Duplicated Terms and Conditions?

[GaryVictory]

Does Google penalise duplicated terms and conditions. I know solicitors use the same legal terms and phrases all the time...

Thanks

[MikeRoberts]

Google penalizes duplicate content which is deceptive, spammy, thin content, etc. If it's necessary duplicate content (like T&C legalese) then at worst they probably won't pass any equity to it. Here's an article on a Matt Cutt's video about Duplicate Content from July of last year http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2284635/Does-Duplicate-Content-From-Terms-Conditions-Affect-Google-Rankings

[AlanBleiweiss]

While Mike is generally correct, I would add that if you have extensive disclaimer, terms and conditions text in the footer of your site's pages (as compared to having a separate dedicated page just for those) even though Google is "fairly good" at figuring out it's purpose, it can weaken individual page unique topical focus, especially when individual pages don't have enough volume of unique content.

Because it's a "maybe" issue in that regard, I personally always recommend that clients have a link to those rather than replicating the text across multiple pages.

[MikeRoberts]

Good point. Wasn't thinking about that when I wrote my answer.