Introduction

Thanks to the internet, the whole world now is a global village. People and organizations from different parts of the world can now link up and be in constant communication and even carry out projects together.

As a result, the market is also online and it is now a popular vocation that many people are now digital marketers. Now, this vocation is proving to be quite profitable however, there are certain challenges that a digital marketer or online content creator, especially newbies do face. That is the challenge of duplicate content.

What Is Duplicate Content?

Generally, these refer to online contents that are very similar. Sometimes, they might be the exact same thing or content appearing across various domains online and sometimes they are just contents that are similar but are not necessarily the same contents. Cases of duplicate contents are quite common for providers or generators of online contents especially digital marketers and there are many misconceptions about it.

Inevitably, due to the share volume of contents that are deposited online, incidences of contents that are similar are bound to occur. Though it has to be added that there are those who plagiarize contents and this is wrong. So the question is; should it be avoided? And does it negatively impact your SEO performance?

To answer these questions, basic understanding of some of these terms should be made for clarity purposes.

What Is SEO?

It stands for search engine optimization and, as can be deduced from the name, it is a way to ensure that search engines are optimized in your favor. It optimizes search engine results in your favor by boosting your rankings when questions or searches related to the content that you are marketing are made online. For an online marketer, this makes you more visible and your webpage one that is more likely to be visited by a potential patron.

It can therefore be deduced that anything that may adversely affect this is not in your favor and this is where the question about the probable adverse effects of duplicate content may have on SEO performance.

There Is No Adverse Effect On SEO Rankings

The belief that there is a penalty or a negative effect that duplicate content has on SEO ranking can actually be termed a myth. The fact is that there are billions of contents that are created online and there is a high likelihood that there are lots of online content providers with contents similar to yours. As a matter of fact, it is most likely that you are not the only digital marketer promoting a particular brand, their services and goods making it more likely that there will be duplicate content.

What really happens is that, where there are contents that are similar, search engine algorithms based on the type of questions asked chooses what contents to show and what not to show. However, if there are various sites with the same content, what really happens is that it affects link equity in the sense that not all contents will get a fair read as they will not just be seen. The reason for this is that the algorithm based on certain considerations will choose what it regards as an authority write up on the issue.

This is how you get your search engine results.  

Conclusion

The fear of every digital marketer is to not be visible online as this means lesser patronage. This is why it is important to weed off everything that might lower your ranking. However, duplicate content does not adversely affect your SEO rankings.