High quality, unique content is one of the most important ranking factors after the latest Google update and whilst many Dentist’s understand the importance of quality, original content on their websites, there are many sites still out there that don’t adhere to this.
In a recent Google Webmaster Help video, Matt Cutts talked about the line between spam content and original content. So can you copy small portions of content from multiple websites and combine it to create one new web page? Would Google consider that unique and high quality?
“I fear you may be heading for heartbreak,” Cutts replied in the video. He added that if this is something you’re considering, you should really be asking yourself why you’re doing it in the first place. For example, are you trying to automate?
Cutts began explaining the practice in question by talking about Yahoo’s distaste for it in days past. Yahoo referred to this tactic as “stitching” and “they really considered that spam,” said Cutts.
But does Google say it’s spam? “If all you’re doing is taking quotes from everyone else, that’s probably not a lot of added value,” he said.
He did give an instance of where multiple resources with bits of information work well in an article, citing Wikipedia as an example. In Wikipedia, several resources come together as citations to support the main topic, but do so in a way that reports on and summarizes the information to create a new, unique web page on the matter.
While many may be fuzzy on what original quality content is, when in doubt, know that any time you’re cutting corners in your content, you’re likely not producing the best content you can for that website.
What do we advise here at Dental Design? Content is king, even more so now according to Google. We recommend making sure all of your treatment pages are unique and written by yourselves, it is tempting to copy marketing material from Invisalign, Inman Aligner or to upload some generic Dental Implant text, but moving forward this won’t help your rankings. We now offer a copywriting service which will ensure that the text on your website is high quality and unique. Please call us on 01202 677 277 for more information.