We've all heard of duplicate content and most webmasters know that it’s a negative step to use it on a web site.

But what exactly is it and why is it bad?

Duplicate content is exactly as its name implies - it's content that's the same as content already on the net - an article or a passage of text that exactly matches an article or passage of text on another web site. The same words, in the same order, with almost the same punctuation.

Basically it's stolen, thieved material. Material written by another person and used on a thief's web site. Stolen by a web master who hasn't got the skill to write a unique article, or more than likely, stolen by a lazy webmaster.

Duplicate content is severely frowned upon by the search engines and punished accordingly. A web site with a page deemed by the search engines to be comprised basically of pirated content will be accorded a lower SERPS positioning or worse still, will be banned altogether, at the discretion of the search engine. Anyone using SEO to achieve a high SERPS position with stolen content is deceiving himself. A high SERPS position is impossible with duplicate content on the web site. It just won't happen.

However there is a way for an article originally shown on another web site to be legitimately displayed on another site without incurring search engine penalties. This is a method I use to add a degree of professionalism to one of my own web sites.

This site promotes an obesity-prevention product and includes pages devoted to obesity news from throughout the world. I keep the pages up to date with the latest news and usually include between 4 to 6 news items on each page.

I regularly trawl the internet looking for the latest news on anything to do with obesity, whether it be government initiatives, research from medical institutions, or personal stories. The content is copied as is - it's not doctored or changed around. I try to include the whole content where possible, but if the article is unduly long, I may copy only the first few paragraphs but ensuring I retain the general theme of the item.

So how do I get around the search engines' duplicate content rules?

I include in the article the full title, the location where I found the news item, and the date. So if I found an item about a speech made by the Canadian Health Minister on the subject of obesity and Canadian school children, I would copy the article intact without a single amendment, with the original title, and date, and the name of the news source, such as the Toronto Mail and Globe or Reuters. All this would appear on my web page.

What I am in fact doing is telling the search engines that in the public interest I'm informing them of the latest developments to combat obesity. The search engines must feel that this information reinforces my site as an authoritative source of obesity news. And how do I know the search engines view my copied content kindly? Because from time to time my pages with this content get a good position on the SERPS.

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