Hi Guys, I was wondering if people tend to hit duplicate content penalties when trying to SEO a BANS store? If so, any way round this? I guess you need to add enough original content to the site to make a large enough portion not duplicate? Will be interested to hear your oppinions.
I hope I'm not way off base here, but I don't think duplicate content is much of an issue with BANS. First of all, the content changes with rollover of auction listings, sometimes on a minute by minute basis. That said, I do think that attention should be paid to distinguishing each store from an SEO standpoint. Adding on-topic content can only help, but not just for the purposes of avoiding what is a non-existent dup content problem, IMO. The spiders need to be fed meaty stuff. Currently, I think there's a larger problem with BANS stores with regard to the saturation of sites with the standard eBay affiliate links (rover links). I think this creates an obvious affiliate footprint that can plunge a site into obscurity on Google. This issue is being addressed with the not yet released Version 3.0 of BANS. They've indicated that the links and images will be masked so that they appear to be on your site. Hope this adds some clarity.
Yep, the rover links are a source of redundant content IMO. Cloaking them eliminates that footprint, but you also need to remember to cloak the gallery images too... Yes, this feature is coming with BANS 3.0. Hopefully the guys are addressing the other footprints that BANS has...