Global SEO Blueprint Webinar Recap

Your company wants to go global. Or, more likely, your company is already global but intends to expand its international reach further. In either case, global Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is a critical success factor in that effort.

What steps can you take now to target a global audience effectively? That question was at the crux of the third session of our SEO Bytes webinar series, Global SEO Blueprint: Approaches to Expand Your Market Reach.

Lionbridge experts Brendan Walsh and Jesse Hollett and Astound Digital Senior Director of Demand Chris Birkholm provided a website architecture blueprint for global traffic.

Want to learn more? Watch the webinar recording or continue reading to glean some main points.

To view recordings of other Lionbridge webinars, visit the Lionbridge webinars page for a library of offerings, including a recording of the previous session in our series, Automating SEO With AI.

Architecture

Website architecture plays a crucial role in your SEO strategy. The domain and URL structure determine how your site’s content is organized and presented to search engines and users, impacting your visibility and usability across different regions and languages.

Domain structure

The domain structure refers to the way you organize your website’s URLs to target different countries and languages. You can use the following strategies when creating multilingual URLs:

• gTLD (Generic Top-Level Domain) — A gTLD is a top-level domain not tied to any specific country, such as .com, .org, or .net. These domains are designed to rank globally. This approach simplifies management but requires robust tagging solutions (like hreflang tags) to help search engines understand which pages to show in each market.

• ccTLD (Country Code Top-Level Domain) — This approach uses country-specific domains, such as “.de” for Germany. It clearly communicates to search engines which country the content is intended for, but it can be harder to administer when you have many sites.

Companies typically use a gTLD to target multiple countries and languages under one domain to simplify management. They often opt for a ccTLD when they need strong geo-targeting signals for specific countries, which can be more effective but more complex and expensive to manage.

URL structure

The URL structure refers to the way you organize the paths within your domain to reflect languages and regions.

Whatever approach you use for your site structure, we recommend consistently using the ISO standard.

Hreflang Tagging Solution

A Hreflang tagging solution is crucial for ensuring your website content is served to the right audience in their preferred language and regional context. Hreflang tags help search engines understand the correct version of your content to display, enhancing user experience and improving conversion rates.

What are Hreflang tags?

Hreflang tags are HTML attributes that tell Google and other search engines which market your content is meant for.

For instance, with proper tagging, search engines will serve French content intended for consumers in France to them — and not to Canadian consumers who also speak French but want the cost of products displayed in the Canadian dollar as opposed to euros.

When engines serve the intended page to consumers, they will see the correct currency, delivery options, product options, and availability in their area.

While some speculate about whether an AI tool may one day be able to understand the relationships between pages and, therefore, replace hreflang tags, the amount of processing involved makes that scenario unlikely, at least in the near term.

When and how should Hreflang solutions be implemented?

Use hreflang when pages are essentially the same but in different languages.

It is essential to apply hreflang tags to all localized pages and the source pages, with every version of the page using the same hreflang tags, including a self-referencing tag. Also, tags must accurately reflect the language of the on-page content.

There are instances when hreflang tags are unnecessary. This scenario occurs when a page is unique to a language or market and has no variant, often when a product or service is unique to a particular market.

What is an x-default, and why is it used?

An x-default attribute is a specified fallback page shown to users when none of the other hreflang attributes match their preferences.

Companies can select a default page for users to see when their preferred region is not among the options. They will frequently opt for a default page when targeting specific countries but accepting business from other areas, especially when these areas cover the users’ languages.

Companies can select a default page for users to see if their preferred language is not part of the site’s languages. Typically, the fallback would map to the English version of the page, but it is possible to choose a different option.

A language level fallback refers to the mechanism used to determine which version to display when the preferred language is unavailable.

Language and Region Selection Tool

A language and region selector enables users to choose the language displayed on the website, enhancing their browser experience. Companies using this tool stand to benefit from an optimized international site.   

When executed correctly, the tool provides a positive user experience, increasing the likelihood of conversion.

Website Localization

No matter how attentive you are to your architecture, it will be for naught unless you are as equally focused on localization, that is, adapting your website’s content to cater to local markets. Website optimization addresses your website’s text, graphics, colors, audio, and video to deliver a unified customer experience that appeals to your target market.

While some website pages may require a heavy lift — such as pages containing legal content that would vary greatly due to differing laws in different countries — others may require fewer changes.

Keyword research is vital to optimizing your websites. Because people use text to find your pages, and that text will vary among locales, you must research region-specific terms and then tailor your copy to incorporate them. Include the primary keyword in your title, pepper your secondary keywords throughout your copy, and write fresh metadata to align with local regions.

Get in touch

Ready to implement global SEO initiatives with proven approaches that maximize your Return on Investment (ROI)? Reach out to learn more about our global SEO services and get expert guidance.