Internationalization guides for subfolder structure
-
I'm wondering if there are any guides out there that list how subfolders should be structured for Internationalization? The first language/location that I'm targeting is Portuguese in Brazil so should my folder structure be:
or
I did find the guide below but was wondering if there was perhaps anything from Google?
-
Hi Gianluca,
I also have a translation for Latin American Spanish, what is the best way to target that? Do I need a site for each country? Or should I just call it "es" and use the same site for each country that I need to target?
-
Yes, I was actually going through the Moz guide to international seo and hreflang is mentioned.
https://moz.com/blog/guide-to-international-seo
Yes, I'm using Wordpress but I decided to go with Multisite. I didn't really like any of the plugins out there that handle translations. I'll look into the rewrite rule, thanks!
-
_So using /pt-br/ is fine, what really matter is letting Google know the language/location through search console and other measures what language/location the page are targeting. _
Correct, also, do look into meta tag called "hreflang":
https://moz.com/learn/seo/hreflang-tag
https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/189077?hl=en
I'm not following what you mean in the last sentence: Unless you use some type of CMS, then you can just use RewriteRule or something to only display needed URL.
Most CMS systems have some type of functionality or plugins, which would let you create content in different languages within the same admin, so you wouldn't have to physically create all subfolders etc. So, whenever CMS does that, it would give you URL, but you might use htaccess rewriterule without redirect to make URL look like you want. Just google "rewrite rule without redirect" and you'll see what i'm talking about.
Hope this clarifies a bit
-
Hi Gianluca,
Thanks for your response. The main version of our site is actually English, that is the language that currently resides in the root.
-Brandon
-
I don't know of any "guide" by Google about how better design an international seo architecture.
However, of the two options you presented, the most common, correct and logic is the second one (domain.com/pt-br/), because the first is substantially burying the Brazilian Portuguese version of your site in the architecture.
Secondly, using the ISO schema "language-country" is also a good way to maintain the consistency in the site, also because those same pairs you will be using when implementing the hreflang annotations (and it is also a way to make understand what iso pairs your developers must use).
Thirdly, internet users recognize very well already what pt-br stands for
Finally, a note. If the brazilian portuguese is the main version of your site, why don't you create it directly in the root of your domain (domain.com directly in brazilian portuguese), when all the other versions will be in their dedicated subdirectories? This is the most common thing to do.
-
Sorry, didn't mean to refer to that link as a guide more of a reference.
So using /pt-br/ is fine, what really matter is letting Google know the language/location through search console and other measures what language/location the page are targeting.
I'm not following what you mean in the last sentence: Unless you use some type of CMS, then you can just use RewriteRule or something to only display needed URL.
-
Hi there.
The link you have provided is not a guide for subfolders structuring, it's simply a list of allowed/known language codes for internalization.
To answer your question - it wouldn't matter. It is more for your own ease of use and user friendliness. For example, since you'd have to have different content, you'd have to keep different versions of the website in different folders for ease of finding stuff. This is where different folders structures would come in handy. Unless you use some type of CMS, then you can just use RewriteRule or something to only display needed URL.
Hope this makes sense
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
-
CcTLD vs subfolder for international SEO
In what situations is subfolder better than ccTLD, and vice versa.
International SEO | | MedicalSEOMarketing1 -
International SEO Sub folder Structure
Hi Could anyone offer some advice on the best way to structure sub folders on a website that we are launching worldwide. We are a UK based business and currently run a UK site on www.website.com and we are planning on launching into Europe using a sub folder structure. We will use /de, /fr, /es for the new countries that are coming on board but the question is should the UK site url be: www.website.com or www.website.com/uk As have an established web presence in the UK I'm thinking it should remain as www.wewbsite.com but are there any advantages / disadvantages to changing it to .com/uk Many Thanks
International SEO | | SmiffysUK0 -
Redirect the main site to keyword-rich subfolder / specific page for SEO
Hi,
International SEO | | Awaraman
I have two questions. Question 1: is it worthwhile to redirect the main site to keyword-rich subfolder / specific page for SEO? For example, my company's webpage is www.example.com. Would it make sense to redirect the main site to address www.example.com/service-one-in-certain-city ? I am asking this as I have learned that it is important for SEO to have keywords in the URL, and I was thinking that we could do this and include the most important keywords to the subfolder / specific URL. What are the pros and cons and how important is it to include keywords to folders and page URLs. Should I create folders or pages just the sake of keywords? Question 2: Most companies have their main URL shown as www.example.com when you access their domain. However, some multi-language sites show e.g. www.example.com/en or www.example.com/en/main when you type the domain to your web browser to access the site. I undertstand that this is a common practice to use subdomains or folders to separate the language versions. My question is regarding the subfolder. Is it better to have only the subfolder shown (www.example.com/en) or should you also include the specific page's URL after the subfolder with keywords (www.example.com/en/main or www.example.com/en/service-one-in-certain-city)? I don't really understand why some companies show only the subfolder of a specific language page and some the page's URL after the subfolder. Thanks in advance, Sam0 -
Geotarget subfolders with the same language or get rid of duplicates but lose option to geotarget?
Hi, we have a domain that is aimed to cover LatAm region. Currently, the homepage contains country selector for ~20 countries. 95% of them hold content in Spanish. We have only homepages for each regions as separate subfolders, i.e.
International SEO | | eset
www.maindomain.com/co
www.maindomain.com/cl
www.maindomain.com/br
etc. but once the user clicks on menu item he is taken back to main domain subpages, i.e. www.maindomain.com/comprar My struggle is to decide whether it is better to: A) copy all content for each subfolder, which will create huge amount of duplicates (there are no resources to create unique content and it is even impossible taking into account nature of the product - mostly tech.specs, etc.) and implement hreflang sitemaps and configure GWT to target each country with its own Spanish content (the same for each country) OR B) remove all local subfolders and keep only main domain in Spanish that will serve all countries within the region. With this option, we will get rid of duplicates but also lose option to geotarget. So, my questions is which option will do less harm, or if there is any other approach that comes to your minds. I consulted with two agencies but still haven't got clear answer. Thanks a lot for your help!0 -
URL Structure for Multilingual Site With Two Major Locations
We're working on a hotel site that has two major locations. Locations currently live in separate domains. The sites target users from around the world and offer content in multiple languages. The client is looking into migrating all content into one domain and creating sub-folders for each location. The sites are strong in organic search, but they want to expand the keyword portfolio to broader keywords regarding activities, which they also market on their sites. The goal is to scale their domain authority as they have a really strong brand. The question is which would be a preferred URL structure in case content is finally migrated into one domain? - (we have doubts about were the lang folder should be placed as each location has different amenities and services). Here is what we had in mind: domain.com – this is the homepage domain.com/location-1 – to target English visitors domain.com/location-2 – to target English visitors domain.com/es/location-1 – to target Spanish visitors domain.com/es/location-2 – to target Spanish visitors
International SEO | | burnseo0 -
CcTLDs 301 redirected to subfolders
My client has an international website and currently has a mixture of ccTLDs, subdomains, and subfolders for the country specific pages. We are trying to change this however they want to have ccTLDS because of the SEO benefit but 301 redirect them to subfolders because of the simplicity of management that subfolders provide. I believe that if they are really just working with subfolders, why don't they just use subfolders and use Google Webmaster Tools and XML Sitemaps to help Google understand each targeted country. My questions are: 1. Does having aht ccTLD example.ca 301 redirected to example.com/ca really benefit anything? 2. This client tends to spell out the name of the country even with country specific TLDs, and they can't change it, will this affect SEO? Ex: example.ca/canada. 3. What the best practice? example.ca/canada/en-ca/city or example.ca/canada/city/en-ca? Thanks!
International SEO | | nrv0 -
Was Geotargeting subfolders in webmaster tools deprecated?
I know that you used to be able to geotarget subfolders on your site to certain regions. We recently made some site-scale updates to make all of our regional pages appear in the appropriate subfolder (for example:site.com/france, or site.com/germany). I recently got admin rights to our site's webmaster tools account that allows us to make these setting changes, but the geotargeting options are only available for the entire site. It still implies on the multi-region site page that you should be able to do this: http://support.google.com/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=182192 | Subdirectories with gTLDs | example.com/de/ | Easy to set up Can use Webmaster Tools geotargeting Low maintenance (same host) | Users might not recognize geotargeting from the URL alone Single server location Separation of sites harder | Is this deprecated? Is there something I need to do to enable setting regions by subdirectories?Thanks
International SEO | | alexdoyne0 -
Internationalization and SEO
Hi Everyone, This is my first post in this new Q & A section!! This interface looks great!! Now onto the question.... We have www.example.com in English that has 50,000+ URLs. We are in the process of building a new site example.de targeting German users. The German site (www.example.de) will be a mirror of the English site at launch as we want to give a full experience to people visiting the .de domain. However, not all pages will be localized as we can't support that. We are planning on localizing the core sets of pages (~500) and leaving the rest in English. Post launch, we will have additional milestones to localize the remaining pages until the entire site is localized (converted to German). Is this the correct way to go? Will this cause duplicate content issue?
International SEO | | Amjath
Will adding "rel=canonical" tag on these pages solve the purpose? Thanks for the help!0