Checking subdomains/ site structure of a website for International SEO

[TAT100]

Dear Moz community,

I am looking into two websites for a friend and we want to understand the following:

What is the site structure as per the sub domains?

e.g currently it is .com/en/ or .com/ru/ or .com/zh/

Using the crawl report, each page has a en or other language version. I take it this means that we have to create copy,  meta titles and descriptions for each of the languages even if the page is the same but in a different language? To avoid duplication of content would you suggest canonical tags to be put in place?

To check hreflang mark up, I couldn't find anything in the code which makes me thing a script is automatically translating this?

This is the first time I have started to look at international SEO and want to understand what to look for in an audit of exisiting sites.

Thank you,

[Roman-Delcarmen]

From my research it is best practice not to use the whole: .com/en/ .com/ru/ style of denoting languages, is this correct? Well I, not I agree with that as long as you set up correctly the language, sitemaps, canonicals and so on you should not have any problem I will give you 2 good examples

• apple.com
• neilpatel.com

If you notice both of them use subfolders for language and region

• apple.com/mx/
• neilpatel.com/mx/

Based on my experience I avoid creating subdomains because basically, prefer to build authority for a single domain rather than build authority for several subdomains. Both strategies have pros and cons and all depend on the size of the project. I mean a big brand can choose subdomain even when is going to manage several link building campaigns for several subdomains (keep in mind that Google will treat every subdomain as a single independent website).

In my case I build authority for the main version of my website www.mycorporatewebsite.com --> English version andwhen I need to launch the Spanish version, this is going to rank a little bit easier mainly for DA that I already built

In your case, if you selected a subdomain as your option no matter the reason, this can be technical reasons or maybe it was a client requirement (Russian and China). Well, the steps to follow are these ones.

1. create the subdomains
2. migrate the content
3. redirect the old pages (not delete)
4. submit the new sitemaps to GSC

I will strongly suggest you make the process as much gradually as you can to not hurt your main website

• build a map of all of your internal pages
• divide it into small categories/tags/taxonomies or whatever you want
• migrate this small pieces gradually

I hope this info will help you

Regards

[TAT100]

Hi Roman,

Thank you for taking the time to answer my question.

All is clear and you've explained and answered my questions very well.

From my research it is best practice not to use the whole: .com/en/ .com/ru/ style of denoting languages, is this correct? Because essentially, the way I see it, the content is the same in all languages and is autotranslated, I believe from the geographical location of the user.

Would you suggest creating subdomains with hreflang mark up on each page. e.g

1. create subdomain

2. publish content and pages

3. Delete old language subfolders and redirect to the new pages?

As I want to target location and not just language.

I want to rank in both Russia and China and this is my first attempt looking at a site that is trying to do so.

Thank you,

TTT

[Roman-Delcarmen]

First, of all, you need to understand the difference between a subdomain and subfolder so

• cars-movie.disney.com ---> this is subdomain
• disney.com/cars-movie ---> this is a folder, subfolder, internal page or whatever you prefer

As I see in this case we are talking about

• language subfolders
• international SEO

So answering your questions

"I take it this means that we have to create a copy_,  meta titles and descriptions for each of the languages even if the page is the same but in a different language?"_ Yes, that is correct, you need to optimize every single page for the specific language you choose it Titles, meta descriptions, all the On-page stuff. Also, you need to keep in mind create a sitemap for each language, set up the canonical tag and language tag for each page.

Here you can find some useful articles from Moz you definitely should check

• Multiple XML Sitemaps: Increased Indexation and Traffic
• Canonicalization

To avoid duplication of content would you suggest canonical tags to be put in place? Yes that also correct this how is going to looks like your canonical tags

Home Page - English Version
URL -> http://example.com/

Home Page - Spanish Version
URL -> http://example.com/es/

To check hreflang mark up, I couldn't find anything in the code which makes me thing a script is automatically translating this? Well, all depends on the platform or cms of the websites, in WordPress, there are several plugins which will help you a lot such as WPML or Polylang.