Article Rewriting, Spinning and the Art of Duplication
Article spinning is a termed coined in recent times by webmasters around the world looking for new ways to make their written web page content go further and provide bigger benefits. In general, article spinning is the practice of taking an existing article and rewriting it in such a way as to avoid detection by online duplicate content checkers. This gives the webmaster two or more articles, all with essentially the same content, that can be used in a number of different ways. The technique has become popular since it is a generally held belief that duplicate content is bad for a website's standing in the eyes of the search engines, devaluing the potential standing of the site in the Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs). Debate rages in forums across the internet on whether this is actually something that will penalise a website's standing in the SERPs and while such uncertainty remains, article spinning will continue to become more and more widespread.
You may be thinking that this is all very well, but what does it have to do with me as a writer? Surely it's much more of a web design issue?
Not so in this day and age. Anyone involved in web content writing or copywriting will tell you it's becoming a basic skill expected of many writers. It can, however, have legal and ethical implications for those who choose to practice it. In a great many cases, mainly due to ignorance, the spun articles are sourced from an original which is being used without the copyright owner's permission in the mistaken belief that changing a few words and beating automated duplication checkers will also absolve the perpetrator of any liability in terms of copyright infringement. A quick study of copyright laws in most countries will show you that this is just not how it works. The rewriting of articles without the copyright owner's permission should not be undertaken by any writer wishing to keep their own reputation intact. Take a look at our Copyright and Plagiarism pages for more information.
Spinning your own articles is an entirely different proposition though and can give many benefits if approached intelligently. A good, original article on a popular subject is undoubtedly worth money as internet content in today's market. By effectively rewriting the article to produce several articles on the same subject you can use the 'spun' versions to help drive web traffic to a website or even the original article. These rewritten versions can then be posted to online article directories with the bio (or resource) box containing a link to the website you want to drive traffic to. As each article is an advertisement for the associated website, it's imperative that the rewritten articles are of equally high quality to the original to ensure potential visitors are not put off by poor quality content before they've even visited the target website. If you think article marketing might work for you, take a look at our article on Getting Started with an Effective Article Marketing Strategy. Remember that selling a rewritten article as original may be harmful to your reputation if the buyer subsequently finds the original or believes that the article they bought is just a rewrite. This applies equally to a copyright infringing rewrite and a rewrite of an article you may have written yourself.
The original article can be devalued by rewritten versions appearing elsewhere on the web. To maintain the potential SERPs standing, or even sale value, of the original article, rewritten versions must be produced in such a way as to complement the original and not devalue it. One way of approaching this is to consider the different elements of the original article. Is it in sections that could stand alone as smaller articles? If so, why not rewrite these sections individually to give smaller but more detailed articles on those parts of the main subject? You can also expand or emphasise some parts of the article while cutting back the content in other areas. This will give the article a slightly different 'direction' adding value to the rewritten version rather than just rewording.
Another trap that many rewriters fall into is using automated rewriting software. This kind of software invariably produces an article which is difficult to read and it's usually very obvious that the article has been produced by a piece of software. This is usually a mistake of non-native English speakers who may not always appreciate the subtleties of the words being replaced or the new words being used and how they can fundamentally change the meaning of a sentence. Take a look at our Language Tips page for an illustration of this. If you are going to rewrite articles, always do it manually by reading and rewording to retain the meaning.
Lastly, and probably most obviously, always give the rewritten articles new titles. Remember that the title is an important place for keywords to be used and people will look for articles in the search engines that have certain keywords in the titles.
In summary:
- Make sure you have permission to rewrite the article before you start. To be absolutely sure, only rewrite articles that you have written from scratch yourself.
- Always manually rewrite your article. Never use automated article spinning software.
- Try to break the article into smaller chunks so each spun article is a piece of the original, allowing the original to retain some of its value by having all of the pieces in one place.
- Emphasise or expand some parts of the original rather than just change words around.
- Always give the new article a different title.
- Better still, just write a new original article! The internet needs and loves good quality, original written material. Ask yourself whether, as a writer, you want to be involved in rewriting or whether you would rather be producing original material.