Go Global with Embryo’s International SEO services

Understanding who you’re up against in the digital landscape of any country that you’re targeting is, along with keyword research, the first step in the international SEO journey. Your competitors in the UK may be entirely different to those in India or Argentina. In addition, the businesses that you may not immediately think of as competitors may have a greater digital presence than you, and vice versa.

When undergoing competitor analysis pay attention to the types of keywords that they rank for which you don’t, the amount of traffic they get for specific keywords plus the total number of terms and phrases that they rank for. This latter one will give you a good idea as to other terms that you could potentially target that you may not have thought of.

Treat each country with the same level of analysis and go as in-depth as you can with each one. These potential markets all have their nuances, idiosyncrasies, and behaviours and will all have an impact on how you write content and optimise your site.

Like any search campaign, keyword research is the first step to ensuring a good level of ROI in a reasonable amount of time. When it comes to targeting an international audience, real thought needs to be given to the keyword strategy.

Beyond just the language barrier, the intent of a key term in one country will be entirely different in another. Thorough research will ensure that the type of work created will satisfy the intent behind the international keyword that you’re looking to rank for.

For example, in the UK, the people who represent citizens in court are called barristers, whereas in the US they are known as lawyers. This is just one instance where proper research needs to be carried out before you create landing pages, content, and imagery, by not doing it you’re setting yourself up to fail before you’ve even set anything live.

We’ll begin by looking at your current rankings and then spend time expanding the keyword lists for the different countries, based on search volume and SERP (Search Engine Results Page) features. We’ll use a variety of tools to examine how those phrases are searched for in different places, whether they speak English or not. We take into account vernacular, slang terms, and units of measurement to create an accurate set of words that we can go after in your target country.

Tools such as Ahrefs allow us to see the search volume for translated keywords in different areas of the world. For instance, let’s say you sell CCTV Cameras and want to expand where you sell them to France. We can view not only the French translation for terms such as ‘Security Cameras’ and ‘CCTV Cameras’ but also see their search volume, what the intent behind that search is, and how best to rank for it.

This allows us to determine which markets are worth going after and spending your investment on.

Once our research into the phrases and terms is complete, the next step is to determine the types of content we can create that will get you a ranking for that country-specific phrase.

Through our research, we’ll uncover the types of questions people are searching for to do with your product or service. We’ll look to answer that as part of our content strategy. Beyond that, our work goes into much greater depth, with global search work it’s important to determine if you’ll optimise your pages based on language, location, or both.

You could choose to focus on just language which would mean creating relatively similar content for every page on your site for each language you wish to target. This involves creating a prompt when a user lands on your site from which they select their language and are set to a specific URL that is written for them. The second option involves aiming content at countries and languages where you create separate sites that are specifically for the country and its native languages. This alternative version would involve separate sites with different URL structures, determining the content you’ll provide with the impact you structure site(s) for international SEO.

Identifying countries that bring you a lot of traffic or links to your site without your optimisation efforts is a good way of not only determining the type of work to do but also can inform you about which countries to target. It’s vital with this type of search work that everything is predicated on data, you need to know there is a demand for products or services such as yours before you optimise for that country.

You cannot afford to just write your content in English, translate it through a machine, throw some keywords in there and expect it to work. Put yourself in the customer’s shoes. Imagine if you landed on a site and it was written in what appeared to be broken English – your trust in that website would plummet very quickly.

What works in one country, will be, at best, incorrect and at worse, offensive! Both of which you want to avoid. If you’re a company that has product descriptions or uses technical language then the need to organically create content in a specific language increases even further as the need for specificity increases. Language is so complex and is packed with microscopic differences which can be the difference between someone trusting your site and not. For instance, the use of the word ‘you’ differs vastly across places such as Italy and Germany. Simply copying and pasting your content into a translator into these languages is not enough.

This part of the process can be very complicated and is often the moment when businesses abandon their global SEO project. Choosing the URL (Uniform Resource Locator) structure is an important step and will impact – for better or worse – your global online presence for years to come.

Essentially there are four types of URL setups, which are:

ccTLD Domains

A ccTLD stands for Country Code Top-Level Domains and is essentially the two letters that are assigned to your website’s URL. Some businesses will opt for this choice when they want to create different websites and customer experiences for different countries. In the UK, the Country-Code Top-Level Domains is ‘.uk’, in Spain it is ‘.es’, and in Ireland, it’s ‘.ie’.

gTLD Domains

Generic Top-Level Domains sound more complicated than they are. gTLDs are those URLs that aren’t unique or bound by a region. The most prominent example of this type of URL is ‘.com’, which is maintained by IANA which stands for the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority.

A certain popular search engine will view a gTLD structure and not restrict its presence on the SERP to region or language. It will be available for everyone to view, effectively. This is fine if you want to cast as wide a net as possible over your target audience, but, it could have a negative impact if speakers of different languages prefer a website with a country-specific top-level domain.

ccTLD or gTLD with subdomains

A slightly different option to the first two involves adding elements of ccTLDs and gTLDs within subdomains. Here, you appear to get the best of both worlds by leveraging the advantages of the gTLDs and the country code that comes with the ccTLDs.

Websites that have the country code before the main part of the URL have opted for this route.

ccTLD or gTLD with subdirectories

The subdirectory version is the opposite of the subdomain version. Instead of having the country code before the main part of the URL, it comes after, e.g. yourbusiness.com/fr.

Which URL structure is right for me?

The advantages and disadvantages of global search URL structures are a topic that could take up quite a few chapters of a book. This is to say that there are many pros and cons, and dozens of features you need to consider.

The one that is right for you is the one that maximises your company’s online presence in the countries in which you want to do business. Broadly speaking, having an entirely different website targeted exclusively at, say, French speakers or German speakers is one of the most obvious signals to search engines that you want to rank in that country. The drawback to this is that you need to create an entirely new site which can take a very long time. In terms of convenience and ease, a gTLD with language parameters is probably your best bet as you don’t need to build/invest time in creating a new website in the correct language. On the other hand, doing this sends a pretty weak signal to your Googles and Yahoos of the world.

Your decision will ultimately depend on how much of a dent you want to make in those potential markets.

An essential component of your international SEO plans, the Hreflang tags allow you to show search engines the relationship between X page and Y language. Essentially, these language tags act as the bridge between the translated content variant and the person from that country who is searching for the query you’re ranking for.

As necessary as Hreflang tags are, they are not a solid directive, as an SEO signal, they mainly act as a road sign for Google’s crawlers. There are a lot of other ranking factors which impact and even override this language tag which is why you should consider it as part of a wider set of global SEO best practices.

If you created a Hreflang tag for French content that you’d written for an alternative homepage it would send signals to search engines that the IP address of the user, which they presume is from a French-speaking country, would be better served the French version of the copy that you’d written, as opposed to the English content.

A properly structured Hreflang tag can help decrease the bounce rate and increase session time because you’re providing the user with the correct information, in their native language. The theory goes that the user is more likely to convert because they’ve been given the best user experience. Going deeper, you can set these tags to recognise localised variations in language. You could target Brazil for instance with a tag that took into account the fact that the main language is Portuguese but the content has been written with Brazilian idiosyncrasies in mind.

With this tag, it’s important to keep two things in mind, they are:

• Where you put the tag: You should only place it once in your URL structure, either in the on-page markup, the sitemap, or the HTTP header.
• What the Hreflang tag looks like: The tag that appears on the page should include all the pages that serve as an alternative to it. If you’re looking to target more than one country with that specific page, the tag should reference that in the code.

In international SEO, your regular keywords may simply not be good enough. While you may be currently ranking high for certain keywords on your home turf, these same words will likely require strategising before entering a more global market.  As keywords differ between regions, you will likely need to run local campaigns specific to certain regions with your strategy – including target audience and campaign wording – being tailored for each location.)

It is no longer enough to look at the country in terms of worldwide numbers. Instead, you need to focus on a local strategy as the search behaviour surrounding your keywords will vary depending on the region and language. This is especially important for countries where the population covers a mix of languages, such as India.

For your international SEO strategy to be successful, you will need to focus on how different regions search for your services and products. You cannot assume everyone in the country will search in the same way. If you simply use the direct translation of the phrase or keyword, it will not have the desired effect. This is where an international SEO agency comes into play, as they have access to certain tools to help determine this.

If this is something you are interested in, contact our sales team today.

High-quality, unique and authoritative content is just as important in every language as far as Google is concerned. Translating your content requires not just technical expertise but also flair and creativity to ensure you’re meeting the needs of your users as well as Google’s EAT (Expertise, Authority, Trustworthiness) requirements for quality content.

Particularly if you’ve invested heavily in long-form content on your original website, it can seem like a mammoth task to translate all of this, which is where it can be tempting to use auto-translate tools to move your copy over to international sites. However, in this case, the investment associated with working with experienced translators and/or native-speaking content writers is well worth the effort.

Manually translated content with proper phrasing and grammar in the target language is not considered duplicate content, and you won’t receive any penalties from Google for using the same content translated. However, using auto-translate tools can cause you issues with duplicate content. Plus, if your auto-translation is inaccurate or doesn’t make sense in the new language, your content and website might also get flagged as spammy, and potentially even become blocked.

While mobile uptake is different between regions, Google’s attitude is not. Mobile-friendly and mobile-first websites are and will continue to be, prioritised by search engines.

Just like your regular SEO campaigns, international SEO requires an exceptionally well-optimised website for both desktop and mobile users. Key elements you’ll want to consider before launching any international website include:

• Responsive design – This is a design that moves and resizes content, menus, images and other website elements intelligently depending on the window/screen size your visitors are using.
• Content design – It’s important to structure your content based on how users are likely to engage with your site, making your site easy to navigate and the content easy to digest.
• Pop-ups – On mobiles, in particular, pop-ups can be a user experience nightmare! Ensure your pop-ups are disabled, or at least easy to exit, on mobile devices so your users don’t get caught in a bottleneck on your site.
• Website speed – The faster the better where speed is concerned! Faster websites, particularly on mobile, are favoured by both users and search engines.
• Button sizes – Keep an eye on the sizes of the key buttons on your site to make sure users on mobile can easily use them too.

Make sure you’re regularly updating and testing all of your sites on mobile as well as on desktop.

As we’ve already examined, the Hreflang attribute is a key indicator when using different languages on your site.

The Hreflang attribute tells the search engine what specific languages you’re using on a page. This tag will signal to the search engine that a user searching for something in “x” language will want their primary search results mirrored in “x” over pages with similar content written in “y”.

By adding the Hreflang attribution to second-language content you’ve written for an alternative version of your website homepage, you can help reduce bounce rate and improve the user experience. Offering locally-focused content in your target language is a big trust signal for users in different language regions.

Hreflang tags aren’t the be-all and end-all of international SEO, but they are an important signpost along the way, and so should be a key part of your overarching international SEO strategy.

Hreflang Tag Example

An Hreflang tag for website content in French would look like this:

<link rel=”alternate” href=”http://website.com/fr” hreflang=”fr-fr”/>

Monitoring and measuring the results of your campaigns are just as important when talking about international SEO as local SEO, if not even more so!

Accurately tracking campaign progress is one of the most significant ways you can measure success when starting international SEO. You can use this information in a myriad of ways, including identifying areas of success, areas for improvement, and areas with the potential to expand and grow.

When it comes to monitoring and measuring the effectiveness of your international SEO strategy, there are a number of things you should be doing to ensure you’re getting all of the relevant data you need:

• Measure everything before, during and after the migration process. Regardless of the strategy you’re using, having a strong baseline from which to measure your progress is incredibly important to an effective global strategy. This also allows you to see any areas that are growing or declining throughout the process and identify any issues quickly.
• Ensure you’re accurately tracking your page rankings. There are thousands of different nuances within even expertly translated content that can affect the overall rankings of your pages. Errors here can reduce your relevancy and hurt your rankings, which is the opposite of what you’re looking for! Tracking page rankings also means you can quickly identify any issues with your hreflang tag implementation at any stage.
• Measure success through a range of other digital channels. As the online landscape continues to evolve and become increasingly integrated, keeping an eye on a range of channels can provide pointers on how your organic SEO is performing. Social media channels and accounts for new regions can be a good indicator in situations like this!
• Don’t just rely on organic traffic. SEO, as we all know, is a long-term organic strategy, and it often takes some time to gain traction, particularly if you’re starting from scratch in new markets. In the interim period, pay-per-click (PPC) can be incredibly valuable for getting your business in front of new users in your territories, and also offers useful insights. Measuring success through PPC can give you some universal indicators on how your website is performing as a whole.‌ Using these measures, you can also better understand search behaviour and conversion rates in your new markets.

Conceptualising, building, and executing an entire international SEO strategy isn’t easy. As we’ve seen by now, there’s an exceptional amount of thought, care, labour, and investment required to effectively carry out an expansion into international markets.

Before starting the process of moving into international SEO, business owners should carefully consider who will be responsible for the process within their organisation.

If you have a large internal marketing team dedicated to supporting and maintaining your SEO already, you may be able to carry this out in-house. However, if your team is already stretched thin, it may make more sense for you to work with a specialist international SEO agency. Agencies have all of the expertise and tools required to create and deliver an international SEO strategy, so there is no need for you to invest in tools or materials in addition to hiring new staff.

To find out more about international SEO strategies or to get started with your next move into a new territory, please don’t hesitate to get in touch with Embryo. Our international SEO experts are on hand to help you throughout the process of implementing an international SEO strategy. We can help you take your business to the next level.

Google My Business (GMB) is a key part of any local SEO strategy, and this is something you’ll need to incorporate into your international strategy too! When implementing an international SEO strategy, you need to remember all of the indicators that make your local SEO so effective and, in many cases, simply replicate them!

Whether you’re expanding locally, domestically or internationally, search engines take GMB presence as a strong signal of your business’s legitimacy. GMB also provides users with a really easy way to interact with your brand and find the information they need from you. Not to mention, GMB gets you a place in the map pack, which takes up considerable space on the SERPs, pushing your competitors down the page and putting your business front and centre.

Machine translation is becoming more and more sophisticated, with many new tools being integrated every day. These tools can be exceptionally useful in a wide range of different applications; however, when it comes to translating web pages and blog posts for SEO, the technology simply isn’t good enough yet.

While many organisations advertise their automated tools for SEO translation purposes, your best bet is to work with professional, human translators – or copywriting experts – who are fluent in your target language.

There are so many nuances between languages that only native speakers or those fluent in the language can understand. When targeting new international audiences in new languages, you need to ensure that those nuances are accounted for.

There is also the matter of keyword reach, which doesn’t always translate directly between regions, let alone between languages! Different languages and regions will have different terminologies they use for different products and services, so your content needs to take this into account if you want to guarantee SEO success in your new target regions.

While machine translation may seem a more affordable and less labour-intensive method in the short term, poor translation and a lack of regionally-specific terminology will only harm your chances of international SEO success in the future.