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  4. Country specific domains pointing to a .com site

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Country specific domains pointing to a .com site

International SEO
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  • jimmer
    jimmer last edited by Sep 21, 2011, 4:31 PM

    Hello,

    I am new to seo so please be easy if this happens to be a "silly" question. My company has a .com site. We are expanding into global markets, focusing on specific countries right now.

    General question: Would I be penalized for duplicate content if I purchased country-specific domains and pointed them to the .com site?

    Thanks,

    Jim

    1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
    • sethmissile
      sethmissile last edited by Sep 22, 2011, 10:04 AM Sep 21, 2011, 7:41 PM

      I work with a few multi-national enterprise level sites. For a site to gain good visibility in non-US countries, it is critical that the content on those sites be in the target language.

      You don't need to necessarily own a country-coded Top Level Domain like a website.fr, either. Plenty of companies do great using .com/fr.  If that is the route you take, make sure you translate as much content as possible into the languages that represent the countries you are targeting.

      If you create country specific sub-directories and just use your English content you will lose some control over what Google will display in search results. The canonical tag can help, but it's best to create in-language content.

      Feel free to reach out to me if you need help!

      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
      • jimmer
        jimmer @jimmer last edited by Sep 21, 2011, 5:11 PM Sep 21, 2011, 5:11 PM

        Thanks again!

        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
        • RyanKent
          RyanKent @jimmer last edited by Sep 21, 2011, 5:04 PM Sep 21, 2011, 5:04 PM

          The idea is search engines need to clearly understand which country your content is targeting. Using a ccTLD such as .fr is a very strong indicator of your target country. Some other indicators:

          • use the meta language tag in the header of your pages

          • ensure your monetary units and measurement units are consistent with the target country

          • ensure the language dialect is consistent with your target country. For example, US English is not the same as UK English.

          • Other references to culture and businesses can be considered.

          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
          • jimmer
            jimmer @RyanKent last edited by Sep 21, 2011, 4:55 PM Sep 21, 2011, 4:55 PM

            Ryan,

            One quick question. You mentioned, "assuming it was properly set up". Can you point me down a road where I can glean some info re: proper setup?

            Thanks,
            Jim

            RyanKent jimmer 2 Replies Last reply Sep 21, 2011, 5:11 PM Reply Quote 0
            • jimmer
              jimmer @RyanKent last edited by Sep 21, 2011, 4:52 PM Sep 21, 2011, 4:52 PM

              Thanks Ryan!

              1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
              • RyanKent
                RyanKent last edited by Sep 21, 2011, 4:57 PM Sep 21, 2011, 4:37 PM

                Hi Jim.

                Duplicate content refers to the content itself being made available on multiple URLs. You can duplicate content internally or externally.

                Would I be penalized for duplicate content if I purchased country-specific domains and pointed them to the .com site?

                No. Let's assume you own www.mysite.com and also own www.mysite.fr. If you use a 301 redirect to point the french URL to your main site, there would be no penalty as all the content is still only on one site.

                Another note is translated content is not considered as duplicate content.

                A final note is country-specific sites can duplicate your .com site without it being considered duplicate content. If you have a .fr site it could be an exact duplicate of your .com site but the .fr site, assuming it was properly set up, would rank well in Google.fr whereas the .com site would rank well in Google.com or whichever country was the focus of the .com site.

                jimmer 2 Replies Last reply Sep 21, 2011, 4:55 PM Reply Quote 1
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