Skip to content
    Moz logo Menu open Menu close
    • Products
      • Moz Pro
      • Moz Pro Home
      • Moz Local
      • Moz Local Home
      • STAT
      • Moz API
      • Moz API Home
      • Compare SEO Products
      • Moz Data
    • Free SEO Tools
      • Domain Analysis
      • Keyword Explorer
      • Link Explorer
      • Competitive Research
      • MozBar
      • More Free SEO Tools
    • Learn SEO
      • Beginner's Guide to SEO
      • SEO Learning Center
      • Moz Academy
      • MozCon
      • Webinars, Whitepapers, & Guides
    • Blog
    • Why Moz
      • Digital Marketers
      • Agency Solutions
      • Enterprise Solutions
      • Small Business Solutions
      • The Moz Story
      • New Releases
    • Log in
    • Log out
    • Products
      • Moz Pro

        Your all-in-one suite of SEO essentials.

      • Moz Local

        Raise your local SEO visibility with complete local SEO management.

      • STAT

        SERP tracking and analytics for enterprise SEO experts.

      • Moz API

        Power your SEO with our index of over 44 trillion links.

      • Compare SEO Products

        See which Moz SEO solution best meets your business needs.

      • Moz Data

        Power your SEO strategy & AI models with custom data solutions.

      Track AI Overviews in Keyword Research
      Moz Pro

      Track AI Overviews in Keyword Research

      Try it free!
    • Free SEO Tools
      • Domain Analysis

        Get top competitive SEO metrics like DA, top pages and more.

      • Keyword Explorer

        Find traffic-driving keywords with our 1.25 billion+ keyword index.

      • Link Explorer

        Explore over 40 trillion links for powerful backlink data.

      • Competitive Research

        Uncover valuable insights on your organic search competitors.

      • MozBar

        See top SEO metrics for free as you browse the web.

      • More Free SEO Tools

        Explore all the free SEO tools Moz has to offer.

      NEW Keyword Suggestions by Topic
      Moz Pro

      NEW Keyword Suggestions by Topic

      Learn more
    • Learn SEO
      • Beginner's Guide to SEO

        The #1 most popular introduction to SEO, trusted by millions.

      • SEO Learning Center

        Broaden your knowledge with SEO resources for all skill levels.

      • On-Demand Webinars

        Learn modern SEO best practices from industry experts.

      • How-To Guides

        Step-by-step guides to search success from the authority on SEO.

      • Moz Academy

        Upskill and get certified with on-demand courses & certifications.

      • MozCon

        Save on Early Bird tickets and join us in London or New York City

      Unlock flexible pricing & new endpoints
      Moz API

      Unlock flexible pricing & new endpoints

      Find your plan
    • Blog
    • Why Moz
      • Digital Marketers

        Simplify SEO tasks to save time and grow your traffic.

      • Small Business Solutions

        Uncover insights to make smarter marketing decisions in less time.

      • Agency Solutions

        Earn & keep valuable clients with unparalleled data & insights.

      • Enterprise Solutions

        Gain a competitive edge in the ever-changing world of search.

      • The Moz Story

        Moz was the first & remains the most trusted SEO company.

      • New Releases

        Get the scoop on the latest and greatest from Moz.

      Surface actionable competitive intel
      New Feature

      Surface actionable competitive intel

      Learn More
    • Log in
      • Moz Pro
      • Moz Local
      • Moz Local Dashboard
      • Moz API
      • Moz API Dashboard
      • Moz Academy
    • Avatar
      • Moz Home
      • Notifications
      • Account & Billing
      • Manage Users
      • Community Profile
      • My Q&A
      • My Videos
      • Log Out

    The Moz Q&A Forum

    • Forum
    • Questions
    • Users
    • Ask the Community

    Welcome to the Q&A Forum

    Browse the forum for helpful insights and fresh discussions about all things SEO.

    1. Home
    2. Digital Marketing
    3. Web Design
    4. Best practice for multilanguage website ( PHP feature based on Browser or Geolocalisation)

    Moz Q&A is closed.

    After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.

    Best practice for multilanguage website ( PHP feature based on Browser or Geolocalisation)

    Web Design
    4
    6
    3759
    Loading More Posts
    • Oldest to Newest
    • Newest to Oldest
    • Most Votes
    Reply
    • Reply as question
    Log in to reply
    This topic has been deleted. Only users with question management privileges can see it.
    • johncurlee
      johncurlee last edited by

      Hi Moz Experts

      I would like to know what does it the best practice for multilanguage website for the default language ?

      There are several PHP features to help users to get the right language when they come from SEO and direct; present the default language by browser language, by gelolocalisation, etc. However, which one is the most appropriate for Quebec company that try to get outside Canada ? PRO and CONS.

      Thank you in advance.

      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
      • johncurlee
        johncurlee @katemorris last edited by

        I love it Kate Moriss. 🙂 it make it simple with the small questions. 😛

        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
        • johncurlee
          johncurlee @PatrickDelehanty last edited by

          Thank you. So, I will need to add the hreflang for the first strategy.

          For the Webmastertool, I'm not so sure, because we didn't have subdirectories. We have www.mycompany.com and www.mycompany.com/fr. So, actually, I have webmastertool for www.mycompany.com. However, we have a Google plus page, but we didn't have a Content marketing strategy.

          that's all we have for the moment in place? 🙂

          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
          • katemorris
            katemorris last edited by

            I built a tool to help people understand how to best go about international expansion. It's here: katemorris.com/issg

            johncurlee 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
            • DirkC
              DirkC last edited by

              Not sure if you could really call it a best practice - but in Belgium (3 different languages) the normal configuration is not to determine the default language automatically but rather to present a first time visitor a "choose language" page and store the choice in a cookie for future visits. This is mainly for direct visits.

              People coming in via search engines use queries in one of the languages, so normally Google will direct them to pages in that language. Again, on first time visit, the implicit choice of language is stored in a cookie.

              All pages contain a link to switch to the other language(s) - which also changes the choice stored in the cookie.

              Disadvantage of this system is that you add an additional layer to the site (choice of language) - advantage is that error margin is zero.

              Systems which are based ip, browser language, ...etc are not 100% reliable - which could lead to unwanted results (in Belgium quite a sensitive issue if you server a Dutch page to a French speaking person - idem for French & Dutch speaking).

              Hope this helps,

              Dirk

              1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 2
              • PatrickDelehanty
                PatrickDelehanty last edited by

                Hi there

                Look into hreflang attributes - if you have the same site with multiple languages, this is a best practice.

                You can also look into setting up Webmaster Tool accounts for different sites (if they have different country codes or subdirectories) and geotarget those for the country they are supposed to appear to.

                Does this help? Let me know - good luck!

                johncurlee 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
                • 1 / 1
                • First post
                  Last post

                Got a burning SEO question?

                Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.


                Start my free trial


                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.

                • See all categories

                Related Questions

                • Stew222

                  Is The HREF Link "Title" Tag Needed on Mobile Websites?

                  Hello To Those Who Are Wiser Than I, I am wondering if the href link "title" tag is needed, or serves any purpose, on mobile websites?  Also, does it effect SEO in any way? I ask because generally the href link title tag provides more information to the user when they scroll their mouse over the link - but this action does not happen on mobile!  Users have no mouse and thus no extra information would be displayed. I'm really wondering if it still matters for SEO purposes on mobile though. -The UnEnlightened

                  Web Design | | Stew222
                  0
                • NachoRetta

                  Spanish website indexed in English, redirect to spanish or english version if i do a new website design?

                  Hi MOZ users, i have this problem. We have a website in Spanish Language but Google crawls it on English (it is not important the reasons). We re made the entire website and now we are planning the move. The new website will have different language versions, english, spanish and portuguese. Somebody tells me that we have to redirect the old urls (crawled on english) to the new english versions, not to the spanish (the real language of the firsts). Example: URL1 Language: Spanish - Crawled on English --> redirect to Language English version. the other option will be redirect to the spanish new version, which the visitor is waiting to find. URL1 Language: Spanish - Crawled on English --> redirect to Language Spanish version. What do you think? Which is the better option?

                  Web Design | | NachoRetta
                  0
                • remkoallertz

                  Best SEO practice - Umbrella brand with several domains

                  Hi, we have several blogs and comparison sites on specific topics. All the domains rank on top positions in very competitive niche markets. We think that we can get more profit out of the domains when we put them under an umbrella brand. Customers that visit domain A can then also find products easily on domain B.  We see this for example on health.com, with several brands in the top. To maintain or improve our rankings i'm looking for specific information for the link structure. For example, is it better to have the 'about us'/rel=author on each domain, with contributors on that specific domain or is it better to have them all in the (umbrella) brand domain. At the moment we have the structure like this: domainA.com, domainA.com/blog, domainA.com/about-us  and  domainB.com, domainB.com/blog, domainB.com/about-us. I think to maintain the rankings it is best to keep specific content (like blog/ about us) on the domain. So is it the best to just do side wide links with a logo (like health.com) and what about hosting? We work with wordpress, so all domains will be hosted on one ip? when we use the multiple site option of WP? All information on this topic is more than welcome 🙂

                  Web Design | | remkoallertz
                  0
                • ScottMcPherson

                  Will google penalize a website for using a table layout?

                  I just got a new client today and his entire website layout and structure is using tables instead of divs. This client is on a tight budget and wants to avoid unnecessary hours for re-coding the website, but at the same time he wants me to improve his SEO organically. This is the first time I've been asked to do work on an existing website that uses pure tables for the entire layout and I'm wondering if this effects the SEO in any way. So my question is, will tables effect rankings and SEO in any way?

                  Web Design | | ScottMcPherson
                  0
                • 1SMG

                  3 Brands, 3 Services, 3 Different Websites Right?

                  My client was told that having 1 website for 3 different brands/services is better than having 3 websites. I need your help to prove my value to a new client.  This client has worked with Reach Local on PPC for some time and when they first got started the Reach Local Markering Consultant told this cleint that they needed to have one site for better SEO purposes. The client was told that Google ranks websites higher if they have more paid traffic going to them.  I've been doing this for long enough to realize this does not help ranking, at least not enough to make a difference. Keep in mind this is for 3 different companies.  One company does plumbing, another electrical and the last one does air conditioning.  They also have  4 locations but only two locations have mutliple services opperating out of them.  I understand these 2 location will not have there own Google+ Local / Places listing.  Using the same address for 2 different business and expecting a first page ranking is just not possible. Right now when you visit the clients website you see a logo that rotates with a banner section that follows the logo rotation.  First you see the AC Company and then the Plumbing etc.  I see this as confusing to the end user and it is more work to get it ranked for SEO.  I recommended that we build 3 speerate websites for each service and just list out all the addresses that the company services on the contact page.  I would also design inside the footer links to the other services for branding purposes. Please share your thoughts on how you would handle this if you were doing the SEO for your own 3 different business services. I really appreicate any input/insight to this.  Thank you so much in advance!!!!

                  Web Design | | 1SMG
                  0
                • netbuilder

                  Html 5 main and secondary navigation for SEO best performances

                  I am building a website which will have a main navigation related to the site and each link of the main navigation will have a secondary navigation. We do not want to use a megamenu style navigation. I will try to explain it with a example: Let's start with an example for a computer store "My PC Store", the Main Navigation would be: Desktop PC's Notebook & Tablets
                  Multimedia
                  When clicking on the "Notebook & Tablets" the user is directed to the page domain.com/notebook-tablet.html and on this page the secondary navigation appears: Laptop Netbook Tablets / iPad I am confused on how I should organize the semantic navigation for best SEO performances and I need advice / suggestions. I thought about 2 different ways to do it but which one is more appropriate in terms of SEO? PROPOSITION A Home Page: <header> My PC Store <nav> Desktop PC's Notebook & Tablets Multimedia </nav> </header> Sub-Page (Notebook & Tablets): <nav>(or <aside>?) Desktop PC's Notebook & Tablets Multimedia </aside> </nav> <header> Notebook & Tablets <nav> Laptop Netbook Tablets / iPad </nav> </header> As you notice on the home page the Main Site Navigation is included in the <header>while it is not in the sub-pages. PROPOSITION B Home Page: <header> My PC Store <nav> Desktop PC's Notebook & Tablets Multimedia </nav> </header> Sub-Page (Notebook & Tablets): <header> Notebook & Tablets <nav> Desktop PC's Notebook & Tablets Multimedia </nav> # Notebook & Tablets * Laptop Netbook Tablets / iPad </header> The main navgation remains always in the <header>(home page / sub-pages) of all page. I need suggestions... How would you guys organize the nav ? </header> </header>

                  Web Design | | netbuilder
                  0
                • DWJames

                  Best method to stop crawler access to extra Nav Menu

                  Our shop site has a 3 tier drop down mega-menu so it's easy to find your way to anything from anywhere. It contains about 150 links and probably 300 words of text. We also have a more context-driven single layer of sub-category navigation as well as breadcrumbs on our category pages. You can get to every product and category page without using the drop down mega-menu. Although the mega-menu is a helpful tool for customers, it means that every single page in our shop has an extra 150 links on it that go to stuff that isn't necessarily related or relevant to the page content. This means that when viewed from the context of a crawler, rather than a nice tree like crawling structure, we've got more of an unstructured mesh where everything is linked to everything else. I'd like to hide the mega-menu links from being picked up by a crawler, but what's the best way to do this? I can add a nofollow to all mega-menu links, but are the links still registered as page content even if they're not followed? It's a lot of text if nothing else. Another possibility we're considering is to set the mega-menu to only populate with links when it's main button is hovered over. So it's not part of the initial page load content at all. Or we could use a crude yet effective system we have used for some other menus we have of base encoding the content inline so it's not readable by a spider. What would you do and why? Thanks, James

                  Web Design | | DWJames
                  0
                • James77

                  Recommended Website Monitoring Tools

                  Hi, I was wondering what people would recommend for website monitoring (IE is my website working as it should!). I need something that will:
                  1/. Allow multiple page monitoring not just homepage
                  2/. Do header status checking
                  3/. Do page content checking (ie if the page changes massively, or include the word "error") then we have an issue!
                  4/. Multiple alert possibilities. We currently use www.websitepulse.com and it is a good service that does all the above, however it just seems so overly complex that its hard to understand what is going on, and its complex functionality and features are really a negative in our case. Thanks

                  Web Design | | James77
                  0

                Get started with Moz Pro!

                Unlock the power of advanced SEO tools and data-driven insights.

                Start my free trial
                Products
                • Moz Pro
                • Moz Local
                • Moz API
                • Moz Data
                • STAT
                • Product Updates
                Moz Solutions
                • SMB Solutions
                • Agency Solutions
                • Enterprise Solutions
                • Digital Marketers
                Free SEO Tools
                • Domain Authority Checker
                • Link Explorer
                • Keyword Explorer
                • Competitive Research
                • Brand Authority Checker
                • Local Citation Checker
                • MozBar Extension
                • MozCast
                Resources
                • Blog
                • SEO Learning Center
                • Help Hub
                • Beginner's Guide to SEO
                • How-to Guides
                • Moz Academy
                • API Docs
                About Moz
                • About
                • Team
                • Careers
                • Contact
                Why Moz
                • Case Studies
                • Testimonials
                Get Involved
                • Become an Affiliate
                • MozCon
                • Webinars
                • Practical Marketer Series
                • MozPod
                Connect with us

                Contact the Help team

                Join our newsletter
                Moz logo
                © 2021 - 2025 SEOMoz, Inc., a Ziff Davis company. All rights reserved. Moz is a registered trademark of SEOMoz, Inc.
                • Accessibility
                • Terms of Use
                • Privacy

                Looks like your connection to Moz was lost, please wait while we try to reconnect.