Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
Worldwide and Europe hreflang implementation.
-
Hi Moz !
We're having quite a discussion here and I'd like to have some inputs. Let me explain the situation and what we plan to do so far.
One of our client has two separate markets : World and Europe. Both pages versions will be mostly the same, except for the fact that they will have their own products. So basically, we'd want to show only the European EN version to Europe and the standard EN version to the rest of the world, same goes for FR and ES. As far as IT, DE, CS and SK, they will only be present within the european version. Since we cannot target all Europe with a single hreflang tag, we might have to do it for every single european countries.
Regarding this subject, SMX Munich recently had quite an interesting session about this topic with a confirmation coming from John Mueller saying that we can target a single URL more than once with different hreflang tags. You can read more here : http://www.rebelytics.com/multiple-hreflang-tags-one-url/
So having all this in mind, here's the implementation we plan to do :
Self canonical
www.example.com/fr/ - hreflang = fr
www.example.com/es/ - hreflang = es
www.example.eu/it/ - hreflang = it
www.example.eu/de/ - hreflang = de
www.example.eu/cs/ - hreflang = cs
www.example.eu/sk/ - hreflang = sk
www.example.eu/fr/ - hreflang = be-fr
www.example.eu/fr/ - hreflang = ch-fr
www.example.eu/fr/ - hreflang = cz-fr
www.example.eu/fr/ - hreflang = de-fr
www.example.eu/fr/ - hreflang = es-fr
www.example.eu/fr/ - hreflang = fr-fr
www.example.eu/fr/ - hreflang = uk-fr
www.example.eu/fr/ - hreflang = gr-fr
www.example.eu/fr/ - hreflang = hr-fr
etc… . This will be done for all european countries (FR, EN and ES).
www.example.com/en/ - x-default
Let me know what you guys think.
Thanks!
-
In general that kind of implementation is correct.
I do something similar for a client, who has a similar problem but more on the logistic side (different warehouse depending on the continent).
Said that, considering that some products are only for the European market, I don't see useful to use an hreflang like the "de", which would target all the German speaking users no matter from the where they are... I mean, if they are in the USA, I believe that they are not allowed to buy products that are meant only for the EU geography even if they are German or Austrian.
Regarding IP redirection, it's not an alternative... moreover, it's not an alternative obliging people to be sticked to one country/website because that it not allowed by legislation now.
For instance, if someone from the USA want to see the EU site, he should be allowed to do it (this is also valid - obviously for Googlebot, as it is a user at the end).
What you can do is working on the basket process, and there using the IP recognition for allowing or not a bought depending from the country someone is trying to buy a product or not.
Doing so, you will also avoid the frequent dumping issue (e.g.: European buying in the USA because it is cheaper).
-
Hi Thomas,
Thanks for the in depth answer. The only problem remaining here is about the products related to Europe only - and this is why we came up with the .eu solution. Since we need to show a few products to Europe only, we can't use a single gTLD (.com).
Theoretically we could achieve this with geo IP targeting, but this option means that if someone from France is within the US and searching a specific product appearing only to Europe, he would not be able to see it - and we don't want that to happen.
The dev company working for this client made it clear that they can't and don't want to produce multiple directories for each countries (website.com/fr-fr/, website.com/fr-en/, website.com/de-en/, website.com/de-fr/, etc.). Same goes for subdomains (ca.website.com, fr.website.com, etc.).
Don't get me wrong, I'm not a huge fan of using two gTLDs (.com and .eu), but I don't see how we could resolve the European products problem without this option. I'm also worried about the sitemap, using two gTLDs. If you have an other solution in mind, it'd be more than welcome.
-
I would put them all on one domain I would not worry about people and your caring about the EU tag on the domain .com's are far more common over there then .eu
I would put it all under one Domain I would not break it up over to Domains using sub folders just target the rest of the world with English but you're basically making that all to your alternate ask for default which is the one design for if there is no proper language to fit the browser language.
Yes you absolutely can target The same URL with multiple tags. In your case because you're going to have so many hreflang tags I would recommend implementing them through the site map it tends to be faster although you'll need a tool like DeepCrawl or Screaming Frog Prod or to make sure that they're all right.
http://www.aleydasolis.com/en/international-seo-tools/hreflang-tags-generator/
you don't need to add a sub folder to the alternative xt tag.
Obviously you can use/DE for Germany and then use the German language/DE – DE and so forth until you target each country with the specific language that you want to target them with. It seems like you're not interested in selling outside do yo selling outside the Europe as each piece of content I'm sure you know this will have to be written by somebody that is native to the country that you are targeting.
I really think it's just as important do you have the correct content is well is the correct tags. But most of the time people do not use the subfolder for their ex you could theoretically do it if you were not going to use English at all
http://www.acronym.com/bebrilliant/seo/hreflang-sitemaps-free-tool/
I would use a single domain or I would use depending on your resources and what you can put into this a separate TLD neither one of those teal these offer any benefit for Ranking what I'm saying is.edu.com or not as powerful is .CO.UK in the United Kingdom or .de in Germany.
My thoughts would be it would save you a lot of time not to have to use to generic Domains for just the sake of aesthetics. When they have no added trust I honestly feel in Europe people do not think don't you is something more trustworthy than.com though this is only one person's opinion mine.
Make sure that if you're splitting up your domains you do not try to run them as one domain. With the tags as shown.
-
Hi Thomas,
Any updates on your thoughts ?
-
I think I have a good answer for you give me about four hours.
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
-
Traffic drop after hreflang tags added
We operate one company with two websites each serving a different location, one targeting EU customers and the other targeting US customers. thespacecollective.com (EU customers) thespacecollective.com/us/ (US customers) We have always had canonical tags in place, but we added the following hreflang tags two weeks ago (apparently this is best practice); EU site (thespacecollective.com) US site (thespacecollective.com/us/) Literally the same day we added the above hreflang tags our traffic dropped off a cliff (we have lost around 70-80% on the EU site, and after a minor recovery, 50% on the US site). Now, my first instinct is to remove the tags entirely and go back to just using canonical, but if this is truly best practice, that could do more damage than good. This is the only change that has been made in recent weeks regarding SEO. Is there something obvious that I am missing because it looks correct to me?
International SEO | | moon-boots0 -
How to Localise per Region (Europe, America, APAC, EMEI) and not per country as best SEO practise?
Hi SEO expertises! I am currently working with a client that initially have an English website targeting UK users but want to expand their market into four new regions (Europe, America, APAC and EMEI) keeping English as a main language. I would like to request your help here as I told the client ISO location and hreflang it will be just possible per language and they must need to localise each English region with local keywords, however I would like to double check if it will be any way (Sitemap, Hreflang) we can tell Google we are targeting per region and not per country? Thanks a lot!
International SEO | | Atalig20 -
Hreflang tag on every page?
Hello Moz Community, I'm working with a client who has translated their top 50 landing pages into Spanish. It's a large website and we don't have the resources to properly translate all pages at once, so we started with the top 50. We've already translated the content, title tags, URLs, etc. and the content will live in it's own /es-us/ directory. The client's website is set up in a way that all content follows a URL structure such as: https://www.example.com/en-us/. For Page A, it will live in English at: https://www.example.com/en-us/page-a For Page A, it will live in Spanish at https://www.example.com/es-us/page-a ("page-a" may vary since that part of the URL is translated) From my research in the Moz forums and Webmaster Support Console, I've written the following hreflang tags: /> For Page B, it will follow the same structure as Page A, and I wrote the corresponding hreflang tags the same way. My question is, do both of these tags need to be on both the Spanish and English version of the page? Or, would I put the "en-us" hreflang tag on the Spanish page and the "es-us" hreflang tag on the English page? I'm thinking that both hreflang tags should be on both the Spanish and English pages, but would love some clarification/confirmation from someone that has implemented this successfully before.
International SEO | | DigitalThirdCoast0 -
Can you target the same site with multiple country HREFlang entries?
Hi, I have a question regarding the country targeting aspect of HREFLANG. Can the same site be targeted with multiple country HREFlang entries? Example: A global company has an English South African site (geotargeted in webmaster tools to South Africa), with a hreflang entry targeted to "en-za", to signify English language and South Africa as the country. Could you add entries to the same site to target other English speaking South African countries? Entries would look something like this: (cd = Congo, a completely random example) etc... Since you can only geo-target a site to one country in WMT would this be a viable option? Thanks in advance for any help! Vince
International SEO | | SimonByrneIFS0 -
What is the proper way to setup hreflang tags on my English and Spanish site?
I have a full English website at http://www.example.com and I have a Spanish version of the website at http://spanish.example.com but only about half of the English pages were translated and exist on the Spanish site. Should I just add a sitemap to both sites with hreflang tags that point to the correct version of the page? Is this a proper way to set this up? I was going to repeat this same process for all of the applicable URLs that exist on both versions of the website (English and Spanish). Is it okay to have hreflang="es" or do I need to have a country code attached as well? There are many Spanish speaking countries and I don't know if I need to list them all out. For example hreflang="es-bo" (Bolivia), hreflang="es-cl" (Chile), hreflang="es-co" (Columbia), etc... Sitemap example for English website URL:
International SEO | | peteboyd
<url><loc>http://www.example.com/</loc></url> Sitemap example for Spanish website URL:
<url><loc>http://spanish.example.com/</loc></url> Thanks in advance for your feedback and help!0 -
Multiple hreflang tags
I'm trying to advise on the multi country seo for a site in terms of markup. We've already decided on using sub folders rather than separate sites or subdomains due to an established link profile and good rankings in all countries. The question is in relation to the homepage. Obviously this is the page most likely to rank well in any country (the site is a .com). But can multiple hreflang tags be put on the page to say that the page targets many countries? Or would leaving the hreflang tag off allow it to just rank for all countries? Also do Yahoo and Bing follow hreflang tags? I can't find any info on this anywhere! Thanks very much in advance for any help!
International SEO | | Bdig0 -
Correct Hreflang & Canonical Implementation for Multilingual Site
OK, 2 primary questions for a multilingual site. This specific site has 2 language so I'll use that for the examples. 1 - Self-Referencing Hreflang Tag Necessary? The first is regarding the correct implementation of hreflang, and whether or not I should have a self-referencing hreflang tag. In other words, if I am looking at the source code for http://www.example.com/es/ (our Spanish subfolder), I am uncertain whether the source code should contain the second line below: Obviously the Spanish version should reference the English version, but does it need to reference itself? I have seen both versions implemented, with seemingly good results, but I want to know the best practice if it exists. 2 - Canonical of Current Language or Default Language? The second questions is regarding which canonical to use on the secondary language pages. I am aware of the update to the Google Webmaster Guidelines recently that state not to use canonical, but they say not to do it because everyone was messing it up, not because it shouldn't be done. So, in other words, if I am looking at the source code for http://www.example.com/es/ (our Spanish subfolder), which of the two following canonicals is correct? OR For this question, you can assume that (A) the English version of the site is our default and (B) the content is identical. Thanks guys, feel free to ask any qualifiers you think are relevant.
International SEO | | KaneJamison1 -
Google Webmaster Tools - International SEO Geo-Targeting site with Worldwide rankings
I have a client who already has rankings in the US & internationally. The site is broken down like this: url.com (main site with USA & International Rankings) url.com/de url.com/de-english url.com/ng url.com/au url.com/ch url.com/ch-french url.com/etc Each folder has it's own sitmap & relative content for it's respective country. I am reading in google webmaster tools > site config > settings, the option under 'Learn More': "If you don't want your site associated with any location, select Unlisted." If I want to keep my client's international rankings the way it currently is on url.com, do NOT geo target to United States? So I select unlisted, right? Would I use geo targeting on the url.com/de, url.com/de-english, url.com/ng, url.com/au and so on?
International SEO | | Francisco_Meza0