Spun Content = A Complete Waste of Time

Having been in this industry for many years, I am still shocked by what people still choose to do when creating their content.  One prime example of this is that there are still way too many people using spun content as a part of their internet content marketing strategy.  For those of you not familiar with what spun content is, spun content is basically a computer generated mash up of similar words found on the internet.  These articles read horribly, make no sense, and almost always have a high duplication percentage. Some internet marketers use this type of content because it is extremely low priced, and they post it to link network blogs and other sources just to get a few contextual back links.  Well the old adage of “you get what you pay for” has never been more true as people who have used spun content are being directly targeted by Google for de-indexing.  What does this mean?  It means that anyone that has spent any money on duplicate content over the years has just wasted a ton of money and time.  Google has removed (and continues to remove) any and all sites from their index that primarily use spun content for their link building strategy.

A State Of Panic

I have had several friends in this industry write me as of late to see if the most recent algorithm updates have affected my sites.  Since i loathe spun & duplicated content like the plague, my rankings have not changed much. Sadly, I have heard too many horror stories on the other end of the phone of what has happened to some of my colleagues in the industry.  As a strong proponent of “white hat” SEO and SEM tactics, I couldn’t help but say, “i told you so” to some of these people as their sites have completely been erased from Google’s index resulting in a huge loss of revenue, and for some, their entire livelihoods!  What was the main culprit for these tales of horror? Spun & duplicated content.

Paid link networks have all been shut down as Google has lifted its heavy hand and completely destroyed them.  The problem is that these network sites primarily publish spun & duplicated content.  This means that even if you put a piece of original content on one of these sites, you can still be penalized as everyone who has posted on a site like this is “guilty by association” in the eyes of Google.  While i do genuinely feel bad for people that have completely been bumped from the rankings, I am also happy that these changes are happening as it rewards sites that post original content and that use “white hat” internet marketing tactics.

Avoid The Temptation

The biggest temptation when it comes to spun content is the price.  While you may be able to buy an article for as low as a dollar a piece, it is the same as flushing that same dollar down the toilet.  Eventually Google will find that garbage content, and all of the hard work you put into posting spun articles will be quickly unraveled when your sites are penalized or even de-indexed by Google. The best course of action is to buy the content that will never end up hurting you, which is unique and original content.  This type of content will end up paying for itself over the years as all of the work you put into internet marketing with original content will never come back to bite you.  While it may be more expensive up front, it is well worth the extra money as you can avoid future headaches, and in some cases, a complete loss of your internet marketing livelihood.

To learn more about what Google deems as “high-quality” content and link building, visit their blog post here.