Back when the internet was still relatively new if you had a website you were already ahead of the game. Now, it’s no longer enough to just have a website. Businesses vie to be at the top of search engine rankings, and they use tactics to drive traffic to their site over competitors. These tools are known as ‘Search Engine Optimisation’ The basics of SEO SEO encompasses both the technical and creative sides of website creation and is comprised of a few different elements. The written content on your website, the design, and even coding all play a part in search engine rankings. Businesses use keywords and carefully chosen content in order to improve their online rankings. So, if you’re operating in more than one country, what can you do to improve your SEO credentials? Multilingual SEO If you’re aiming to target a new market overseas, it’s important that your SEO strategy reflects this. In most cases, what works in one country won’t work universally. Here are three important things you should consider when working on a multi-lingual SEO strategy. Host location The location of the server used to host your website can affect your rankings in different countries. If you’re moving into a market that’s quite a way from your main server, hosting the new site on a server closer to the target location get to improve the speed and efficiency of the website. Before doing this, it’s important that you look into rules and restrictions for each country. Keyword analysis Your keywords may not be the same in each and every country. This can sometimes be due to language barriers but is also influenced by the way people search. You should carefully analyse keywords to identify the traffic volume in each country. You should never take a ‘one size fits all’ approach to keywords. Localisation Make sure that your website is fully localised for each country you are trying to target. This isn’t just a matter of standard translation, you should aim for transcreation when it comes to localising your content. This means looking at not just the words you use, but the designs, layouts, signs, symbols, and even colours. If you’re looking to crack a new market overseas, our Multilingual SEO services can help – no matter your industry. Find out what Language Insight can do for you here.
