Coca-Cola, Chanel and other famous registered trademarks are supposedly universally recognized, beyond any linguistic nuances. In fact, brands are pretty much the only universal words. But whether you manage Microsoft’s or a start-ups website, your marketing vocabulary can’t be limited exclusively to the brand name.
By choosing a language, you have made your first internet marketing choice. Indeed, even if you are targeting English-speaking internet users in an English-speaking country, your website might be reached by a visitor whom English is not the mother-tongue, and we know that language does matter in purchasing behaviours. In 2006, Donald A. DePalma led a global marketing survey about more than 2,400 consumers’ online buying habits and preferences in eight non-English-speaking countries. Findings state that nearly 90% of people who have no or little English ability spend most or all of their time on sites in their own language and among those who can read English, more than 60% prefer buying from sites in their own language.
After all, in a context of economic globalization, multilingual SEO has become a very central issue. Here, I will discuss two strategies to build substantial multilingual SEO recommendations and guarantee a sustainable presence in search engines: localization and valuable content.
Localization first. Your multilingual website structure should be able to coordinate pages in various languages to help bots index non-English content, and finally deliver targeted results to specific searches. Also, you may identify keyword terms that are most important for your business, both in English and French for example. By utilizing quantifiable searcher behaviour data, make sure to select the most potentially profitable terms to build a comprehensive SEO campaign. Indeed, in a multicultural nation such as Canada or the United States, marketing messages should ideally be adapted to each target market. Multilingual websites allow companies to enlarge their presence, multilingual SEO strategies allow them to fit their messages while increasing online visibility.
Then, bet on valuable content. By creating high-value content, you will encourage other sites to link to yours and write reviews. Keep in mind that highly valued by search engines, rich content leads to higher organic rankings. As far as multilingual websites are concerned, I would deeply recommend giving up online translators. Every visitor in every country has his/her own search habits; and every word in every language has its own search volume and competition level. Even within the same language, there are significant regional disparities. French-language is a good example: a Baccalaurat is an advanced degree in Quebec, obtained after a 3-year study program whereas, in France, le bac is a national high-school examination. Recruitment websites should carefully take into account this type of nuances in their SEO strategic choices to target the right job-seekers.
Besides the words meaning, also consider syntax and spelling. Let’s take another French example: “Canadians” favourite songs’. Often in French, more words/characters are needed to convey the same idea. Indeed, the French equivalent would be “Les chansons préférées des Canadiens”. So, to be grammatically correct, the French phrase:
-enhances plurality: adjectives agree with nouns
-inserts accents: “préférées”
-adds determinants: “les” and “des”.
People from Quebec might search for “meilleures chansons canadiennes”, “chansons préférées au Canadiens” and more. Each of these searches comprises different key indicator performances. As a result, SEO rules change. In order to provide clients with customized SEO solutions, one should not deny any of these variants and integrate them into mostly properly-spelled contents. If it may be acceptable to remove accents from the titles, it should not be tolerated in a product description for instance. The call to action is at the heart of a marketing message, a billboard would never contain any spelling mistakes, and neither does an online presentation.
We all know that an appropriate communication strategy leads in higher customer satisfaction levels and conversion rates. Key-phrases tracking and reporting are essential but meaningful only if they are done separately and in an ongoing process. Multilingual SEO requires resources and patience, and we should always keep in mind that the more localized a website is, the better multilingual and the more global it will be.
