International Seo: Find Out How To Do It!

How to do international SEO?

How to do international SEO?

Well, if your business has grown enough to expand its boundaries, or you are probably starting out as a global business or as a service provider, international SEO can help.  

So you came up with the idea of ​​creating language / country based versions of your website to target users in new markets. 

A daunting task that will make you take a closer look at international markets, so you need to know international SEO well!

I said a daunting task, but not really so daunting if you prepare and have a plan. Well, let's do things in the right order.

What is international SEO?

International SEO helps you deliver content in multiple languages ​​to users (and search engines!) In different locations. It also ensures that certain content is displayed to users based on their location or spoken language. 

While international and "regular" SEO share the basics, they require different approaches and tactics. International SEO involves a deeper understanding of all technical things and requires preparatory work.

Thus, an international  SEO implementation plan  can include steps as follows:

1 Access training

2 Segment identification

3 Conducting international keyword research

4 Analysis of competition

5 Working on the technical part

6 Content location

7 Building connections

Evaluate your international training

In essence, going global requires sufficient foundations. The same goes for international SEO. So, before launching an international SEO campaign, you need to balance your expectations and skills. This will help you get a clearer picture of how much this step will cost you in terms of money, time and resources. To determine if your business is ready to take this step, answer a few questions:

Are you ready to create a different user experience, specific to users in different regions / languages?

Becoming global doesn't just mean translating your site into a new language. You need to build a specific user experience that takes into account the language spoken, the culture and the particularities of the target market.

Are you able to create, review, and maintain content for users in different regions / languages?

Simply creating content for each language / country version of the website is not enough. You need to be prepared to keep it up to date. Will you be able to manage using your own resources? You will probably need extra hands. Which would be better for you: expanding your local team or having a dedicated team in your target region?

Are you ready to support customers in a new region / language?

International expansion brings you more customers. It also brings with it the need to provide quality customer support. Which means you'll need people in your support team who speak the right languages ​​and are available to customers in different time zones.

The answer to these questions can show you the real picture of what to expect in terms of the investment required and the additional size of the team. It can also influence the choice of international SEO tactics and tools.

Identify potential target markets

Unless your business initially targets different regions of the world, you start thinking about doing international SEO when you start seeing a sufficient influx of foreign clients. Analyzing this flow will help you identify the potential target market.

There is a great tool you can use to measure your traffic. I'm talking about Google Analytics. It gives you the ability to analyze the overall traffic your site receives from different countries. 

You can also assess each country's traffic from a business perspective by looking at the number of transactions, revenue, and other factors that can give you clues about the market's potential.

Open your Google Analytics account and go to Public> Geography> Location or Language. You can now analyze the data:

  • Are there visits to your site from other countries?
  • What languages ​​do they speak?
  • Does any country send more traffic to your site than others?
  • Traffic from which country already converts etc.?

There is another way to search for potential markets using, for example, tools like Google's Market Finder. 

Basically, it can be an additional tool for checking opportunities, assessing the general interest in your business or the services you provide.

All you have to do is enter the URL and let the tool analyze your site. It will then automatically drag the categories to your site - you will be able to correct them - and show you the markets that might interest you.

Do separate keyword searches for each version of the site

The main purpose of SEO is to make your site appear in the SERP (s) for  the keywords  you are targeting. This is the basic element that "regular" and international SEO have in common. 

So when it comes to keyword research mechanics, there will be nothing completely different. There is a great guide on keyword research that you can read for more details. 

However, it is extremely important to do separate keyword searches for each country or version of the site, depending on the language. Here's why:

  1. Translated keywords are not the search queries that people use in real life. Of course, you can't just translate your keyword list into the main version of your site and use it to optimize your site for foreign languages. Because translated keywords can be very different from the actual search queries people use.
  • Even the same language in different countries has its peculiarities. Although people living in different countries can officially speak only one language, they actually speak different variants of the same language. So they can search for the same things using different queries.

Take the word "tennis" for example. If we were to define sneakers in general, we would say that they are sports shoes with rubber soles. People love sneakers, they are extremely popular shoes.

But in the UK, for example, people look for the same rubber-soled shoes by calling them by another name.

And if we look at how people in different countries look for these shoes, we'll see an interesting result that Google Trends shows, for example.

Analyze and capitalize on competition

Now that you have defined the potential target markets, it is time to take a second step and scan the competitive landscape. Whatever strategy you choose for your international SEO campaign, you simply cannot go without a thorough competitive analysis.

Important Note. The biggest mistake you can make at this stage is to get the wrong image if you look at the wrong SERPs. You certainly know that search results differ depending on the location of those who search. Therefore, people in the UK and US will see different results for the same search query. Thus, it is essential to research competitors and analyze local snakes in the right place.

1. Provide a real picture of who you are competing with in your local search market.

Needless to say, there can be a huge difference between your offline and online competitors. You need to know the biggest players in the target market niche. But not necessarily the same companies will look like your SEO competitors.

So, finding out who surpasses you in the SERPs for your target keywords can greatly influence what tactics to prioritize SEO in this market.

2. It gives you a clearer idea of ​​how business people or services like yours look. Analyzing your competitors' ranking keywords is a great SEO hack.

First, enrich your keyword list with great keywords that people in your target market use to search for things.

Second, by analyzing your keyword difficulty scores and competition, you can prioritize the keywords you follow.

And third, by analyzing your own positions for your competitors' ranking keywords, you can find them, you are an impressive distance from the first SERP. Then you will know for sure where to strive.

3. Suggest successful SEO tactics to your competitors. Knowing what works well, you can use it in your own SEO campaign. In fact, it saves a lot of time and resources. And this is especially useful when you are not sure what to put your effort into.

Work on the technical part

Being international requires a lot of technical work done correctly to be successful. Most of the issues affecting international SEO are related to the technical part. So it is essential to do things right. So let's see what's important here.

Choosing the domain and structure of the website

Language and region-optimized URLs is one of the signals that search engines consider for local ranking. So choosing the right domain is a crucial point in an international SEO campaign. There are several options, each with its own advantages and disadvantages. So, you can choose the one that best suits your goals and possibilities.

Find your content

Almost last, but not least. The content of your site Your most valuable asset that you want users to have access to. And you need to approach your targeted content internationally, taking into account not only the language that your users speak, but also the cultural differences and the particularities of the market.

Therefore, simply translating your site into an appropriate language is certainly not an option. Instead, you need to locate it based on the language and cultural quirks of your users.

In fact, localization can go very well if you know the challenges you may face.

challenge

  • Lack of local staff. There is controversy as to whether you really need a localization team in your target region. Well, the answer is: it depends. Expanding your team is an expensive option, so if you have a limited budget, you'll end up using your own strengths. However, having local employees has its advantages.
  • They are more aware of the peculiarities of the market and can suggest better things, such as keywords, slogans, etc.
  • They speak the same language as the target audience, while the internal team even speaking a certain language may not be aware of all the small variations and expressions commonly used.
  • Inconsistency in all localized content. It is a common challenge that occurs when a distributed team is working on location. There may be terms that can be translated in different ways. And that can confuse users, which is bad in terms of user experience. So the best practice that works very well is to create a glossary of important terms and encourage the localization team to follow it.
  • Poorly optimized content. The point is, even high-quality localized content can rank poorly for your keywords if it's not optimized for them. Therefore, you need to create content optimization rules for your localization team to follow. And you can use content optimization platforms to ensure a more creative and fruitful content optimization process.

Create quality backlinks

Backlinks are still one of the most significant ranking signals. At the same time, link building is often an overlooked part of an international SEO strategy. This happens for a variety of reasons - from lack of resources to prioritizing other tactics, such as content optimization, and so on. 

But, indeed, international SEO is a big separate project, no part of which can be missed if you strive for success. So let's see what link building tactics can stimulate an international SEO strategy.

Take advantage of the main backlink profile of the site. Typically, if your site receives foreign traffic, there is a high chance that you will have international links pointing to your main site. Analyzing your backlink profile will help you define these links. 

Then, you just need to advertise the site owners and ask them to link to your version of the site that is most relevant to your users. It's actually a win-win for all, because the site owners offer a better user experience and get quality links.

Think beyond Google

Although Google is the most used search engine in the world, there are popular alternative search engines in different regions. Therefore, it would be quite unwise to miss out on the opportunities it offers. So let's see which search engines, besides Google, are successful in different regions of the world.

  • Europe - Bing is the second most popular search engine in the world. And it is widely used in Europe, especially in the UK and France, where it has a market share of 4% and 2.8% respectively.
  • Russia and Russian-speaking countries - although Yandex holds about 1% of the global search market - in Russia and the Russian-speaking region, surpasses Google. Yandex's share of the Russian search market is 48%, while Google's share is about 47%.
  • China - China has a lot of its own search engines, with Baidu as the leader. Here Google is the most unpopular option (and has actually been banned from the Chinese market).

International SEO completion

Thinking of international SEO as a secondary SEO overall project is quite unlikely to lead to any success. You are more likely to spend time and money on results that are not at all or very insignificant.

So, if you think it's time to go global, make international SEO a major independent project in which you are ready to invest money, time and resources. 

Check your training, define what parts of the process your team will be responsible for, and what you assign to a local team. Prepare a plan and follow it. With  Creativ24 ​​Agency  , we guarantee you much more than an attractive look, as well as a modern look for your website. Our main goal is to provide companies around the world with effective solutions to generate visibility on the Internet.

Our agency develops SEO strategies and brand positioning for multinational companies, large, medium, but also small, all projects are important to us.

Creativ24 ​​​​offers you professional web design services at favorable prices, creation of presentation sites for small and medium-sized companiescreation of online stores and product catalogs, as well as other related services: website maintenance and administration , optimization SEO and online promotion , graphic design and company identity , web hosting and domain name registration.

License: You have permission to republish this article in any format, even commercially, but you must keep all links intact. Attribution required.