Google.ie returning more and more UK based results, why?
-
I have discovered the most infuriating issue with Google Search for Irish users and it seems to be getting increasingly worse in the last 2 years or so. This is not only frustrating as a business owner (in fact it could bring a business to its knees) but it is rage inducing as a consumer.
Google knows the location where I am searching from and I'm using google.ie yet I still get just a small number of Irish websites usually followed by eBay and Amazon results then a never ending list of websites that are based in the United Kingdom. Now, I know the one thing that we all have in common is the use of the English language, however what we don't have in common is shipping costs. In order to slightly increase the number of Irish based companies I need to add in the phrase 'Ireland' to my search (on google.ie in Ireland) and this makes only a small difference. In fact, oftentimes Google seems to throw in the odd American or Australian site just to really wind me up.
It's completely absurd that Google rarely returns results for .ie websites or irish based websites when searching in Ireland. Many UK companies don't ship to Ireland (including many of the eBay and Amazon results). This is killing Irish businesses who have the products and cheaper or free shipping and many how are working damn hard on their SEO are still being passed up for companies that have nothing to do with our economy.... Why oh why is this happening. -
Thanks Mirko,
Yup, I have this done on my site
It seems to be on a general scale that Google chooses to ignore Irish sites even .ie sites over UK and US results. Very frustrating for Irish businesses and buyers. We've only a population of 4m and it would be nice to have the Irish online economy to work a little better!
-
Hi,
I'm not sure how advanced your SEO knowledge is but geotargeting on the Google Search Console in combination with the hreflang tag could be the solution for your specific site to appear in right search results.
I'd suggest to read through the following links to get an idea of what it is:
https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/62399?hl=en
https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/189077?hl=en
Hope this helps for now
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
-
How To Rank A UK Website On Google.com (US)
Hi, I've done some research on this but couldn't find any definitive answer I can trust! We have a client who resides in the UK. They have '.com' domain, hosted on a UK server, using UK spelling. Their business objective for this year is to expand in the USA, including the opening of a warehouse over there. They are wanting us to rank their website on both Google.co.uk and Google.com (North America); besides changing the geolocation settings in GWT's, and building links from .com websites is there anything else we can do to increase their visibility on Google.com? Many thanks in advance, appreciated!
International SEO | | Webpresence
Lee.0 -
What is best practice of using google translate
Hi, I'm thinking of adding google translate to our retailing site so that we could reach more international customers. what about the pros&cons? Any experience of success of utilising it and what potential issues should I be looking at? Thanks
International SEO | | LauraHT0 -
When searching for example.com, only example.co.uk is showing up. Why?
Hi there, I have a quick question, when looking for our client's domain name in Google (Google.it, Google.co.uk and Google.com), we search for example.com, but the first (and only) search result showing is example.co.uk (which redirects then to example.com) Why is the co.uk domain showing instead of the com domain where we are redirecting to? I don't assume that this is any form of penalisation? Thanks!
International SEO | | Gabriele_Layoutweb0 -
Google EE.UU, ¿Some especific documentation?
¡Hello! I have started a project to be ranked in EE.UU. I'm following the same steps that for Google Spain, but as far as I know, some Google updates that are implemented in EE.UU are not implemented in Google Spain. ¿Can someone give me some information about the most important thinks to do to get a good ranking in EE.UU? Thanks!
International SEO | | OkTuWeb0 -
Google search cache points to and uses content from different url
We have two sites, 1 in new zealand: ecostore.co.nz and 1 in Australia: ecostoreaustralia.com.au Both sites have been assigned with the correct country in Webmaster tools Both site use the same urls structure and content for product and category pages Both sites run off the same server in the US but have unique ip adresses. When I go to google.com.au and search for: site:ecostoreaustralia.com.au I get results which google says are from the Australian domain yet on closer inspection it is actually drawing content from the NZ website. When I view a cached page the URL bar displays the AU domain name but on the page (in the top grey box) it says: _This is Google's cache of http://www.ecostore.co.nz/pages/our-highlights. _ Here is the link to this page: http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:Zg_CYkqyjP4J:www.ecostoreaustralia.com.au/pages/our-highlights+&cd=7&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=au In the last four weeks the ranking of the AU website has dropped significantly and the NZ site now ranks first in Google AU, where before the AU site was listed first. Any idea what is going wrong here?
International SEO | | ArchMedia0 -
Will Google punish me cuz my websites content are almost the same?
If I have almost the same contents for my three e-commerce websites, say A.com,B.uk,C.ca. They're promoted in US, GB, Canada which are all English speaking. Will my site be punished because they're almost the same to Google?
International SEO | | SquallPersun0 -
What countries does Google crawl from? Is it only US or do they crawl from Europe and Asia, etc.?
Where does Google crawl the web from? Is it in the US only, or do they do it from a European base too? The reason for asking is for GeoIP redirection. For example, if a website is using GeoIP redirection to redirect all US traffic to a .com site and all EU traffic to a .co.uk site, will Google ever see the .co.uk site?
International SEO | | Envoke-Marketing2 -
Www.google.rs for SERBIA is mising in Engienes
Why you dont have SERBIA in engines for google - www.google.rs You have Croatia, Bosnia and Hercegovina and Slovenia and Serbia is missing 😞 Best regards kasa
International SEO | | stamparija2