This guest post is by Kimberly Nilson of writemyessay4me.com.
Many of us have faced the problem of dealing with plagiarised content, either while reviewing guest articles by low-quality bloggers, or inadvertently using common phrases in our own writing.
Even the most skilled blogger cannot possibly be familiar with all the pages of content which are already online in a specific niche. When writing about a particular topic, it is very easy to use phrases which are similar to ones used on other sites.
If similar issues are being discussed in the blogosphere, it is not outside the realm of possibility that some similar content may inadvertently appear—even if the work was made by the blogger personally and not copied and pasted from someone else’s site.
For that reason, running a plagiarism check should be part of your standard procedure of checks and balances before accepting work from a blogger. These five online services for blog post plagiarism checking can help you weed out any duplicate content.
Copyscape
Copyscape has the advantage of being easy to use: simply paste in a URL or a section of text you wish to check for plagiarism.
This well-known service charges $0.05 per search. Sign up for an account at the site to get started. You’ll need to buy credits in advance, whether you end up performing plagiarism checks or not.
ContentPlagiarismChecker
This is a premium service for people who work with large text/content arrays. It gives an option to test the service free of charge right on the home page. The results will be available after a few-click registration. The pricing is $0.05 /1 page, and it takes less than 20 seconds to perform a scan of any size. The checker suits professional content writers and bloggers who outsource their content writing.
ArticleChecker
ArticleChecker is a free online service which is very simple to use. Simply copy and paste the blog post you wish to check into the text box on the site, or provide the article’s URL and click “Compare.” You can choose to check your text using Google or Yahoo searches. And for extra protection, you can choose to run your search twice, once against each search engine.
If any matched phrases are found, the results will show the number of times that content appears online. While this tool is very easy to use, you have no way to control the level of sensitivity of the search you are conducting, so it can miss results that the other tools will catch.
Duplichecker
Duplichecker is a free online service which allows you to copy and paste your text into a box, upload the post file, or enter the URL of the website you would like to check.
Unregistered users can perform three searches per day. Registered users can perform unlimited searches. The service checks each piece of text on a line-by-line basis to look for duplicate content, which suggests it’s a bit more thorough than some of the other tools.
Plagiarisma
Plagiarisma has the advantage of supporting over 190 languages. This plagiarism detector allows users to check for duplicate content on Google or Yahoo by copying and pasting text into a text box, entering a URL to be checked, or uploading a file. Accepted file formats include .doc, .docx, .rtf, .txt, .odt, and .pdf.
Each query is limited to 5,000 characters if you are using the free version of the tool. If you have a long blog post you wish to check, you will need run more than one check on the text, or register with the site. Signing up is free and will give you faster and better results.
This tool will show you results from Google and Yahoo, which will allow you to determine whether the text was copied word for word, or simply contains similar phrases to the blog post you are checking.
Registered users are able to use the service up to five times per day, which may not be enough if you have a large volume of checking you need to do on a regular basis. To access all the features available through the service and do more searches, you will need to buy a premium membership.
Get to know your bloggers
Checking a blogger’s work is a good way to ensure that it is up to par, but there are some things you can do beforehand to increase the odds that you will be working with a good quality blogger. Most importantly, the person should have some experience writing for the web, even if only for their personal blog.
Make a point of checking references to make sure that the people you are working with are trustworthy. Someone who holds him or herself to a high standard in his or her personal life will likely carry the same attitude through to his or her work.
Take the time to ask writers some questions, either by email, phone, or Skype, to determine their level of knowledge about the importance of unique content and meeting deadlines. For your part, have a copyright and plagiarism policy that explains how you check and will respond to any copyright infringing content. Removing the temptation to copy text “just this once” because a blogger is rushing to meet a deadline may nip the issue in the bud.
Don’t underestimate the value of original content. Apart from its rankings potential, it’s probably the best way to manage your blogging reputation, so it’s worth it!
Follow this simple rule: better check twice than get penalized once. Make content checking a part of your daily routine.
This guest post is provided by Kimberly Nilson, who is deeply in love with blogging and inspirational writing. She is an editor at the website writemyessay4me and is now working on her debut book.
