Understanding Multilingual Search Engine Optimization
There are a gazillion of untapped potential customers and clients who don't even know your business exists, but they are definitely interested in your products and services.
Guess what?
They're not even in the United States.
Perhaps now is the time to get out of the "local" pond and jump into the "international" ocean with multilingual search engine optimization (also known as search engine optimization international).
Consider this scenario:
- Your business is based in Anytown, USA but your customer base extends across the country. Products can be easily be shipped, consultation can be conducted via telephone or online and digital goods can be downloaded from the Internet.
- But what about business beyond our borders?
- Are you currently entertaining business inquiries from Canada? Mexico? Timbuktu?
- Can potential international customers and clients read your current website?
- Is your website available — and ranked — within search engines in other countries?
International business shouldn't be difficult or challenging when you follow simple steps and processes for putting your website in front of a much larger audience of potential customers and clients.
Look for "opportunities" while doing some simple research.
First, do you currently have any international clients or customers? If you have one or more customers from France, you might have a bigger opportunity there. They just need to know where to find you and learn more about your company.
Second, if you don't have any international clients or customers, have you ever received valid inquiries for product or company information from overseas prospects?
Third, check your Google Analytics account for traffic from international countries. Those 55 visitors from Germany last month may be interested in buying your services, but perhaps they've reached a translation or purchasing roadblock on your website.
Anything here sound familiar?
Here's a simple checklist to help get you started:
- When presenting your company and website to a specific country, translation will be a key (always remember that not everyone speaks and reads English in Germany).
- You don't need to have your entire website translated. One to three pages of information is a great start.
- Use a translator native to the country you wish to target. Someone who lives in Germany will be far more familiar with slang and specific words than a U.S. college graduate who minored in German. Also, don't rely on translation software for your website. Google does not recommend automatic translations. Stick with a human to do the work.
- Highly consider language-specific URL extensions. These can be country specific, such as www.yourwebsite.de (You will need to purchase the domain), or subdomains of your current website, such as www.de.yourwebsite.com, or sub-directories of your current domain, such as www.yourwebsite.com/de/content.html.
- If you are targeting a language-specific domain such as www.yourwebsite.de, you may also need to consider language-specific and country-specific hosting.
- Keyword research is a must. The top keyword for your website in the United States may not necessarily be the best keyword choice in a different country.
- Search Engine Optimization International (SEOi) is also a must for language-specific websites. Is your site optimized and indexed for Google Germany (www.google.de)? What about other country-specific websites? In some countries, Google is not the top search engine, so you'll need to do some investigation of SEO tactics for other search engines.
- Pay Per Click International is also a possibility. However, your ads will need to be translated and still must adhere to Google's guidelines (or the guidelines of the language-specific search engine). If your ads are language-specific, then your targeted landing pages should also be language-specific.
While there are other considerations to opening your business and website to international possibilities, these steps should get you well on your way to reaching a much larger global audience.
