This happens so often, maybe I should make this a monthly column.
Yesterday, during a blog consult, a client asked me if there was anything to prevent people from stealing her copy. I told her not really, but using Copyscape you could at least find the culprits. To show how it worked, I typed in the URL for our Web site, http://www.flyte.biz, in to Copyscape’s search bar. A few seconds later we got the results.
Besides the ones I had gotten used to seeing up there was a new one: Emarketer Associates, Inc., run by Mark Roscoe. As we–my clients and I–reviewed his site on the overhead projector we just had to laugh. Most of my home page–word for word–had been taken from our home page. Other parts were taken from other sections of my site.
I contacted Mark via email and asked him to remove the offending copy. Although I didn’t hear back from him I did see that he updated his home page–in letter if not in intent. For example:
- "Your Web site is the hub of your marketing universe" became "Your Web site is the centerpiece of your marketing efforts." (originally found here: www.flyte.biz/web-design/web-sites/)
- "Whether you call it Internet marketing, Web marketing or online marketing, the goals are the same…." became " It doesn’t matter what you call it – Online marketing, Web marketing, or Internet marketing, the goal is the same…." (originally found here: www.flyte.biz/internet-marketing/)
- And "You don’t need a Web site, you need a Web strategy" became "Your Business Doesn’t Need a Website! Your Business Needs An Online Marketing Strategy." (originally found at www.flyte.biz/)
Mark didn’t contact me to apologize, or pretend it happened by accident. This isn’t a case of "great minds think alike." He just stole a bunch of copy off of our Web site and passed it along as his own. Since he’s down in Richmond and King William, Virginia, there’s not much I can or want to do.
Except call him on it.
If you’d like to see the original Web design and Internet marketing copy you can visit our Web site.
Thanks for sharing this post. Now I know what to do if ever my article/blog will be stolen. Best of luck!
I found 4 websites that have stolenm our content owned by the same person under and hosted by godaddy. What can I do to shut them down! Doesnt godaddy have anything inplace to catch crooks like this?