How to boost Traffic using Multilingual SEO - Tips & Tactics

Business owners are always looking for tips and tricks to increase website traffic.

11:35 26 June 2020

No matter how good your website or how great your content is, if people are not reading it, all your efforts are going to waste. This is where SEO comes as a knight in shining armor to save the day! 

 

Multilingual SEO is one step further; any software development expert worth their salt will tell you to focus on multilingual SEO to boost your website traffic. Now, the question is, why do you need to optimize your content in different languages? The answer is simple; the whole world can access your website, but not everyone speaks English. 

 

Therefore, to target a larger audience, you can optimize content in multiple languages. In this article, I discuss the best way to adopt multilingual SEO. Let's begin!

 

What Is Multilingual SEO & When To Use It?

 

Multilingual SEO means translating your existing content into other languages and optimizing it to drive traffic from your targeted audience. If you are optimizing your content for the English speaking audience only, you are missing on a huge chunk of potential non-English speaking consumers. 

 

Multilingual SEO makes your website or content accessible to worldwide customers, and it is also one of the best ways to create and share your powerful content. However, do not confuse Multilingual SEO with multiregional SEO, which means writing unique content in each language. 

 

You do so to customize the content so that it reaches directly to the people of a certain region. A website can be multiregional and multilingual as well. If you are planning to expand your marketing to multilingual SEO and don't know where to start, don't worry, we have got you covered. 

 

In this article, we have jotted down tips and tricks on how to boost traffic for your website using multilingual SEO. So, without any further ado, let's get started.

Decide the Languages You Want to Translate In 

 

Before you start, you need a strategy. You should have clear goals in mind regarding the languages that you want to target. Firstly, figure out where your traffic mostly comes from. Once you know that, based on that region or country, you should see what languages are common in that region or country to make a copy of your content in that language.

 

You may use Google Analytics to pinpoint geographical locations where your traffic is coming from. Additionally, identifying locations will help you determine visitor personas from different countries. Social media usage, SERPs, and usage timings could vary from region to region. Knowing this information can help you optimize accordingly.

 

Do not make the mistake of using Google translator for content translations! Many businesses are tempted to use Google translate as people around the world use it frequently to translate content. However, despite its benefits, the software is often incorrect. If you want higher quality content and a better conversion rate, then it's preferable to opt for a more reliable translation solution. 

Set Target after Deciding the Languages

 

Once you have decided the languages and translated them, go for the optimization of each content in each language. You have to optimize content in every language separately and target specific keywords in that language. Look for the keyword with a high volume of search in that language. You can easily find that on Google ads campaign dashboard or Google analytics tool.

Use Dedicated URLs

 

Duplicate content is one of the unwanted things by site owners. A single content with multiple URLs can lead to de-indexing, lower search appearance, and ranks. Use language indicators, which might be the best practice as per Google's recommendation as well.

 

The language indicator helps enable the search engines and visitors to identify the language from the URL alone. So the language indicator automatically converts the URL to that specific language-based on the visitor's language or region. 

 

For example, if the original site is www.example.com, but a visitor from Spain visits it, so it will redirect to www.example.com/sp, and the content that you have already translated will be shown in Spanish.

 

The placement for the indicator depends on the level of domains you choose. The placements can be like:

(e.g., www.example.fr) for the highest level domain

(e.g., www.fr.example.com) for subdomain

(e.g. www.example.com/fr/) for subdirectory

Make Sure There Is an Easy Option to Switch between Languages

 

IP addresses don't necessarily indicate which language does your visitor speaks. For example, a Chinese visitor might be located in Italy, so if your language indicator automatically redirects him to Italian, it will be frustrating for the visitor.

 

Therefore, the best thing is to enable the option to switch between languages for more satisfactory user experience. Make sure that multiple versions of your site are easily discoverable by visitors. Adding simple buttons containing links at the top of the page can make it easy for people to switch languages of their choice.

Research Keywords in Other Languages

 

We have discussed it before, but you need to think about it carefully before translating the content. Make sure your keywords are present in the content. For this purpose, you need to research for the high volume keywords in that specific language because every language will have their kind of keywords with high volume search. 

 

In this way, you can optimize your site and content for international search and rank your content worldwide. Multilingual SEO allows you to break the language barriers that occur between you and your potential visitor.

Tracking Results

 

Once you have created your multilingual site and content, you need to start tracking your results, minimum once a week. Tracking results enable you to analyze your performance, based on which you can decide if you want to follow the same strategy or whether there is something you need to enhance or modify. 

 

Conclusion

 

While creating multilingual content for your site, you must also consider several important SEO factors. Make sure your content is not duplicated, and you have defined your niche target market. If you successfully address these issues, your content will rank higher, and you will get potential readers rather than just cold clicks.

For the success of any business, SEO is critical. The digital marketing campaigns of any business are incomplete with SEO. But multilingual SEO can take your traffic to new heights. Follow the steps we have mentioned in this article, and soon, you will be ready to experience the benefits of it. Let us know if these tips are helpful. Cheers!

 

Author Bio:
Nouman provides ghostwriting and copywriting services. His educational background in the technical field and business studies helps him in tackling topics ranging from career and business productivity to web development and digital marketing. He occasionally writes articles for Dynamologic solutions