Duplicate web sites

what does google look for?

[leef50]

If I have a site that is hosted at mydomain.net and I wish to put a new version of the site on mydomain.co.uk and start promoting that domain with recip links and entries in yahoo and dmoz how will google react if the page looks almost (see below) the same on the .net as the .co.uk.

Changes made to the site on the .co.uk:
1) Old site ran off the index page using query string... ie. index.php?dir=support&page=widget_support.php and the new site uses its own page.
2) HTML has been slimmed down and (removed unneeded tags and elements) and also changed the css.
3) HTML has altered in terms of table sizes and subtle changes to our products.
4) Several pages are have been changed and extended also

The thing is visually the site looks the same but it has undergone a large change. Navigation remains the same (to look at) but again the HTML has changed. Since google cannot SEE the pages as a human does, will it still see the site as duplicate? Several filenames have been changed also but the body content on the index page is the same and it is the same on 5 or 6 other pages (out of 100 or so).

Will I end up hurting both sites if I start on this mission...

Thanks

Leef50

[leef50]

Its also worth adding that the old site had about 10 indexed pages. The new version has a large support area of about 90 or so pages.

Leef50

[Powdork]

In my opinion (only a guess) Google won't automatically do anything. Their filters may cacth it and then only index one, but I doubt it. If both sites show up in the same results then you may risk someone reporting it. If the two sites are created for a different market it might make good business sense as well as seo sense to look into ways to change the new site so it is more UK friendly (i.e. organized becomes organised). I would guess there are many other ways to make it more attractive to one market and sufficiently change the content as well.

[darnbarn]

I read on another thread that any page that has 80% or more, the exact same text and links, then the site is considered a duplicate. Is this true?

[leef50]

well WRT both domains being pulled into the same results... yes it is possible but I can pretty much control where the .net will be positioned by setting a flag to remove some of the optimisation. When set it drops it far down the google results (page 10+ as opposed to page 1 on my best keywords). So I doubt some1 would notice and report it. Its just if google detects it.