Google is all about making the Web experience great for readers. That is why their search market share has grown and is what the Google algorithm is all about – finding and rewarding websites that provide a great reader experience with unique informational content.
This past year we saw Google patent technology to identify specific authors of content. In part, I feel, down the pike Google will allow website owners and authors to tag their content with unique IDs. Google has not said anything about this, but in their patent disclosure it appeared that this was a possible future direction.
Google likes unique and in-depth informational content. Websites that offer a rich informational experience for their readers will place higher organically than website that are simply “web brochures”, branded affiliate websites that repeat parent site content, or those that show content that is widely syndicated in an industry. There is simply no fooling Google on these issues. When Google indexes billions and billions of web pages and has the technology to weigh content, keyword density, and assign an organic placement score, don’t think that they don’t know that you and 2,000 people share the same content! Google is very smart.
Problems with shared content are important issue for lawyers, real estate agents, and affiliates to consider before purchase. Google has recently aggressively target affiliate websites as these are typically websites that share the same content with many other affiliates on the Web. Real estate agents and lawyers sometimes buy syndicated content that is widely shared by others as well. The content that they buy for their website will not help them with Google placement and overtime, Google may actually remove any pages from their index that shows this content. Google does not like to show duplicate content in their index; it affects the user’s experience and as a result hurts the Google reputation for quality search returns. If you as a website owner understand this before purchase, that’s good, but if you don’t and think that this syndicated content will help you with organic placement, think again!
When it comes to Web content, the best rule of thumb is to invest in your own. Make it unique, make it informational and you will overtime improve your organic search placement, end up with more links to your website, and develop the Web Authority with readers that you really have been seeking in the first place.