Hi everyone,
This is a long post but I feel you need a little background.
I made a website for a friend a few years back and offered to do this for free. I didn't have a clue about how to make one but nor did I want to use a simple website creator to make yet another generic typical website, so I decided to learn HTML and a little script and PHP and do my own from scratch.
I have a background in programming which I had as a past hobby so I thought it wouldnt be that difficult.
This friend is onto some very interesting research and I wanted to help him get this out to the public as best as possible. It took me a good three months to finally have a complete working website with several pages, and paypal integration for purchase of books etc.
The problem is after just over two years it has never had a high ranking on google. The topic doesnt help either because it's about King Arthur, but my website is way out there into the 300th listing if I simply type in King Arthur without quotes, but as there are over 20million hits I suppose thats not really bad is it?
Anyway, I made this entire website with only HTML (tiny bit of javascript) and its probably not optimized as I only knew the basics of optimization. I registered it with a couple of sites claiming to hit up the google rankings. I havent used google adwords or advertising.
I have used descriptive meta tags and I did a fair bit of research into these so I dont think thats a problem. The problem is simply HTML and lots of tables apparently dont score high on google.
Anyway, fast forward to the current problem.
This friend (more like a colleague) is old and is becoming desperate to advertise his research. So he hired a professional web designer to do a thorough marketing job. I was initially told this guy would be making the site I made have a high google ranking. This is not the case.
I was originally given by my friend/colleague typed text by himself about history to put on the website. I reshuffled this text into a more website friendly manner to make it more palatable. I scanned images from his books to accompany the text to make the site more pleasing. So although most of the text is actually belonging to my friend/colleage who has written several books, I myself am the one spending all the many hundreds of hours making this website in the first place.
This new computer guy has spotted an opportunity and has went and copied ALL text and ALL images from my website and pasted them EXACTLY the same on his own. He has obviously done this to save the time in reshuffling the text like I did.
He has even copied the design of the site I made, similar menu layout etc.
Now we have a situation where there are two websites on the internet with exact same text. He tells me this will severely damage google ratings and has the cheek to insist I take my text down!
He copied all this without asking me even though I copyrighted all this website in my own name.
Now he is offering his client (my friend/colleague who is desperate) to market this new website only, and is expecting me to give my site over to him exclusively.
I spent a long time with this site and stupidly I volunteered without payment for it, thinking I was doing the decent thing - although I do have a certain percentage of online sales, but as its ranked poorly in google, I havent made much.
This guy knows a heck of a lot more than I do about internet design, its his job. However, he is hounding me with domain transfer requests for the entire domain over to his new site.
So in a nutshell he has copied my text, images, and site layout, and telling me that I must transfer over the domain. He insists that two websites with same text will REALLY hurt google rankings. I have given a simple solution, namely remove the text he copied from my website and paste up his own using the original typed text I myself was given from my friend/colleague. He still insists.
My friend is in his mid 70s and desperate to have his work shared with a greater audience which is only natural. So far he has backed me up in keeping the original website, but I fear this new guy will do his best to convince him to have me transfer over the domain.
I will not do this and that would mean a major falling out with my friend if this happens.
This guy has from the beginning wanted me to transfer over the entire domain, as well as the password for the paypal account so he can make necessary ammendments for his shopping cart. He wanted the paypal account permanently. I obviously told him NO and again was backed by my friend.
This is a bizarre situation and because I dont have the technical expertise I feel helpless to convince my friend there is something wrong here. This guy has offered to do this new website, as well as others which includes a solid months work for only £400! I know from ringing and obtaining several quotes that this would normally cost into the thousands to achieve the same.
Obviously my "friend" must be thinking of striking a deal with this guy because of his better expertise, and desperation, as well as because no great online presence has been achieved by myself.
That was a very long winded explanation of my situation but the background is needed.
1)
I guess exact website content will be a problem, but will two websites with similar content SEVERELY hurt google rankings - especially if he reshuffles the text?
2)
Why should he need my entire domain be transferred over to him?
3)
Can I somehow convert my eight page HTML website to make it more ranked with google?
Thanks very much if you got this far into the post!
Roy.
This is a long post but I feel you need a little background.
I made a website for a friend a few years back and offered to do this for free. I didn't have a clue about how to make one but nor did I want to use a simple website creator to make yet another generic typical website, so I decided to learn HTML and a little script and PHP and do my own from scratch.
I have a background in programming which I had as a past hobby so I thought it wouldnt be that difficult.
This friend is onto some very interesting research and I wanted to help him get this out to the public as best as possible. It took me a good three months to finally have a complete working website with several pages, and paypal integration for purchase of books etc.
The problem is after just over two years it has never had a high ranking on google. The topic doesnt help either because it's about King Arthur, but my website is way out there into the 300th listing if I simply type in King Arthur without quotes, but as there are over 20million hits I suppose thats not really bad is it?
Anyway, I made this entire website with only HTML (tiny bit of javascript) and its probably not optimized as I only knew the basics of optimization. I registered it with a couple of sites claiming to hit up the google rankings. I havent used google adwords or advertising.
I have used descriptive meta tags and I did a fair bit of research into these so I dont think thats a problem. The problem is simply HTML and lots of tables apparently dont score high on google.
Anyway, fast forward to the current problem.
This friend (more like a colleague) is old and is becoming desperate to advertise his research. So he hired a professional web designer to do a thorough marketing job. I was initially told this guy would be making the site I made have a high google ranking. This is not the case.
I was originally given by my friend/colleague typed text by himself about history to put on the website. I reshuffled this text into a more website friendly manner to make it more palatable. I scanned images from his books to accompany the text to make the site more pleasing. So although most of the text is actually belonging to my friend/colleage who has written several books, I myself am the one spending all the many hundreds of hours making this website in the first place.
This new computer guy has spotted an opportunity and has went and copied ALL text and ALL images from my website and pasted them EXACTLY the same on his own. He has obviously done this to save the time in reshuffling the text like I did.
He has even copied the design of the site I made, similar menu layout etc.
Now we have a situation where there are two websites on the internet with exact same text. He tells me this will severely damage google ratings and has the cheek to insist I take my text down!
He copied all this without asking me even though I copyrighted all this website in my own name.
Now he is offering his client (my friend/colleague who is desperate) to market this new website only, and is expecting me to give my site over to him exclusively.
I spent a long time with this site and stupidly I volunteered without payment for it, thinking I was doing the decent thing - although I do have a certain percentage of online sales, but as its ranked poorly in google, I havent made much.
This guy knows a heck of a lot more than I do about internet design, its his job. However, he is hounding me with domain transfer requests for the entire domain over to his new site.
So in a nutshell he has copied my text, images, and site layout, and telling me that I must transfer over the domain. He insists that two websites with same text will REALLY hurt google rankings. I have given a simple solution, namely remove the text he copied from my website and paste up his own using the original typed text I myself was given from my friend/colleague. He still insists.
My friend is in his mid 70s and desperate to have his work shared with a greater audience which is only natural. So far he has backed me up in keeping the original website, but I fear this new guy will do his best to convince him to have me transfer over the domain.
I will not do this and that would mean a major falling out with my friend if this happens.
This guy has from the beginning wanted me to transfer over the entire domain, as well as the password for the paypal account so he can make necessary ammendments for his shopping cart. He wanted the paypal account permanently. I obviously told him NO and again was backed by my friend.
This is a bizarre situation and because I dont have the technical expertise I feel helpless to convince my friend there is something wrong here. This guy has offered to do this new website, as well as others which includes a solid months work for only £400! I know from ringing and obtaining several quotes that this would normally cost into the thousands to achieve the same.
Obviously my "friend" must be thinking of striking a deal with this guy because of his better expertise, and desperation, as well as because no great online presence has been achieved by myself.
That was a very long winded explanation of my situation but the background is needed.
1)
I guess exact website content will be a problem, but will two websites with similar content SEVERELY hurt google rankings - especially if he reshuffles the text?
2)
Why should he need my entire domain be transferred over to him?
3)
Can I somehow convert my eight page HTML website to make it more ranked with google?
Thanks very much if you got this far into the post!
Roy.
