Building a new site and want to be found in both Google.co.uk and Goolge.ie. What is the best practice?

[WSIDW]

We are building a new site which is a .com site and the client would like to be found in both Google.co.uk and Goolge.ie. What is the best practice to go about this? Can you geo-target two countries with the one site?

[gfiorelli1]

Hi Peter,

A generic domain name's website can geo-target more than one country only it is follow a geo-targeting subfolders or subdomains strategy.

For instance, domain.com may geo-target its root on UK and its subfolder domain.com/ie/ on Ireland (or ie.domain.com, in case of subdomain).

If the site you are talking about is http://www.wsidigitalweb.co.uk/, then I see it hard to follow a subfolder/subdomain strategy, because the content will be substantially the same. Not impossible, but complicated.

An option could be:

1. creating duplicating everything but the blog both in the root (for UK) and a /ie/ subfolder;
2. then creating to properties on Search Console (1 for the UK version and 1 for the IE one) and geo-target them appropriately;
3. then localizing as much as possible the two versions. if you have prices, convert them in Euros for Ireland. If you can buy an Irish phone number, present it in your contact information and so on;
4. then implementing the hreflang in order to tell Google to show the UK version to British users from Great Britain and the Irish version to Irish users from Ireland.

I suggest to not duplicate the blog, because in that case you should be always paying attention in implementing the hreflang correctly every time you publish a new post, and because - a even greater bias - you will have to double your efforts in promoting the blog's content.

Remember, then, that backlinks are very helpful also for geotargeting, so try to create content that answers to real needs your geo-targeted audiences have, and remember to dedicate some of your posts to topics particularly urgent for one or the other specific country target.

[gfiorelli1]

Hi Robert,

thanks for your answer, but I think it is not on topic.

Peter is asking about International SEO and geotargeting, not about optimizing for multi-location, which is more Local Search than International.

If the "new site" is a new version of http://www.wsidigitalweb.co.uk/ (the one Peter indicates in his Moz profile), your solution is not valid either, because they have only one physical address in Belfast.

[Toddfoster]

Hello Peter,

There is only 1 strategy I can think of that will make this possible, and I'm sure other Mozzers will have their own tactics.

For me, you are looking at building a silo into your site architecture. Basically, you use the website folders to create geo-targeted locations pages for areas you wish to rank for. You always start from the largest geographical area (country) and work your way down to the smallest (city). For example:

yoursite.com/United-States/New-York/New-York

would be found through Google.com.

It follows that:

yoursite.co.uk/UK/Suffolk/Ipswich will be found in the UK and
yoursite.ie/ireland/leinster/dublin will be found in Ireland

This will result in you building a link to a "Locations" page through your Home Page from which you can break down your service areas according to regions and cities. A direct example you can use for your client is:

yoursite.com/uk/suffolk/ipswich
yoursite.com/ireland/leinster/dublin

This way you retain geographical relevance but are able to hit multiple countries/regions/cities from the same domain TLD. Don't forget to add the keyword you are targeting for topical relevance!

For example:

yoursite.com/uk/suffolk/ipswich/ipswich-plumber

I have several clients I have performed this service for in the US and the UK who have service areas that are separated geographically but serviced by the same company. Google has responded quite well, with most of them featuring 1st page rankings within 3-6 months. You might even shorten the internal link path to reduce the amount of drain on your link juice from your Home Page.

The other benefit of this approach is it automatically creates landing pages that you can use for additional targeted link-building campaigns.

Hope this helps and let me know if you need further clarification - always happy to help!

Best regards,

Rob