International websites : hreflang
-
Hi,
i'm looking for good examples with 'href lang' tag (rel="alternate" hreflang="x")
Have you examples of websites with this tag?
Thanks
D.
-
Found one: freelancer.com
<link rel="<a class="attribute-value">alternate</a>" hreflang="<a class="attribute-value">en</a>" href="[http://www.freelancer.com/](view-source:http://www.freelancer.com/)" />
<link rel="<a class="attribute-value">alternate</a>" hreflang="<a class="attribute-value">en-AU</a>" href="http://www.freelancer.com.au/" />
<link rel="<a class="attribute-value">alternate</a>" hreflang="<a class="attribute-value">en-NZ</a>" href="[http://www.freelancer.co.nz/](view-source:http://www.freelancer.co.nz/)" />
<link rel="<a class="attribute-value">alternate</a>" hreflang="<a class="attribute-value">en-GB</a>" href="http://www.freelancer.co.uk/" />
<link rel="<a class="attribute-value">alternate</a>" hreflang="<a class="attribute-value">en-HK</a>" href="[http://www.freelancer.hk/](view-source:http://www.freelancer.hk/)" />
<link rel="<a class="attribute-value">alternate</a>" hreflang="<a class="attribute-value">en-SG</a>" href="http://www.freelancer.sg/" />
<link rel="<a class="attribute-value">alternate</a>" hreflang="<a class="attribute-value">en-PH</a>" href="[http://www.freelancer.ph/](view-source:http://www.freelancer.ph/)" />
<link rel="<a class="attribute-value">alternate</a>" hreflang="<a class="attribute-value">de</a>" href="http://www.freelancer.de/" />
<link rel="<a class="attribute-value">alternate</a>" hreflang="<a class="attribute-value">de-DE</a>" href="[http://www.freelancer.de/](view-source:http://www.freelancer.de/)" />
<link rel="<a class="attribute-value">alternate</a>" hreflang="<a class="attribute-value">en-CA</a>" href="http://www.freelancer.ca/" />
<link rel="<a class="attribute-value">alternate</a>" hreflang="<a class="attribute-value">en-ZA</a>" href="[http://www.freelancer.co.za/](view-source:http://www.freelancer.co.za/)" />
<link rel="<a class="attribute-value">alternate</a>" hreflang="<a class="attribute-value">en-IN</a>" href="http://www.freelancer.in/" />
<link rel="<a class="attribute-value">alternate</a>" hreflang="<a class="attribute-value">en-JM</a>" href="[http://www.freelancer.com.jm/](view-source:http://www.freelancer.com.jm/)" />
<link rel="<a class="attribute-value">alternate</a>" hreflang="<a class="attribute-value">es</a>" href="http://www.freelancer.com.es/" />
<link rel="<a class="attribute-value">alternate</a>" hreflang="<a class="attribute-value">es-ES</a>" href="[http://www.freelancer.com.es/](view-source:http://www.freelancer.com.es/)" />
<link rel="<a class="attribute-value">alternate</a>" hreflang="<a class="attribute-value">es-MX</a>" href="http://www.freelancer.mx/" />
<link rel="<a class="attribute-value">alternate</a>" hreflang="<a class="attribute-value">es-PE</a>" href="[http://www.freelancer.com.pe/](view-source:http://www.freelancer.com.pe/)" />
<link rel="<a class="attribute-value">alternate</a>" hreflang="<a class="attribute-value">es-EC</a>" href="http://www.freelancer.ec/" />
<link rel="<a class="attribute-value">alternate</a>" hreflang="<a class="attribute-value">es-CL</a>" href="[http://www.freelancer.cl/](view-source:http://www.freelancer.cl/)" />
<link rel="<a class="attribute-value">alternate</a>" hreflang="<a class="attribute-value">en-PK</a>" href="http://www.freelancer.pk/" />
<link rel="<a class="attribute-value">alternate</a>" hreflang="<a class="attribute-value">id</a>" href="[http://www.freelancer.co.id/](view-source:http://www.freelancer.co.id/)" />
<link rel="<a class="attribute-value">alternate</a>" hreflang="<a class="attribute-value">id-ID</a>" href="http://www.freelancer.co.id/" />
<link rel="<a class="attribute-value">alternate</a>" hreflang="<a class="attribute-value">en-BD</a>" href="[http://www.freelancer.com.bd/](view-source:http://www.freelancer.com.bd/)" />
<link rel="<a class="attribute-value">alternate</a>" hreflang="<a class="attribute-value">es-UY</a>" href="http://www.freelancer.uy/" />
<link rel="<a class="attribute-value">alternate</a>" hreflang="<a class="attribute-value">pt</a>" href="[http://www.freelancer.pt/](view-source:http://www.freelancer.pt/)" />
<link rel="<a class="attribute-value">alternate</a>" hreflang="<a class="attribute-value">pt-PT</a>" href="http://www.freelancer.pt/" />
-
What is weird is that Wikipedia doesn't use it and still ranks 1st for almost every keyword while having alternates in almost every language for every page.
-
Hello,
The hreflang attribute is used with the link element to provide an alternative page in another language.
The simplest way of using it is to be adding a link to the header of your page to give them alternative urls to the same content in another language.Here is a list of language attributes you can use http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_3166-1_alpha-2#Decoding_table
You should read google's webmasters tip regarding this topic to get a better understanding: https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/189077?hl=en.
I actually couldn't find any sites right now that use this technique.
--
Jørgen Juel
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
-
Is this approach of returning different content depending on IP beneficial for international SEO?
I've decided to use sub folders for my site, and from everything I've read online it seems I shouldn't change the page content depending on IP, yet I know of a successful well funded site that hires full time SEO staff that does just that, and I'm wondering whether they know something I don’t which is helping their SEO. From everything I've read online this is the format I think I should use: mysite.com/us/red-wigs mysite.com/gb/red-wigs mysite.com/red-wigs does not exist This is the format the other site is using: othersite.com/red-wigs (from US IP address) othersite.com/red-wigs (from UK IP address) othersite.com/gb/red-wigs The content on othersite.com/red-wigs is identical to othersite.com/gb/red-wigs when loading from a UK IP address, and a lot of URLs without /gb/ are being returned when searching google. The benefit I can think of that they are gaining is US pages which are being returned for UK based searches will return the correct content. Are their any other gains to this approach? I'm concerned that if I use this approach for different languages then the radically differing content of othersite.com/red-wigs depending on the location of the crawler might confuse google - also generally changing content depending on IP seems to be recommended against. Thanks
International SEO | | Mickooo0 -
International SEO - Alternatives to Automatic IP re-direct
Hello, When doing international SEO I've read that it's not good practice to automatically re-direct users to the correct part of the website based on their IP address. But what alternatives are there to this? Let's say you're targeting the US and the UK through multiregional SEO. What can you do to ensure that users from the US go to the US sub-directory and that users from the UK go to the UK sub-directory? In Moz's international SEO guide it says that: "If you choose to try to guess at the user’s language preference when they enter your site, you can use the browser’s language setting or the IP address and ask the user to confirm the choice. Using JavaScript to do this will ensure that Googlebot does not get confused. Pair this with a good XML sitemap and the user can have a great interaction. Plus, the search engines will be able to crawl and index all of your translated content." Can anyone explain this further? Any help would be much appreciated! Thanks in advance
International SEO | | SEOCT0 -
Google Search Console "International Targeting" is reporting errors that are not present on my site
We are currently handling search for a global brand www.example.com/ which has presence in many countries worldwide. To help Google understand that there is an alternate version of the website available in another language, we have used hreflang tags. These hreflang tags are implemented only via the XML sitemap across all geo-locations. Under the “Search Analytics -> International Targeting” section, in Google Search Console, for the Malaysian website (www.example.com/my/), there are a number of “no-return tags (sitemaps)” errors arising. For example, for India as a geo-location, there is one ‘en-IN’ – no return tags (sitemaps) errors listed. The error is listed below: Originating URL - www.example.com/my/xyz/ Alternate URL - www.example.com/in/xyz/ When the XML sitemap for the URL – www.example.com/in/ was checked for the hreflang tags, it was noticed that the implementation of hreflang tags for the URL – www.example.com/in/xyz/ was perfectly fine and it was providing a return tag to the URL – www.example.com/my/xyz/. After the code level verification, it was identified that the implementation of hreflang tags was perfectly fine via the XML sitemap. Even though at the code level it was verified that the implementation is fine, the error still persists in Google Search Console. Kindly suggest a solution to this situation, and also advise the effects of these errors on search engine performance
International SEO | | Starcom_Search0 -
For My International Sites only Homepage in other Language rest Pages are in English. Hreflang required here?
Hello All, For my ecommerce site at my homepage there is an Language option of 9 different countries. My main site - abcd.co.uk and other sites are like this se.abcd.co.uk, fr.abcd.co.uk, es.abcd.co.uk etc From my main site if user clicks on fr.abcd.co.uk then France site will open but when he click on any link it will redirect to my UK site. On France site homepage if user hover the cursor then links are visible of UK site only. My query is ;- Do it required here to implement hreflang? As only homepage is in different language? Do it anything wrong in google point of view? Thanks!
International SEO | | wright3350 -
Different urls for the homepage on an international website
Hi! I was wondering what would be the best strategy to solve duplicated content generated by the homepage and its differents URLS This is an international website. Now it only has one language working: Spanish, but the url structure is already ready to work with the language approach So we have now www.brand.com -> Spanish Homepage (canonical www.brand.com/es)
International SEO | | teconsite
www.brand.com/es -> Spanish Homepage (canonical www.brand.com/es)
www.brand.com/index.php -> Spanish Homepage (canonical www.brand.com/es) I would like to know if this is the correct approach of if we should add 301 redirects instead of canonical. Let's image that they want to active the /en language, so they will have www.brand.com
www.brand.com/index.php
www.brand.com/es
www.brand.com/en now what? I image they have to use hreflang, but I am a little lost with how this should work. 301? canonical? hreflang? Could you help me? Thank you! Victoria0 -
Hreflang link is always going to the homepage
Hey there fellow Mozzers, I'm currently performing some work for a webshop which is located at two different TLD's.
International SEO | | WesleySmits
example.com and example.nl. In the head of both websites the hreflang tags have been added to tell Search Engines which site is targeted at which country. That's good 🙂 However, the hreflang links are pointing to the homepages of both websites from every page on the websites. Isn't example.nl/blog/ not supposed to link the hreflang tag to example.com/blog/?0 -
Canonical and hreflang mess of international desktop and mobile site versions
Hello, I have an interesting case and I am lost in it. There are two versions of the site: desktop and mobile. And there are also international versions: English and Spanish. I'm stuck at implementation of canonical tags. Currently my setup has the following: English (default) desktop page has these: English Mobile page has these: Spanish Desktop version: Spanish Mobile version: But I somewhat feel that I messed the things... Could you guys point me to what I did wrong and explain how to set it right? Also, if you know URLs of blog posts or articles, where similar case is explained - share with me please.
International SEO | | poiseo0 -
Anchor text for international SEO
HI I am looking to rank sites in multiple foreign search engines. I am thinking about the anchor text strategies I need to employ. My key phrase: golfschläger (golf club) I am targeting a German page (written in German). Would Google understand that if I use the anchor text “golf club” to my German “golfschläger” page, it is infact the same word and therefore give anchor text benefits to that page, or for anchor text benefits to pass does the anchor text have to be in the same language? thanks for any help!!!!
International SEO | | Turkey0