Just before starting with the actual topic first read the below scenario,
You’ve got a new idea and invested around 2 hours to make it as one of your best articles.
You’ve published it on your blog and have checked Google after sometime. Now, what would be your first reaction when you see that your article is in the 1st position in Google for specific keyword?Would you be happy, for it? Don’t answer this, as my question is not yet complete.
Your site is no where in the 1st page of Google. But still your article is ranked in number 1 position.
IMAGE CREDIT : WESLEY FRYER [FLICKR] | VIEW LARGER VERSION
I think most of you have understood what exactly happened in this situation.
A scraper site is a spam website (can be manually operated or autopilot) which has the content, copied from other sources. This can be either by downloading the content or getting the data from RSS feeds. These scraper sites do not credit the original source which is actually violating the copyright law by reprinting the content without appropriate permission. Also, these scraper sites, create lot of confusion among the search engines (but not so easy) which actually affects the search engine rankings. This in turn leads to the duplicate content issue as the same content is present (copied) everywhere.
Here are some of the ways mentioned to save your blog from becoming a scraper site and prevent getting penalized by search engines.
1) Don’t use PLR articles directly on your blog
Private label rights (PLR) is a concept used in Internet Marketing and derived from private labeling. It’s a license where the author sell most or all of the intellectual property rights to their work. The license is defined by the author of the work and has no legal definition. (via Wikipedia)
Now this doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t use PLR articles. PLR articles can be very efficient to get lot of new ideas. But many of these PLR articles are directly ripped from Ezine, Squidoo, Hubpages and other article directories. If you are using them directly on your blog, you might face a lot of issues including duplicate content, copyright laws, legal issues etc.
If you are a creative writer then never take a chance to use PLR articles because they do kill the creativity. Just take a to look over the various titles available and start writing your own content.
Also, read HOW TO: Never Run Out Of Topics For Blogging
2) Never copy content from other blogs
It’s illegal in fact. Don’t spoil others’ hard work and creativity. Never ever copy the content which is already published, if you like the topic then try to rewrite incorporating your views and ideas which will be very well appreciated by the readers and the search engines like Google.
You can also check :
- Use Google To Find Creative Commons Content
- 5 Ways You Can Get Fresh Content Inspiration
- 5 Unique Ways Bloggers Can Create Killer Content (Without Writing)
3) Never use copyrighted images for your articles
Do not use the images by directly searching them using Google images. You might be subjected to copyright issues. Check out list of cool websites For Copyright And Royalty Free images to find various sources to get free images.
4) Get Permission Before Reusing
If you want to use the information which has been already published, you can get the permission from the author (original source) to reuse the content. Also don’t forget to check out that site’s copyright policy and reprints policy.
5) Credit Original Source
It’s a good idea to give credit to the original source. This has many benefits like appreciating the author’s effort and also at the same time, protecting your blog from future disasters. Credit the source whenever any external content/image being used/referred in your articles.
Hope these small things which we all know, if implemented regularly can save us from getting our site/blog labelled as scraper site.
This article is written by Phanindra. He created a platform called SparkInDark to share the information about the best giveaways available online. If you wish to write for us, kindly check this.
This is going on a lot with hubs at hubpages actually. It's quite annoying as it hurts your earnings and can also cause duplicate content issues and hubpages could make your take down your original work. I absolutely hate scraper sites…. Turn them all in is what I say!
i face this as well while i do use my blog post and change it to article and submit .
That why i face lot of problem that it show article more than my original post in blog.
Beside that it cause my article post been copy by others as well.
really these are very important points to remember while we are starting the blog and publishing the articles.thnx for the great info.
Thank You Junaid 🙂
What do u mean by PLR article , can u explain me briefly ? i m unaware of that!!!
Hi Ganesh,
PLR means Private Label Articles. These are bunch of articles in various categories which can be bought at some nominal price and can be used in your blog/site.
The problem is same are articles are bought by many people and when they directly post them on their blog it leads to content duplicity .
Correction. It is Private Label Rights. You can also resell them to anyone once you own the rights. But again you need to read the instructions carefully about what rights do you get 🙂
There were very useful tips, thanks a lot… I'm saying this a starting blogger — I learned a lot from this post.
Thank You Alexander 🙂
really nice article Phanindra,,scrap sites are really increasing these days..people usually copy paste content from other blogs and paste it in theirs..
Thanks Abhishek.
There are some good .htaccess code modifications that can help prevent scrapers too. Not that it will catch them all, but every little bit helps. You need to do a little research and testing, but nothing wrong with that. If you can prevent one scraper it might be worth the effort.
That's right Ray 🙂
Have to write creative article and it will be attractive to the readers side. Mainly, don't copy content form any published article -its one of the illegal part-its my point of view.
There is unlimited potential for creativity but all that matters is how people can use it effectively 🙂
Only put link of source and don't give any importance to them in entire blog post or article is really bad thing, it is important give utmost credit to source from where you take content or images or any other information
And to add on, instead of using the same article, rewriting it would be more efficient and credits should never be forgotten 🙂
I agree especially after the Google Panda Update the scrapper sites are getting the treatment they deserved but some spammers have deprived the legal bloggers with the reward they received after a lot of mental struggle
Actually Panda Update had worked in the reverse order for many blogs where the scraper sites were ranked better than the original one's. But again, google is working to update its algorithm with more efficient changes to deliver the quality of the content in their search criteria and to outrank all these scraper sites.
This was a very helpful post
I wasn't knowing much about it, but now I do.
Copying sucks until the real person gets the credit!
Good to see that this post helped you, my friend 🙂
But still it is advisable to check that if the copyrighted material can be reused before publishing and giving credit back to the author.
This is because there might be some instances where the author might not want to get his/her material distributed.
Hi Phanindra,
Let's say I have niche blog where I usually publish specific type of news which I found from online newspaper site, So do I need to get their permission or I can just publish it after giving them credit?
Hi Aarti
Generally it is advisable to take permission from the original sites before you publish the content on your niche blog. Sometimes these people won't respond to any one.
Atleast what you can do is, try to rewrite the article/information completely in your own words and give the reference of the source site at the end of your article.
Say for example, if google has introduced some new features then the same information will be shared by many other blogs. The main difference is the language style which differentiates from blog to blog but at the end source material remains same.
Thanks for the clarification, Got your point. Same approach apply with news site as news remain same only the language changes for news site. 😉
I have always been trying to know how to avoid scraper sites from stealing my blog contents as well as other blog's content and this article really solved my dilemma. Scrapers are really always getting in the way of others who are trying their best and making extra time and effort to increase their page rank. But we have to fight the enemies and be on guard. Thanks to this article.
Hi John, Filing DMCA really helps to protect our content from getting removed from scraper sites. But we need to show google the proofs (links where your content is copied).
Very Nice post 🙂
Learned a lot form it. But I would like to ask you If you find some scrapper site continually copying your content then what should we do? I mean how to report Google and other search engines about it so that they can check and de-index that site.
Thanks Ankit.
You can file DMCA(Digital Millennium Copyright Act ) with Google complaining your problem.
DMCA can be filed at
https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/dmca-notice
Though there are cases where this doesn't solve your issue , but still there are chances 🙂
Also, please check http://hellboundbloggers.com/2010/11/23/bloggers-stealing-site-design/
Many thanks for the "Copyright And Royalty Free images" list. I realy needed it.
Welcome 🙂 This is an excellent list compiled by Pradeep long back .
wow your article is nice phanindra.may be i think this is your first article on HBB !
Thanks Sai 🙂 Yes, This is my first article on HBB
Scrap sites are increasing these days and bloggers need to protect their site. Google panda should take care of this.
Not sure about Google Panda but definitely Google should take it very seriously because of 2 reasons
1. Google Search is filled with junk content due to these sites which is actually the main reason for reduction in the quality data retrieved by Google search
2. These scraper sites are built mostly targeting the advertisements (like adsense etc.)
We can also file the DMCA Complaint to Google 🙂