Image Optimization & Duplicate Content Issues
-
Hello Everyone,
I have a new site that we're building which will incorporate some product thumbnail images cut and pasted from other sites and I would like some advice on how to properly manage those images on our site. Here's one sample scenario from the new website:
We're building furniture and the client has the option of selecting 50 plastic laminate finish options from the Formica company. We'll cut and paste those 50 thumbnails of the various plastic laminate finishes and incorporate them into our site. Rather than sending our website visitors over to the Formica site, we want them to stay put on our site, and select the finishes from our pages.
The borrowed thumbnail images will not represent the majority of the site's content and we have plenty of our own images and original content. As it does not make sense for us to order 50 samples from Formica & photograph them ourselves, what is the best way to handle to issue?
Thanks in advance,
Scott
-
If you have permission to use their images, just get images from them, name them accurately, and give them accurate alt-text. Duplicate content has to do with your own content, in general. Since the point of naming images and alt-text is to help Google understand them, it's not a big issue if an image has the same alt-text as another or appears multiple times on the site (especially since they should all be coming from an images directory, no matter where they are on the website). Also, images are much more likely to be naturally reused than text, as licensing photos is a long accepted practice.
-
Google does "see" a lot more than just the alt text. To decide which keywords an image should rank for they take into account amongst other things:
- The text surrounding the image (caption, article it illustrates, etc.)
- Which images it is similar to
- The filename of the image
- Text recognition
In this video google shows how much they can "see" when it comes to images: http://youtu.be/t99BfDnBZcI
-
Arjen, Thanks for your reply.
You are correct that we're not looking to rank for images of Formica samples (or any of our other samples for that matter), in fact we're just providing the sample images to help our clients better decide which one of our products to order. The sample tiles are just a means to an end.
Do you have any knowledge as to the extent to which Google can "see" an image the same way a human user sees an image? Does Google just rely on the alt text that that you provide them with?
Thanks in advance,
Scott
-
Hello Keri,
Thanks for your reply. We do have an account with them and permission to use their images.
Do you have any opinions as to the best way to manage the images - ie title, alt text, etc - so as not to run into any duplicate content issues? I'm not clear if Google has the ability to somehow scan the images themselves, or if they just rely on the alt text, titles, etc that you provide along with the images. Any thoughts are appreciated.
Scott
-
I do not think using some images from another website will hurt your SEO. Logo's on a 'our clients' page, news photography delivered through news agencies, icon sets and stock images are by definition used on more than one site. The fact that this form of 'duplicate content' is so omni present, proofs that Google cannot devaluate sites using it.
If you your goal is to rank high in image search for formica in different colours, you should make sure to get your own high res images. If this is not one of your primary SEO goals, you should not worry about using copied images.
My advice would be to focus on really good photography of the furniture you are building and do not worry to much about the thumbnails of formica samples.
PS: I agree with KeriMorget. You should get permission to use the photo's before using them on your site.
-
The first thing I would do would be to look at the copyright on the Formica site to see their policy on copying their content.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Do we get de-indexed for changing some content and tags frequently? What is the scope in 2017?
Hi all, We are making some changes in our website content at some paragraphs and tags with our main keywords. I'm just wondering if this is going to make us de indexed from Google? Because we recently dropped in rankings when we added some new content; so I am worried whether there are any chances it will turn more risky when we try to make anymore changes like changing the content. There are actually many reasons a website gets de indexed from Google but we don't employ any such black hat techniques. Our website got a reputation with thousands of direct traffic and organic search. However I am curious to know what are the chances of getting de indexed as per the new trends at Google? Thanks
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | vtmoz0 -
Question regarding subdomains and duplicate content
Hey everyone, I have another question regarding duplicate content. We are planning on launching a new sector in our industry to satisfy a niche. Our main site works as a directory with listings with NAP. The new sector that we are launching will be taking all of the content on the main site and duplicating it on a subdomain for the new sector. We still want the subdomain to rank organically, but I'm having struggles between putting a rel=canonical back to main site, or doing a self-referencing canonical, but now I have duplicates. The other idea is to rewrite the content on each listing so that the menu items are still the same, but the listing description is different. Do you think this would be enough differentiating content that it won't be seen as a duplicate? Obviously make this to be part of the main site is the best option, but we can't do that unfortunately. Last question, what are the advantages or disadvantages of doing a subdomain?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | imjonny0 -
What tools do you use to find scraped content?
This hasn’t been an issue for our company so far, but I like to be proactive. What tools do you use to find sites that may have scraped your content? Looking forward to your suggestions. Vic
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | VicMarcusNWI0 -
Content optimized for old keywords and G Updates
Hi, We've got some old content, about 50 pages worth in an Ecommerce site, that is optimized for keywords that aren't the subject of the page - these keywords occur about 8 times (2 keywords per page) in the old content. We are going through these 50 pages and changing the title, H1, and meta description tag to match the exact subject of the page - so that we will increase in rankings again - the updates have been lowering our rankings. Do we need to completely rewrite the content for these 50 pages, or can we just sprinkle it with any needed additions of the one keyword that is the subject of the page? The reason I'm asking is that our rankings keep dropping and these 50 pages seem to be part of the problem. We're in the process of updating these 50 pages Thanks.
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | BobGW0 -
Google messages & penalties
I just read the following comment in a response to someone else's question. The Responer is an SEOMoz Authority whose opinion I respect and have learned from (not sure if it's cool to mention names in a question) and it spurred my curiosity: "...Generally you will receive a warning from Google before your site is penalized, unless you are talking about just specific keywords." This is something I have been wondering about in relation to my own sudden ranking drop for 2 specific keywords as I did not receive any warnings or notices. I have been proceeding as if I had over used these keywords on my Home page due to an initial lesser drop, but identifying the cause for the huge drop still seems useful for a number of reasons. Can anyone explain this further?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | gfiedel0 -
Content box (on page content) and titles Google over-optimization penalty?
We have a content box at the bottom of our website with a scroll bar and have posted a fair bit of content into this area (too much for on page) granted it is a combination of SEO content (with links to our pages) and informative but with the over optimization penalty coming around I am a little scared if this will result in a problem for us. I am thinking of adopting the process of this website HERE with the content behind a more information button that drops down, would this be better as it could be much more organised and we will be swopping out to more helpful information than the current 50/50 (SEO – helpful content) or will it be viewed the same and we might as well leave it as is and lower the amount of repetition and links in the content. Also we sell printed goods so our titles may be a bit over the top but they are bring us a lot of converting traffic but again I am worried about the new Google release this is an example of a typical title (only an example not our product page) Banner Printing | PVC Banners | Outdoor Banners | Backdrops | Vinyl Banners | Banner Signs Thank you for any help with these matters.
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | BobAnderson0 -
Possibly a dumb question - 301 from a banned domain to new domain with NEW content
I was wondering if banned domains pass any page rank, link love, etc. My domain got banned and I AM working to get it unbanned, but in the mean time, would buying a new domain, and creating NEW content that DOES adhere to the google quality guidelines, help at all? Would this force an 'auto-evaluation' or 're-evaluation' of the site by google? or would the new domain simply have ZERO effect from the 301 unless that old domain got into google's good graces again.
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | ilyaelbert0 -
IP-Based Content on Homepage?
We're looking to redesign one of our niche business directory websites and we'd like to place local content on the homepage catered to the user based on IP. For instance, someone from Los Angeles would see local business recommendations in their area. Pretty much a majority of the page would be this kind of content. Is this considered cloaking or in any way a bad idea for SEO? Here are some examples of what we're thinking: http://www.yellowbook.com http://www.yellowpages.com/ I've seen some sites redirect to a local version of the page, but I'm a little worried Google will index us with localized content and the homepage would not rank for any worthwhile keywords. What's the best way to handle this? Thanks.
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | newriver0