Note: The blog post below is verbatim from a post I made on a local networking forum. It’s a very real-world, un-sugar-coated wake-up call to the website owner (and all website owners) about a problem that runs rampant in the web-design business – companies that create ‘custom’ sites without custom content.
People make open critiques of random websites all the time. The Wall Street Journal’s Dyan Machan wrote a comparison of two very different websites and Kirsten wright followed up with some real-world thoughts for the site owners. I doubt Machan or Wright reached out a delicate hand to offer advice to the site owners before writing their respective opinions.
The fact is, this is a cautionary about companies that provide website design, SEO and of course content that is cookie-cutter and useless, yet sold to the client as the best thing since the letter B.
I’ll remove the network name, but if you really want to know, Google me. 
Ok, read the post…I’ve interjected some added info in block quotes.
So you had that award-winning Raleigh-area web design company make you a website…
…did they give you the same content as 57 other sites?
An (network name deleted) sponsor ad got my curiosity up this morning, so I clicked on it.
As soon as I saw the sponsor’s website, I knew exactly who had designed it. It’s a local, award-winning company that designs sites for a particular industry. (I’ll leave it at that for the sake of this post) In fact, I had cold-called this web design company a few weeks ago to ask if they needed a freelance copywriter. Apparently they have someone in-house that does their (ahem) writing.
I bet myself a cup of fresh (not re-heated) coffee that I could find some of the sponsor’s website content duplicated on at least one other site elsewhere on the web.
I took a random sentence – a question from their FAQ page – and Googled it with quotes so I would only get page results that contain the exact phrase.
The phrase was “Every noise should be checked by a qualified technician.” It’s ok, there are 57 results….I’m sure you’ll find the one I was writing about.
57 results. 57 other sites on the web have the exact same sentence.
It’s certainly no stretch to guess that the one sentence I Googled was not the only sentence duplicated.
And it’s also no stretch to guess that the same local design firm designed all 57 of those sites.
Is there an award for that?
How would you feel if your content were 90% the same as 57 other sites on the web? Granted, maybe the website’s owner didn’t pay for unique and relevant content, and maybe content isn’t the most important item on the site owner’s list.
If my blog post/cautionary tale causes one site owner some discomfort, but warns others of potential danger, I’ve done my job.
But just knowing that there are 57 other sites out there with duplicated content gives me the Heebie-jeebies.
I can’t stress how important unique and relevant content is for your site. The sentence I chose from the site could have easily been edited to add keywords, a call to action, a human tone – things that would actually make the content work for the owner and not just sit there on the web earning someone else an award.
My cup of fresh, hot coffee was good. I know you were curious.
The End
And that’s that. I’d love your take on whether or not I went to far. Send a tweet to @JPJay411 and let me know what you think.
As a freelance copywriter in Raleigh, I see this kind of client-hosing far too often. It makes me sick to think that there are awards on some agency’s wall, while their clients get stiffed with sub-par content that’s of no value.
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Amen from the Triad!