Duplicate content - 6 websites, 1 IP. Is the #1 site knocked down too?

[Webprint]

Yes I know, running multiple websites on 1 IP isn't smart. 6 Websites with duplicate content on 1 IP is even worse. It's a technical issue we can't solve quickly.

Thing is, our #1 website, which has the highest DA and PR, was the first website with all this content. All other websites we're running were launched a few months, and some a few years, later. All content was copied from the #1 website.

I'd say the other websites would get knocked down by Google, because they duplicated the content. Google should see that our #1 website was the first that uploaded this content. Therefore our #1 website should rank normally.

Questions is: What does Google think of duplicate content when all websites are on 1 IP? Is, or will our #1 website get punished as well?

[ivan.precisodisso]

Hi!

I think Google should imagine that your site is trying to rank better using duplicated content.

Maybe you could use rel canonical tags for all this content to show Google that this content came for that place, and is the #1 site. Than you can create new content to the sites that are coming now for optimization.

[Webprint]

Hi Thiago,

Thanks for your answer, good point.

I do know I have to rewrite content on our other websites. We could use canonicals for all websites linked to the #1 website. But we also want to rank separately under different domains.

What I do want to know is: Does Google punish our #1 website?

[EGOL]

I know someone who had several duplicate sites on same server with links connecting them.  All of the sites disappeared from google and have been gone for over a year.   They are still in Bing.

[NakulGoyal]

If you want to rank multiple domains for the same content, in that case canonical tag won't do it. Also, keep in mind that with your current structure you are risking everything including the main-website. I am sure you read what EGOL mentioned. Its not worth the risk. I would concentrate on the main-website first and do whatever it takes to separate it from the rest of the websites. If you still really really have to do the other domains/websites, I would do the following: 1. Change the Product Names, Descriptions, Image file-names etc as much as you can. Make them unique. Honestly, there's no shortcut to this. 2. Separate the sites in terms of domains and hosting and do not interlink the sites to each other. 3. As much as possible, use a completely different CMS/URL structure.

[Webprint]

Thanks for helping everyone.

We rewrote content for a few websites, and no-indexed a few.

It's not worth the risk.
We can rewrite URL structure in the future, but I think rewriting the content has solved the issue.