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I think the following requirements are a minimum:
Local language text by (or translated by) native speaking professionals (or friends).
Local hosting.
local inbound links, i.e. local directories.
If possible, local country specific TLD.
Language help for submissions, especially to portals.
What have I missed?
As for culture, we are talking design, slogans, etc. where local help is needed too.
Translation has been covered in Translation for European languages [webmasterworld.com]. Personally I recommend using a combination of native translators with local SEO's.
I now that there has been a lot discussions about local vs. central hosting. I'm using central hosting for ceveral clients and it's working fine. Think about all the large corporate sites, which offer different language versions should they be penalized for central hosting? Will SERP's be more relevant if they only consist of sites hosted in a given country? Call me Spock but the arguments for local hoting are not logical.
Local inbound links? Google can't even tell the difference from a link from a page about horses and one about racing cars. Why should local links count more?
Local TLD. YES!
The submission part is easy. The tricky thing is ensuring quality translation and optimization. Use a local SEO.
I have a lot experience marketing sites all over Europe but the best results have come from projects where local SEO's where involved.
Torben
Local hosting has done better for me, lots of factors are involved and your experiences are as good as mine.
Local language specific and acknowledged directories has, better relevancy value (no hard evidence).
Well, the best thing about local links is they are usually in the target language ;)
The simple weight of the links is for all we know independant of language. The link text however is one of the strongest SEO tools.
Local hosting: With the latest changes I would at this point vote for local hosting. I see the downside, less direct control for the client, higher costs of multiple hosting accounts. But at least in case the TLD is not local, hosting should be.
I was wondering if you are searching for a destination abroad and you are the usually joe surfer.Are you going to use the local default or click the world wide search?
If they go to the world search then I am sorted through Google and Fast.....
Do I need to be the local directory will it get me loads more hits having a local domian?
ulstrup,
that's interesting, care to share that source?
(excluding American English? ;))
It's from a survey about one year old, can't remember the source, but I'll try to dig it up, probably it's to be found right here at WebmasterWorld ;)
Local hosting
- For the benefit of googlebot and most other crawlers
- The value is that local hosting gives your site base in the country you target, and gets better placement for local searches (country specific / only sites from UK, Germany etc.)
Local inbound links
- Just an idea, which i have persued with good results
County specific TLD
- same value as local hosting
Yes, it gives a lot of work, a lot of sites to keep track of and a lot of expences for hosting etc.
But my experience is that it's worth it.
What i need is more input on what more to do to get high rankins on local serps of google etc.
That's it. At least in my experience the more local inbound links you get, the more likely you are to crawl up the serps in the local se's.
I always first focus on getting a site listed in the local cats of odp and the local versions of Yahoo. This should tell a crawling engine that the site probably is relevant to users of that particular language.
It used to be one of the most important things to Ink - the local webmapping - and imo is also very important to local Google rankings these days.
Another important factor in local inbound links is the anchor text factor. You're more likely to get good on topic links with your primary kwd's in them, if you target local language sites. It's good for theming as well.
I don't agree 100% on the local hosting. Not as things look today at least, but who knows what the engines come up with...
That might be a small misunderstanding of figures that I published here a year ago. Only 28% of the 802 million Europeans understand English at all. But all Europeans are not surfers. The understanding of English could be higher among surfers, i.e. people who own or have access to a PC at work. I have not seen figures published for the European surfing population in general. Global Reach is a good source though.
Even in the 15 European Union member states only 41% of the 335 millions who live there understand English at all according to The EU Language year project 2001 (published by the European Commission.) Say "Good Morning" or "Good Evening" to the remaining 59% and they will give you a blank stare.
Attaining high rankings is easy for all languages except English as long as the site is not adult or gambling oriented or in another extremely competitive environment. Good rankings gets easier the smaller the language. A good basic job is all it takes. Nothing fancy is required, even for German. At least, that has been my experience. Having a local SEO-person make sure that the job is actually both good and basic is a good investment though. Prefferably one with a local keyword database.
The recommendations made here: [webmasterworld.com...] still hold.
Well I guess that even with my misunderstanding / bad memory, the message is still the same, local language for country specific targeting in Europe.
