first read about this relationship in 2009 in the above article.

Uh, it's 2015 and even if it was 2009, when a 3rd parties post disagrees with the current official recommendation's example, and the same example is in the draft of the "next version" of the official recommendation, I'll go with the official recommendation's example as being "authoritative" over a 3rd parties post every time, especially when the 3rd party post is over half-a-decade old.

I had a look at the current W3C website editors draft and there are plenty of examples in the comments on the first code block:

Yes, including the one I cited above -- It's there verbatim.

So, we're back to: Either the HTML current and future recommendation spec's example is wrong in both versions of the official documentation [someone should bring it up to them if it is] or an aside does not need to be inside an article element to be considered part of a page rather than part of a document as a whole.

Johan007

12:34 pm on Aug 11, 2015 (gmt 0)

@TheMadScientist I really do not understand you. This could be because as a designer I am on the creative end of the spectrum and the opposite to most programmers.

In my eyes all 3 resources say the same thing:

1. Official Recommendation [w3.org...]
2. The working draft
3. The HTML5 doctor website from 2009 (the site does get update if things change)

If the <aside> content has a relationship with the <article> then the <aside> should be inside the <article>.

As for <aside> information outside the <article> personally I like the majority we never do this.

We are going slightly off topic on this thread on SEO. If the above is true or not I don't think Google would trust the implementation anyway.

TheMadScientist

1:30 pm on Aug 11, 2015 (gmt 0)

In my eyes all 3 resources say the same thing:

Look at the example I posted above.
Look at where the <aside> is in the HTML.
Look at where the <article> is in the HTML.
Read the comments within the <aside>.

-- It's very easy to see the HTML documentation and the 2009 html5 doctor post completely disagree.

As for <aside> information outside the <article> personally I like the majority we never do this.

Please, when you state something as fact, cite a source -- I can't find one for that states "the majority of people never put an <aside> outside an <article>" anywhere and what's the majority? 51% v 49%, 70% v 30%, 90% v 10%

If the above is true or not I don't think Google would trust the implementation anyway.

As a search engine you have to figure out what a page is mainly about to know what to show people for a query. You don't "just trust anything", but you do also look for clues that help you do your job. There's no way to abuse an <aside> that can't be done with RDFa, schema.org markup, or a number of other ways, so there's no reason to "trust" an <aside> less or more than WPSideBar [schema.org...] or <hN>, <section>, <article>, <main> or any other markup on the page -- They use markup as a "suggestion" and then test to see if it makes sense, like a rel=canonical.

A great example of what I mean is:
<h1> Apples
<h2> Oranges

According to the documentation means the <h2> is a subsection of the <h1>.

<h1> Apples
<h2> Oranges

As a search engine, when "generally accepted practice" has been <hN> indicates "order of importance" for years [or even if it just makes sense people would think <hN> indicates order of importance], both have to be tested, because using a "generally accepted practice" interpretation rather than "strict interpretation" gives the preceding a completely different meaning.

A search engine has to test to see which way to interpret something, including a <aside> because if they only go with a strict interpretation of the documentation, they end up with things like [oranges] being a subsection of [apples] rather than [oranges] being the 2nd most important independent topic on the page like the author intended.

Finally, there's no way anyone who "matters" [meaning visitors or a modern search engine] would interpret the <aside> in the following as having anything to do with my page about dogs, horses, zebras, camels, or my site as a whole but if you want to think they would because I didn't use an <article>, then feel free.

<html>
<body>
<h1>Domesticated Cats</h1>
<p>Cats were domesticate a long time ago.
<aside><h1>Lions, Cheetahs, Leopards</h1>
<p>Are not domesticated.
<p>You can find more information [link]here[/link]
</aside>
</body>
</html>