International SEO Difficulty With Hreflang
-
Hi,
It seems that multilingual sites can be very tricky sometimes. This is the second problem we are facing with a client this month...
A company which already has a presence in Spain wants to expand now in Portugal, Brazil and Argentina.
There are some linguistic differences between Spain Spanish and Argentina Spanish so we will have a slightly different content but same url (check below)
We will also cover the linguistic differences between Portuguese and Brazilian but with different urls, so we will have 4 pages serving the same content in 3 ( technically 4 ) different languages:
company.com/idioma -> (original Spain Spanish page - url stays the same.)
company.com/es-ar/idioma (Argentina url)
company.com/pt-pt/idioma (Portugal url)
company.com/pt-br/lingua (Brazil url)
Normally we know we should use alternate hreflang to all 4 pages, but now that the url changes, e.g between Argentina and Brazil, the case is the same or we can omit it for these two countries?
Thank you!
-
Hey there,
Thank you all for helping with this...
-
Yup, you're correct.
About the order, sincerely I don't think it affects the hreflang functionality, but using the right order is helpful for better reading the code when analyzing it.
-
Thanks Gianluca,
so if I'm correct the English page would include
etc.
and add the same code to the /fr page and /pt page. Does it matter in what order they are placed (English hreflang at the top for English page, French hreflang at the top on the French page)?
-
If your site is multilingual, hence not expressly targeting any country but users speaking a given language, then you DON'T have to use the country ISO code in the hreflang (ES, IT, DE), but only the language ISO code.
-
We're having a similar situation on our site, but I'm a bit confused with the info I found here: https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/189077?hl=en
It's multilingual (7 languages) which are set up like this:
site.com/en
site.com/es
site.com/pt
etc.I know I should add the hreflang tag on each page AND add the href with link to corresponding page in the other languages, but is it enough to just use
hreflang="en"
or should I also add en-us & en-uk to the english pages? Same for the pt version. Should I just add hreflang="pt" or specify Portugal and Brazil? -
What Patrick wrote is substantially correct.
On the other hand, in the specific case of your Spanish and Portuguese versions, you may consider to not use all four hreflang annotations but for their "home pages", but only using hreflang for better geotarget the two different Spanish version in case of the Spanish and Argentinian versions and the two different Portuguese one in the case of the Portuguese and Brazilian versions.
I say this because even without the hreflang, Google have enough data to understand that one page is targeting Portugal and not Spanish (different language, different geo-targeting in Search Console/Webmaster Tools, possibly a well located Spanish for Spain, currency - if it is an Ecommerce -, address...).
Not so clear would be in the case of Portugal Portuguese and Brazil Portuguese... that why I suggest to maintain the usage of the hreflang when language is common.
-
Hi there
If I am understanding right, you are worried about Argentina and Brazil URL variations having the same hreflang tag? That's fine if it's the same language. You should also take advantage of country targeting in your Google and Bing Webmaster Tools, as this will tell crawlers that these URL variations (which you should create a profile for each variation), while having the same languages, serve two different countries.
For Bing, you can also check out language tags.
Hope this helps! Good luck!
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Hreflang: customize, selection the best URL structure
Hi All,
Local Website Optimization | | SergeyFufaev
We have two websites:
example.info - this is a working site in Russian hreflang="ru"
example.com - this new site We want to start with US. For the US, we will have: local address and phone, currency in $, fully translated content.
In the future we want to expand the business (ie en-GB, en-CA, de-DE, fr-CA, fr-FR). For each country, a regional dialect, currency, address and telephone number will be used. I need to choose the right URL structure so that there won't be problems in the future. 1. When configuring geotargeting (ie fr-CA and en-CA ) in the URL of the page specify: • http://example.com/ca/ - hreflang="en-CA" - Can use Search Console geotargeting
• http://example.com/ca/fr/ - hreflang="fr-CA"
or
• http://example.com/en-ca/ - hreflang="en-CA" - Can I use a geo-targeting search console?
• http://example.com/fr-ca/ - hreflang="fr-CA" .
or
• http://example.com/ca-en/ - hreflang="en-CA" - Can I use a geo-targeting search console?
• http://example.com/ca-fr/ - hreflang="fr-CA" . quote: To geotarget your site on Google:
o Page or site level: Use locale-specific URLs for your site or page. 2. If I set the target (ie "en-CA", "fr-CA" and "fr-FR"). Can I use the page http://example.com/fr/ with customized targeting (hreflang = "fr-FR") for french speakers worldwide (hreflang= "fr"), ie: french speakers worldwide quote: "If you have several alternate URLs targeted at users with the same language but in different locales, it's a good idea also to provide a catchall URL for geographically unspecified users of that language. For example, you may have specific URLs for English speakers in Ireland (en-ie), Canada (en-ca), and Australia (en-au), but should also provide a generic English (en) page for searchers in, say, the US, UK, and all other English-speaking locations. It can be one of the specific pages, if you choose." 3. Where is it better to place select of language and country on the page?
Header, footer, pop-up window ......
The page http://example.com will be used for hreflang = "en". In my case, do I need x-default? Can I use a page with hreflang="en"configured as the x-default version? ie: Is it right?0 -
Research on industries that are most competitive for SEO?
I am trying to see if there is a reputable / research-backed source that can show which industries are most competitive for search engine optimization. In particularly, I'd be interested in reports / research related to the residential real estate industry, which I believe based on anecdotal experience to be extremely competitive.
Local Website Optimization | | Kevin_P3 -
Local SEO for Multiple Locations - Is this the best approach?
Hi everyone! I previously have worked with single-location companies, and am now working for a company that is continuously growing and adding new locations. We are a financial institution that currently has 12 locations, and we should have 15+ locations by year-end 2017. Seeing as we have all of these locations, I thought the following approach would be the best for increasing our presence in local search. Our primary keyword is "credit union in location". Our search traffic has increased heavily over last year, but is down from the beginning of the year. I've gone through and done the following: Freshened up the content on the main website Created pages for each of our locations around April-end Attributed these location page URLs to our Google My Business locations Verified each location Wrote unique content for each page Our primary keyword rankings seem to fluctuate weekly. My next steps are to get our web design company to add the following: Structured Data on all location pages The ability to change SEO title and meta descriptions on location pages Sitemap (there is none currently, and I've been fighting them to get one added because it isn't needed.) I also plan on utilizing Moz Local to manage our local listings. After this is done I plan on finding ways for us to build links for each location, like the chambers of commerce in each city and local partnerships. Is this the best approach for our overall goal, and should I continue? Is there anything I should change about our current approach? I appreciate the help!
Local Website Optimization | | PelicanStateCU0 -
Ideas on creating location based service pages for SEO value while not worrying about local SEO?
Hello and thanks for reading! We have a bit of a rare issue, where we are a nationwide distributor but have a local side that handles all tristate area requests, the sales that happen via local basically don't impact the online side, so we're trying to not focus on local SEO but in a sense worry about abroad local SEO. We want to try the location based service pages, but not for every state, at most 5 states and inside those pages target 2 to 3 big cities. Is this a waste of time to even think about or is this something that can be done with a careful touch?
Local Website Optimization | | Deacyde0 -
SEO and Redirecting Site to a Different Firm's Domain while Maintaining Current Domain's Rankings
I am a plaintiffs' attorney with a website that ranks well for my major practice areas. I am considering taking a position with a new firm. As part of the discussion, the new firm would allow me to keep my current site so long as it redirects to my bio page on their firm's site. My goal is to keep my current site ranking well and continuously work on SEO efforts, in case I leave the new firm and want to rely on my current site in the future. My questions are: Is there a way to redirect my site every time it shows up in the listings (I have 1000+ indexed pages) without sacrificing its current rankings b/c of bounce rate issues, etc and 2) If I continue to add pages and work on SEO for my site while it redirects to another, will those efforts be worthwhile due to the redirect? I want to keep trying to build my site even though it redirects to a page on a different domain.
Local Website Optimization | | crpoll0 -
Local SEO HELP for Franchise SAB Business
This all began when I was asked to develop experiment parameters for our content protocol & strategy. It should be simple right? I've reviewed A/B testing tips for days now, from Moz and other sources.I'm totally amped and ready to begin testing in Google Analytics. Say we have a restoration service franchise with over 40 franchises we perform SEO for. They are all over the US. Every franchise has their own local website. Example restorationcompanylosangeles.com Every franchise purchases territories in which they want to rank in. Some service over 100 cities. Most franchises also have PPC campaigns. As a part of our strategy we incorporate the location reach data from Adwords to focus on their high reach locations first. We have 'power pages' which include 5 high reach branch preferences (areas in which the owners prefer to target) and 5 non branch preference high reach locations. We are working heavily on our National brand presence & working with PR and local news companies to build relationships for natural backlinks. We are developing a strategy for social media for national brand outlets and local outlets. We are using major aggregators to distribute our local citation for our branch offices. We make sure all NAP is consistent across all citations. We are partners with Google so we work with them on new branches that are developing to create their Google listings (MyBusiness & G+). We use local business schema markup for all pages. Our content protocol encompasses all the needed onsite optimization tactics; meta, titles, schema, placement of keywords, semantic Q&A & internal linking strategies etc. Our leads are calls and form submissions. We use several call tracking services to monitor calls, caller's location etc. We are testing Callrail to start monitoring landing pages and keywords that generating our leads. Parts that I want to change: Some of the local sites have over 100 pages targeted for 'water damage + city ' aka what Moz would call "Doorway pages. " These pages have 600-1000 words all talking about services we provide. Although our writers (4 of them) manipulate them in a way so that they aren't duplicate pages. They add about 100 words about the city location. This is the only unique variable. We pump out about 10 new local pages a month per site - so yes - over 300 local pages a month. Traffic to the local sites is very scarce. Content protocol / strategy is only tested based on ranking! We have a tool that monitors ranking on all domains. This does not count for mobile, local, nor user based preference searching like Google Now. My team is deeply attached to basing our metrics solely on ranking. The logic behind this is that if there is no local city page existing for a targeted location, there is less likelihood of ranking for that location. If you are not seen then you will not get traffic nor leads. Ranking for power locations is poor - while less competitive low reach locations rank ok. We are updating content protocol by tweaking small things (multiple variants at a time). They will check ranking everyday for about a week to determine whether that experiment was a success or not. What I need: Internal duplicate content analyzer - to prove that writing over 400 pages a month about water damage + city IS duplicate content. Unique content for 'Power pages' - I know based on dozens of chats here on the community and in MOZ blogs that we can only truly create quality content for 5-10 pages. Meaning we need to narrow down what locations are most important to us and beef them up. Creating blog content for non 'power' locations. Develop new experiment protocol based on metrics like traffic, impressions, bounce rate landing page analysis, domain authority etc. Dig deeper into call metrics and their sources. Now I am at a roadblock because I cannot develop valid content experimenting parameters based on ranking. I know that a/b testing requires testing two pages that are same except the one variable. We'd either non index these or canonicalize.. both are not in favor of testing ranking for the same term. Questions: Are all these local pages duplicate content? Is there a such thing as content experiments based solely on ranking? Any other suggestions for this scenario?
Local Website Optimization | | MilestoneSEO_LA1 -
Can anyone recommend small UK based SEO Consultancy companies?
Hi there, We're possibly looking for a small, completely whitehat SEO firm here in the UK to work with us from early next year. We've probably got a budget of around £200 - £300 a month. We're looking for top up work really, not a complete campaign. I've checked out http://moz.com/community/recommended but it's not broken down by region or budget. I had an embarrassing phone call with Distilled who it turns out charge £10,000 a month minimum! Can anyone recommend anyone to speak to?
Local Website Optimization | | jennie.evans0 -
Local Area SEO - Directions Page and Multiple Use of Direction pages
Hello, We are looking to focus on multiple local areas and it has been suggested one way to mention lots of different locations on pages without doing lists or using grey SEO practices is to create directions pages. We are trying this with a client who has 2 business at the same address. The layout is:- Introduction - 2-3 sentences Directions by Car Park Parking info Directions by Public Transports Closing - 3-4 sentences - using clients keywords The hope is the having locations/areas and the clients keywords on the same page will capture some of the local areas with the clients keywords. I have some questions:- 1. If we use the same directions text and just change the opening and closing paragraphs on the different website will this be enough to not have a duplicate content issue. 2. Are the directions pages the best way to capture keywords and local area/locations on the same page. 3. Is there anything I am missing or could do instead? Looking forward to everyone's input....
Local Website Optimization | | JohnW-UK0