Multiple Sites, multiple locations similar / duplicate content

[SysAdmin19]

I am working with a business that wants to rank in local searches around the country for the same service. So they have websites such as OURSITE-chicago.com and OURSITE-seattle.com -- All of these sites are selling the same services, but with small variations in each state due to different legal standards in the state. The current strategy is to put up similar "local" websites with all the same content.

So the bottom line is that we have a few different sites with the same content. The business wants to go national and is planning a different website for each location. In my opinion the duplicate content is a real problem. Unfortunately the nature of the service makes it so that there aren't many ways to say the same thing on each site 50 times without duplicate content. Rewriting content for each state seems like a daunting task when you have 70+ pages per site.

So, from an SEO standpoint we have considered:

1. Using the canonocalization tag on all but the central site... I think this would hurt all of the websites SERPs because none will have unique content.

2. Having a central site with directories OURSITE.com/chicago -- but this creates a problem because we need to link back to the relevant content in the main site and ALSO have the unique "Chicago" content easily accessable to Chicago users while having Seattle users able to access their Seattle data. The best way we thought to do this was using a frame with a universal menu and a unique state based menu... Also not a good option because of frames will also hurt SEO.

3. Rewrite all the same content 50 times.

You can see why none of these are desirable options. But I know that plenty of websites have "state maps" on their main site. Is there a way to accomplish this in a way that doesn't make our copywriter want to kill us?

[SL_SEM]

Without knowing the terms, or the type of content it is hard to say what would work best. I know that if you rank well for the topic in general you will rank well for localized terms using localized landing pages if each page has unique enough content.

So if you rank well for Blue Widget Company, and you setup a section of the site for "locations" or "Service Areas" and then build out a "Dallas Blue Widgets" page that talks about your location in Dallas, your contact info, and staff that serve Dallas, and Maybe a short story on what you have done for people in Dallas you should do relatively well. From there you can link back to your generic "Blue Widget" page.

Obviously the success of that strategy will depend on how competitive each market is for that term, and probably on how unique your regional content is as well.

If there is anything to be learned from the panda update it should be that going the route of serving the user with your local content is Key. So providing "service areas" and then creating somewhat unique content for that market should be a good way to go. This also helps you consolidate all of your links.

I would rather spend time writing 50x unique pieces of content than try to get good links for EACH site.

Just my thoughts anyway.

EDIT: This way is also MUCH easier to track in analytics, and helps you consolidate all of your tracking, so for efficiency, and for flexibility I say this route wins in the long run