Chris Young
Companies who have international aspirations or international operations must consider content creation in local languages. There are many advantages to entering foreign markets, but neglecting SEO, localization, and relevant content marketing is a mistake that can and must be avoided.
The world is becoming more connected and aware of other cultures and people, creating new opportunities for companies willing to operate across international borders. Furthermore, the rate of international eCommerce and the exportation of service-based goods is becoming increasingly easier. As a result, many companies have created multilingual websites, content in different languages, and service options for different cultural contexts. One of the phenomena that remains constant, regardless of the culture, is the use of search engines like Google, Yahoo, and Bing, as well as newcomers without tracking features like DuckDuckGo and Brave. By far, one of the best ways to optimize a website for an international presence is with international search engine optimization. However, international SEO goes beyond doing a mere "one-to-one translation," and requires SEO expertise.
The main reason companies internationalize, especially those offering professional services, consumer goods, and industrial goods, is to take advantage of untapped foreign markets. The domestic US market certainly has plenty of opportunities, but many businesses, particularly in the B2B space such as manufacturing, distribution, and many other industries, are able to find deep markets outside of domestic borders. If a considerable portion of your website's visitors are from a country other than your own, speak different languages, or both, it might be time to adjust your website to attract customers from different countries.
The best practice for businesses is usually to earn a solid foothold before expanding into a foreign market. However, many countries, especially in Latin America, are beginning to create the infrastructure needed for eCommerce operations and have growing economies. These countries often have the added benefit of lower auxiliary marketing costs like PPC ads and other marketing efforts. Many successful eCommerce brands in the USA, therefore, have started looking towards Latin America as a new market to sell their products. Translating a website from English to Spanish and then localizing it with different currencies and idioms has proven extremely effective.
There are many different ways to schematically separate different sections of a website for international optimization. SEO professionals can make the correct recommendation for you and your website based on your individual needs.
There are a few URL structures that companies can utilize to target a particular country with their websites. It's necessary to use a country code top-level domain (ccTLD), a subdomain, a subdirectory, or a subfolder with language parameters. In some cases, a company may even want to use an entirely different domain name.
A ccTLD uses two-letter codes to signal to search engines and users which country a website is from. For example, some country codes like ".co" (meaning "Colombia" rather than "company") are often so misused that Google has started treating them generically.
A subdomain denotes which country is being targeted on a third-level domain. Common subdomains may be Mexico.example.com or mx.example.com. Google and other search engines normally treat these subdomains as totally different websites and therefore they do not normally receive link equity from the root domain.
Next, a subdirectory can be created to address a certain country underneath the umbrella of a given root domain. This strategy will transfer link equity but may be insufficient to totally denote a different country being targeted.
Finally, some businesses choose to move their international SEO efforts to an entirely different domain. This also has its advantages and disadvantages, but SEOs will be able to point you in the right direction for what's best for your website.
Search engines can identify which languages you're hosting by using the hreflang or language meta tags. These small bits of code show which languages your website supports.
It is best practice to translate everything on your website into the language of a new geographic region you're targeting. For example, often overlooked pages like site navigation, "Contact Us" pages, and more should all be in the target language. Machine translation should also be avoided. While machines have gotten good enough to make it possible to understand a website, a user shouldn't have to work to understand what your website is saying and selling. Using a bona fide human translator is necessary.
Other pieces of best practice include offering the option to change the site language instead of automatically changing it. Someone in Spain may be an American professional traveling on business, a Spanish person, or even someone lost on the internet. In this case, it's best to ask permission rather than for forgiveness.
Finally, avoid using cookies or scripts to translate the website in real-time. Search engines are unable to scan this information and therefore it cannot be used to improve your SERP. All content should be written out the "old-fashioned" way.
Perhaps the most substantial part of any SEO campaign is the creation of new content. Whether this is thought leadership content or simple "listicles" to help your website rank, this content must be included in other languages and made specifically for other countries. Many of the topics relevant from one geographic region will also be relevant in another geographical region. However, this is not always the case. SEO experts must do the requisite research to understand what keywords are most appropriate for a given geographic area . Based on this, the SEO expert can recommend topics and articles to improve SERP.
International SEO is more complex than just running a website through a translator. For the best results in international SEO, the spirit of your entire user experience must be translated from one language to another. This requires a combined effort of SEO experts as well as bilingual translators and perhaps even localization experts. Be More Digital has the SEO leadership experience to lead your international SEO project and create a website that your users will love. Our team of bilingual SEO experts and content creators has broad experience in website translation and international SEO. We're able to handle translation internally or work and liaise with other translators you're already working with. For more information about international SEO services, please contact us for an international SEO quote.
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