Does it matter whether you use /en vs /uk
-
I have a global site targeting many countries including the UK which is the only English language site.
Does it matter whether I use /en or /uk for the UK sub-folder?
If I already have /en in place, but my Google UK listings are struggling, will it benefit me to switch to /uk?
I honestly don't think it matters too much, but given the choice would've gone for the /uk
I'm trying to weigh up whether it is worth the effort of changing it.
-
Ralph,
I would not suggest "switching" to uk but adding uk. A web page written for UK English will look differently then a page written for US English. Words such as "center" vs "centre", references to London vs references to Washington, monetary units, systems of measurement "miles" vs "kilometers", etc.
If you want to improve your UK rankings, offer a UK section of your site, adjust your articles specifically for the UK and obtain links from the UK pointed to this part of your site. If you perform these steps properly you will definitely improve your UK rankings.
I'm trying to weigh up whether it is worth the effort of changing it.
Only you can answer that question. It depends on how many pages are involved, the quality of your content and your site's profitability.
-
Yes thanks. That is not an option unfortunately because that is without a doubt my number 1 preferred route for international seo.
Did you know that you can also direct sub-folders in webmaster tools so that they are targeting specific countries?
-
If you are looking for a better way for localization (instead of /en /uk), i think it would be far better for your to purchase local cctld (.co.uk) instead... you can than mark it under your google webmaster tools, that the .co.uk is a content served for UK audiences... and it would be quite easy and much neater too
my 2 cents
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
-
International SEO - Targeting US and UK markets
Hi folks, i have a client who is based in italy and they set up a site that sells travel experiences in the sout of Italy (the site currently sit on a server in Italy). The site has been set up as gTLDs: www.example.com They only want to target the US and the UK market to promote their travel experiences and the site has only the english version (the site does not currently offer an italian version). If they decide to go for the gTLDs and not actually change to a ccTLDs (which would be ideal from my point of view) how are the steps to be taken to set this up correctly on GSC? They currently only have one property registered on GSC: www.exapmple.com therefore i guess the next steps are: Add new property - www.example.com/uk and and set up geo targeting for UK Existing property - www.example.com/ set up geo targeting for US In case the client does not have the budget to optimise the content for american and british languages, would still make sense to have 2 separate property in GSC (example.com for US market and example.com/uk for UK market)? Few considerations: Add canonical tag to avoid duplicate content across the two versions of the site (in the event there is no budget to optimise the content for US and UK market)? Thank you all in advance for looking into this David
International SEO | | Davide19840 -
Why Google is not indexing each country/language subfolder on the ranks?
Hi folks, We use Magento 2 for the multi-country shops (its a multistore). The URL: www.avarcas.com The first days Google indexed the proper url in each country: avarcas.com/uk avarcas.com/de ... Some days later, all the countries are just indexing / (the root). I correctly set the subfolders in Webmaster tools. What's happening? Thanks
International SEO | | administratorwibee0 -
Best URL structure for Multinational/Multilingual websites
Hi I am wondering what the best URL format to use is when a website targets several countries, in several languages. (without owning the local domains, only a .com, and ideally to use sub-folders rather than sub-domains.) As an example, to target a hotel in Sweden (Google.se) are there any MUST-HAVE indicators in the URL to target the relevant countries? Such as hotelsite.com**/se/**hotel-name. Would this represent the language? Or is it the location of the product? To clarify a bit, I would like to target around 10 countries, with the product pages each having 2 languages (the local language + english). I'm considering using the following format: hotelsite.com/en/hotel-name (for english) and hotelsite.com/se/hotel-name (for swedish content of that same product) and then using rel=”alternate” hreflang=”se-SV” markup to target the /se/ page for Sweden (Google.se) and rel=”alternate” hreflang=”en” for UK? And to also geotarget those in Webmaster tools using those /se/ folders etc. Would this be sufficient? Or does there need to be an indicator of both the location, AND the language in the URLs? I mean would the URL's need to be hotelsite.com/se/hotel-name/se-SV (for swedish) or can it just be hotelsite.com/se/hotel-name? Any thoughts on best practice would be greatly appreciated.
International SEO | | pikka0 -
.co.uk domain for US market??
I have a client in the UK with a very successful .co.uk domain. He has also chosen to enter other markets by translating the website into different languages and acquiring the appropriate domains. So he has a .fr and a .de for example. He wants a larger presence in the US market. The question is - Does he acquire the .com and ensure all pages are very different to the UK variant ( a lot of work) or is it more appropriate to use the .co.uk domain and (for example) acquire more US links to the site in order to increase its universal/US appeal in the eyes of Google?
International SEO | | driansmith0 -
Global SEO - How quickly/aggressively should one expand into multiple countries?
SITUATION: Our client is a global company lacking the global presence, so naturally the idea is performing international/global SEO in each country. For benchmarking purposes, our plan is to focus on a select number of keywords (ie 8-15) for each country and begin link building within each respective country. All SEO effort (ie. link building) will be for sub-folders (ie. www.client.com/subfolder/) on the same top level domain. Note, each country may have multiple languages, so each language will be broken out as it's own unique SEO campaign with it's very own strategy and link building efforts. For example: Mexico has 2 languages (English & Spanish) and will be considered 2 separate campaigns. PROBLEM: The client wants to be extremely aggressive and perform SEO on 3 new countries every month. This amounts to 36 new countries/SEO campaigns per year. Assuming each country has 2 languages each, we are looking at 6 SEO campaigns per month, or 72 per year. Our concern is that since all SEO effort will be performed on the same top level domain, we may be growing too fast and the search engines may consider the addition of these new pages and links to be too 'spammy'. We'd love to hear some feedback or personal experience on what might be considered a "safe" or "healthy" expansion into different countries. Thanks!
International SEO | | ByteLaunch0 -
Moving British site to the US... who will have .com? US or UK?
We are the UK's first baby social commerce site launched in Nov 2011. We're doing quite well and are looking at expanding to the US. However I'm not sure what advice you'd give me in terms of internationalising the site. I see three options on how to deal with the URL structure? Make US site as .com as it will be my main source of revenue for the long run and redirect all British traffic to .co.uk Have .com for both UK and US but have the URL as either: us.babyhuddle.com or as babyhuddle.com/us/. Same thing for the UK Another option? Would love to hear the feedback from you guys. Thanks, Walid
International SEO | | walidalsaqqaf0 -
Results in Google.co.uk when viewing from US?
If I search Google.co.uk from the United States, will I get the same or different results compared to searching from the UK? If different, what can I use to see the same results as if I am in the UK? web proxy? Thanks for the help!
International SEO | | GSWInbound0 -
Est ce qu'on peut poser des questions en français ?
(can we ask questions in a language other than English?) Pour le SEO est ce qu'il faut mieux un domain avec les tirets ou sans ? Les américains aurait tendance a faire les domaines sans tirets
International SEO | | NeilInFrance
Par exemple goodseoconsultants.com Et bcp disent qu'utiliser les tirets fait "spammy" ; En France il y a plus tendance à mettre les tirets mais est ce qu'il y a une risque négatif pour le sites qui le font ? Par contre il y a plus de chances que les moteurs et les humaines comprennes les mots avec ; good-seo-consultants.com Qui a raison ? Neil0