Proper use of HREF-LANG tag and Geotargeting.
-
I am working with a global company that has different country sites (these are distinguished via country subdomains - country.site.com). Upon looking at the Google Analytics data, I noticed that even though the different country geotargeting settings aren't set up correctly, we are reaching the right target market for each site.
My hunch is because even though there is no geotargeting, the language for each country site is making the content relavant (this in combination with the subdomain).
I have read through various resources here on MOZ, and noticed that the primary purpose of the href-lang tag is important if you have similar/identical pages that are targeted towards different countries/languages. If the pages are translations however, how important or impactful is it to set the geotargeting and href-lang tags for the other sites altogether?
-
The Matt Cutts stated that href-lang is important because it will help Google bot know that the page is intended for a different language, rather than a poorly translated page 'written' just to 'rank'. If it seems like everything is okay, then err on the side of caution and use href-lang. You may just see an improvement.
However, the critical piece is making sure the pages are well written/translated for their intended target. Perhaps search engines have gotten better at weeding out/penalizing poor translations, but I would use href-lang just so I could sleep at night. At least you'll know you did that much.
If you really want to go for the gold, get someone fluent in the target languages and see what they think. You may end up with some edits. There are a ton of Spanish dialects and what reads well in Mexico might not read so well in Spain.
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
-
Using same URL for both "en" and "en-us" hreflang tags
Hi,I have a question. Is it okay if I use the same URL for both "en" and "en-us" hreflang tags? For example, for my en-us page: Is this okay with Google? What are your thoughts on this?
International SEO | | Avid_Demand0 -
Traffic drop after hreflang tags added
We operate one company with two websites each serving a different location, one targeting EU customers and the other targeting US customers. thespacecollective.com (EU customers) thespacecollective.com/us/ (US customers) We have always had canonical tags in place, but we added the following hreflang tags two weeks ago (apparently this is best practice); EU site (thespacecollective.com) US site (thespacecollective.com/us/) Literally the same day we added the above hreflang tags our traffic dropped off a cliff (we have lost around 70-80% on the EU site, and after a minor recovery, 50% on the US site). Now, my first instinct is to remove the tags entirely and go back to just using canonical, but if this is truly best practice, that could do more damage than good. This is the only change that has been made in recent weeks regarding SEO. Is there something obvious that I am missing because it looks correct to me?
International SEO | | moon-boots0 -
Does not having any hreflang tags for U.S Visitors lead to an increase in International Visitors?
I have seen a massive increase in International Visitors on our website and visitors within the United States dropped off hard this month (by about 20%). Could it be possible that not having any hreflang tags can lead to an increase in International Customers visiting the site even though your sitemap is set to "Target users in United States" within the Google Search Console? In the Google Search Console, I have International Targeting set to "Target users in United States." However, Google Search Console is saying our site doesn't have any hreflang tags. In the Google Search Console, it says "Your site has no hreflang tags. Google uses hreflang tags to match the user's language preference to the right variation of your pages." I'm not sure when that was flagged, but recently we have seen a massive increase in International Visitors to our site from countries such as Russia, Vietnam, Indonesia, the United Kingdom and so on. This poses a problem since our chances of turning one of those visitors into a customer is extremely slim. Along with that, nearly every international customer is contributing to an extremely high Bounce Rate. Attached is a screenshot of the Error about hreflang tags. https://imgur.com/a/XZI45Pw And here is a screenshot of the Country we are targeting. https://imgur.com/a/ArpWe9Z Lastly, attached is a screenshot of all of the Countries that visited our site today: https://imgur.com/a/d0tNwkI
International SEO | | MichaelAtMSP1 -
Hreflang tags
I know these are intended for specifying different language/regional versions of one site, but can they be used to specify just ONE country (eg. "en-au")? Or does it only work to specify an ALTERNATIVE to another language/region variation?
International SEO | | muzzmoz0 -
Using a top level domain name and directing it to a subfolder
Hi, we have a large international network. Our main website sits on .com domain and is used by the UK market. We have an international site in a subdirectory .com/dk/ for Denmark for example. We have also purchased the domain name www.ourcompany.dk/. Should we be forwarding the domain name (www.ourcompany.dk/) to point to the subdirectory www.ourcomany.com.dk/ so in the browser it shows up as www.ourcompany.dk or should we be displaying it as www.ourcompany.com/dk/? Are there any pros and cons to this method? Which one is best and are there any benefits in SEO. Ideally we want the .com domain name to have the best domain authority so would this impact it in any way? Any tips would be great.
International SEO | | Easigrass0 -
International SEO Question: Using hreflang tags across two different TLDs.
Hi! My UK based company just recently made the decision to let the US market operate their ecommerce business independently. Initially, both markets were operating off the same domain using sub-directories (i.e: www.brandname.com/en-us/ , www.brandname.com/en-gb/ ) Now that the US team have broken away from the domain - they are now using www.brandnameUSA.com while the UK continues to use www.brandname.com/en-gb/. The content is similar across both domains - however, the new US website has been able to consolidate several product variations onto single product pages where the UK website is using individual product pages for each variation. We have placed a geo-filter on the main domain which is 301 redirecting North American traffic looking for www.brandname.com to www.brandnameUSA.com However, since the domain change has taken place, product pages from the original domain are now indexing alongside the new US websites product pages in US search results. The UK website wants to be the default destination for all international traffic. My question is - how do we correctly setup hrlang tags across two separate TLDs and how do we handle a situation where multiple product pages on the "default" domain have been consolidated into one product page on the new USA domain? This is how we are currently handling it: "en-us" href="https://www.BRANDNAMEUSA.com/All-Variations" /> href="https://www.BRANDNAMEUSA.com/All-Variations" />
International SEO | | alexcbrands0 -
Can we use similar images on multi regional websites?
I have couple of questions regarding multi regional websites. Right now, We're working on http://www.canvaschamp.com/ and planning to design new website for Australia region. I have read Google's official guidelines regarding duplicate content on following URL. https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/182192?hl=en Now, I have biggest question regarding images and videos. We're going to use all photo gallery images on Australia website. http://www.canvaschamp.com/canvas-prints We may use similar name, title tag, meta description for all images. So, Will it work for us? I want to save my website from duplicate content penalty. I am looking forward for any additional help which may help me to perform better on different region with similar images.
International SEO | | CommercePundit0 -
Do you recommend for registering international domains (IDN) for ranking on words used in domain name?
Hi everybody, thanks for putting time to reply me 🙂 I am working on SEO of a website that its content is in Farsi. I have chosen a few rather competitive keywords (difficulty between 30-40% :thanks to KDT in seomoz!) to target. Due to the importance of keyword in domain name I was thinking about registering a few international domains that contain exactly the same Farsi words that I target. Do you recommend this as a valid approach? For each of these domains, I am going to setup a very simple 1 page site for each domain, a few lines of content and a big button linked to my primary website. How does it sound? Best regards,
International SEO | | Ashkan10
