How to Fix Duplicate Content on Your Website? – Panda SEO Update

First, i would like to update you on  date 19th April 2015 that after 2 years of time i had updated this post, This post is only showing the solutions for the panda penalty, But before I take you to Let see how much time penguin is refreshed. Below is the list of dates where most of the web marketer has noticed penguin effect and notices ups and down in search engine ranking.

Penguin updates history

History of  Panda update

I had found a good info-graphics written by  KENNA FLANDERS-YOUNG author from boostability.com 

Staty updated with Matt cutts, because he is sharing lot of information about the updates and the information are 100% right, why because he is the head of webspam team at google, so he will be the key person. On Panda 4.0 updates he had twitted like below.

Panda 4.0 updates Matt cutts

Follow Matt cutts on twitter or his official website mattcutt.com/blog

So now we reach at right place to see difference between Panda and penguin, and here is the image that describe a lot of information.
 
Image source:  Shrusti blog
 
So now to stay away from panda and penguin what next you can do? Also after this big two updats what will be next? Some website calling Next is “Zebra update” Let see if the prediction is right then what it will target, where the current activity is going and do feel that all are genuine and white hat? Let see the image
 
 
Image source: Gemfind.com

After the lots of discussion and reference we see now lets focus on what are the best practices to get best results in the age of panda and penguin update and probably the Zebra update.

Best practices to stay away from panda penalty

Basically panda update was designed to target mainly for low quality content, poor English, and duplicate content.

I will discuss in deep about blogger website, wordpress website and then ecommerce website and give you a perfect solutions for panda update.

1. Blogger Website – Like my website vijaybhabhor.com

Different Label on same post, Search pages, archive pages are the dangerous pages available in blogspot and i suggest you to must know how to stay away from it.

Below images that describe how the duplication occur in blogspot through archive page.

Archive duplicate content Solutions for blogspot

– You can add custom meta tags for archive and search pages and nofollow this pages.

<b:if cond='data:blog.pageType == &quot;archive&quot;'>
<meta content='NOINDEX' name='ROBOTS'/>
</b:if>

I also suggest you to follow this two guy for blogger solutions, their blog is very intersting and provide deep solution for it.

1. Blog tips – Follow this website Link for archive page duplicate content solution

2. Sushatech Blog – http://suhastech.com/blogspot-blogger-seo-avoid-duplicate-content-by-blocking-archive-page/

Now here is the not end for the duplicate content  on blogger, There is also a home page on blogger have chances of duplicate content, if you show the full post. Also it will not improve user experience and chances are that you will get very less conversions. So as per my thinking.

Duplicate content ISSUE in WordPress Website

Like blogger, if you using a standard theme in wordpress, then you need to know what are the plugin available that solve panda duplicate content issue.

As per my observation i found below pages in wordpress theme that creating duplicate content issue

  • Tags
  • category
  • www and non www
  • external website post
  • Author/Archives:
  • Attachment Image URL

I had listed 7 types of example with url that I think have 100% chances of  creating duplicate content issue. if you don’t take necessary actions.

  1. http://www.example.com/penguin-panda
  2. http://example.com/penguin-panda
  3. http://example.com/tag/panda
  4. http://www.example.com/tag/panda
  5. http://example.com/category/panda
  6. http://www.example.com/Category/panda
  7. http://example23.com/panda-post (External website)

Duplicate content Solutions for WordPress website

    • WordPress SEO Yoast: This is the best solution available on wordpress, a nice plugin that you can use in your website to give proper instructions to search engine on what to index, and what to avoid. You can install it from https://wordpress.org/plugins/wordpress-seo/ Here is the video

  • Use Robots.txt : Create effective robots.txt file and block the french fry pages (pages having less value) Let see how the robots.txt file work
Now lets learn how to block the search engine crawlers to index the duplicate and private content. Below is the image that describe a perfect robots.txt file for wordpress website.
Wordpress website robots.txt file to stop duplicate content
So creating effective robots.txt file will solve most of the issue, but its also important that you should redirect unnecessary pages to main relevant page.
  • Canonical Tag – Use rel=canonical if you think its create duplicate content.

Additional Reference to solve duplicate content problem  on Wordpress website

  1. http://www.shoutmeloud.com/wordpress-duplicate-content-problems-fixes.html
  2. http://moz.com/community/q/wordpress-duplicate-content-issues
  3. https://yoast.com/articles/duplicate-content/
  4. How To Stop Your WordPress Blog Getting Penalized For Duplicate Content

Duplicate Content issue on E-commerce Website:

From last 4 years I was doing my marketing practice in promoting ecommerce website, So I have a good understanding of where the content is duplicated and how you can fix it.

  1. www and now www
  2. Session id
  3. Attribute filter
  4. duplicate content on product pages
  5. Currency filter

Below is the image that describe some of the topics of duplicate content

Solutions for eCommerce website

Image credit – http://jasonmun.com/ecommerce-seo-best-practices-for-new-website-launch/

To solve above duplication issue Create effective robots.txt, 301 redirection and use of rel=canonical tag can help to solve duplicate content issue.

Additional references for eCommerce website

  1. https://blog.kissmetrics.com/seo-errors-ecommerce-websites/
  2. https://econsultancy.com/blog/61802-how-to-avoid-duplicate-content-issues-in-ecommerce/
  3. http://www.goinflow.com/duplicate-content-ecommerce-seo/
  4. http://searchenginewatch.com/sew/how-to/2300528/ecommerce-product-pages-how-to-fix-duplicate-thin-too-much-content
  5. http://www.searchenginejournal.com/thin-duplicate-content-not-safe-bet-e-commerce-seo/119041/

Bonus tips to solve duplicate content on Blog home page

Best practices in blog home page design – Wire frame for blog home page

I recommenced similar type of website, as i believe it has clear call to actions, easy navigation and very few chances of duplicate content.

Example 1


Image credit – http://scm.ulster.ac.uk/~B00579751/des311/images/wireframeexample1.jpg

Example 2 – 



Image credit – http://grahamtodman.co.uk/blog/category/wireframes/

Example 3 – Youtube type wire frame for blog

This template serves users experience, marketing concepts and i m sure if you have good design skills then your conversion after applying this template will be just outstanding.

Image credit – http://zeendo.com/info/wireframing-websites/

So applying similar type of designs I believe you have solved 90% of panda update issue, Also the clear navigation will improve your website user experience, reduce your bounce rate improve time spend and ultimately engage your visitors.Because of this hard work and best quality google will start loving you by providing best ranking.

I have try my best to give you all the neccary infomation panda update,

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