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Here's an interesting observation -
'Search engine optimization' shows 613,000 results on Google while 'search engine optimisation' throws up 108,000 pages - fairly sizable. Although Google is courteous enough to ask if I meant 'optimization' in my second search, the results were totally different in both searches. Barring one site, none of the top-5 sites in the first search showed up in first 5 pages in the second search. Even title phrases were specific to respective searches, which means that the spell correction of Google does not reflect in the results...it only asks the user if s/he would like to refine the search with suggested spellings.
My question is, given such vast variation, would it not be fair for webmasters to be using both variations of spellings in Title and other key phrases?
Or at least that has been my experience from trying this in one of my fields.
English has its barriers...
If you are not use to text copy for one place or the other... you're likely not going to be very effective in reaching that client's "home field advantage" (local) market, which in most cases is the market of easiest fruition.
optimisation is the varaiant they use in the UK, Australia, etc -> basically everywhere but the USA. :)
<added>
To clarify, pick the one that matches the market you are selling to. If you are providing the service in the USA market, optimisation referrals may not get you qualified traffic...</added>
It would be fair for webmasters to try for both variations in such cases but possibly a bit foolish - it would make a mess of the title tags and while you are busily trying to rank well under both variation you'll probably fail to achieve good rankings for either.
In the search example given, one of the top-5 sites in the first search showed up on the 5th page in the second search but with title tag of an inner page. So using spelling variations in titles on different pages makes it legit?
To clarify, pick the one that matches the market you are selling to. If you are providing the service in the USA market, optimisation referrals may not get you qualified traffic
For SEO work, I doubt that service providers (or clients) really care about their location. One can service globally is'nt it?
For SEO work, I doubt that service providers (or clients) really care about their location. One can service globally is'nt it?
In practice maybe so... in principle... you obviously do not have international clients.
You simply can take someone elses business in another country and make it fit your culture.
You can optimize globally, but most businesses you may service can not fulfill globally... there is a difference, and in the end you do them dis-service by not understanding their culture.
You can optimize globally, but most businesses can not fulfill globally... there is a difference.
What I meant was that one can provide 'SEO' services to clients globally. All my clients for SEO services are half-way across the world, from where I'm located.
Even though the world is a much smaller place and globalization is in a small way occurring, we are a very long way from this in reality.
I live in Eastern Canada, the bulk of clients are here as well, I do have almost as many in the US and one in the UK.
In saying that, marketing online for them is not so much about my reach, but about their reach, and about what they can fulfill, not what I believe they can reach and fulfill.
Simply target keywords because you can doesn't help clients achieve ROI.
If all your clients "half way around the world" are happy with your work, I'm happy for you and them, but...
Thinking globally is one thing... being global is totally different.
For SEO work, I doubt that service providers (or clients) really care about their location
True enough to an extent but ceratin issues come into play that make it harder to go to foreign countries for work:
1. It is sometimes very useful to see a client face to face.
2. Calling clients (prospective?) gets costly in the UK, we get ripped off for domestic call charges.
3. Legal issues when there is a dispute (also you can easliy roll up on the door with Dave "Baseball bat" Jones when you have to get a plane ticket for Dave who has been banned from traveling outside of the UK).
4. Exchange rates, one party is going to lose out, if I have it the right way around based on current rates an Australian paying UK£ would have to pay more. He may not like that.
Sure there are others.
As with a lot of things people like local, so it would even pay to get local with your words somehow. <Search Engine Otimisation London>
Cheers
We are shortly to be increasing royalty fees to those licensed to use our language and unauthorised modifications will be reviewed at that time.
For us, its been very easy to communicate with remote clients.
1. Dedicated personal email for urgent enquiries
2. Using IM systems like trillian or Y!/MSN/AOL
3. Using customer service chat like Livehelper etc
We very very rarely have a phone call or personal meeting with clients. The above methods seem to be well above satisfactory for quick, fast, (and very importantly automatically documented!)
communication.
Using different spellings is easy. We use english spelling and many clients use American spelling.
eg:
"We can help you with organizational improvement in your organisation".
Also use diff spellings in metatags for keywords and descriptors. It does not hurt, and in some cases helps.
When we have special messages targeted for people from different countries, we just change the spell checker settings, and go on as usual...
I dont think thats spam at all. Its targeted at users, not search engines, and in search engines it helps people fro diff countries find the page in the language they are most confortable with.
I know that if I do a search on 'examplisation' and I go to the site and it mixes and matches 'examplisation' and 'examplization' I would be less likely to trust the site than if it were consistent all the way through.
Part of what a website has to do in is first few seconds is convince the viewer that the organisation backing it is reputable for me language consistency and good use of the language is a pointer (maybe not a deciding factor in itself but part of what makes the decision)
However, its dependant to your target market, if you're aiming at the motherland of the tongue, as in the UK, then using ENGLISH, or as the yanks like to call it International ENGLISH, is acceptable, this would also cover all native/second ENGLISH speaking country's, except the States. IF, you're looking at US only then off course use their variation of the ENGLISH language. BUT, IF you're looking globally then using both, possibly segmented to target the SEO market's seperately, would be advantagous. Hence if the entire documents, / area's of the website or even subdomain, or website(s) are completely one or the other, and targetted visually to that effect, i can't see any problems, as long as the segmentation is strict.
If I were to target UK and US clients for SEO work, (I target and currently have both), do you think it is legit to use 'optimisation' and 'optimization' as my key phrase in the same site?.... or do you feel one has to setup 2 different sites with 2 different domain names to avoid being called a 'spammer' ....and then start worrying about canonicals.
I'm referring particularly to Comment #90 on <snip>
I pasted this URL as I believe the above site is also managed by promoters of webmasterworld.com. I apologise if I have violated any forum rules.
Note from pageoneresults: seoRank, the link that you provided is promoted by me and not WebmasterWorld. I appreciate the exposure but also have a responsibility to follow the board TOS.
The comment that seoRank is referring to dealt with a site that was stacking keywords in their title tags trying to cover all misspellings, etc. Some misspelled words were side by side.
[edited by: pageoneresults at 5:08 pm (utc) on Jan. 30, 2003]
[edit reason] No URLs Please - Refer to TOS [/edit]
...the simple truth is the majority of the net is US english.
Not so sure about that. Largest language segment yes but majority....?
Anyway the difference between US English and UK English is not just the spelling. It is the whole vocabulary and even the style. If your site contains a significant amount of prose or there is a national difference in the spelling of your keywords, it is better to have two targeted websites in my opinion.
I don't believe variation in spelling is spam, but I do believe the profession of Optimization or Optimisation can not be taken lightly.
It's great to advertise and target across the board but there are grave limitations - particularly with cross-cultural differences, that I suppose have less to do with spelling and more to do with meaning.
Some examples
"chips" >> "crisps" >> "fries"
"shopping cart" >> "basket"
"football" >> "rugby" >> "soccer"
Everyone in their local cultures known precisely what these mean but globally they may or may not be what you think, and targeting keywords do not spell it out.
These are trival as long as you are not specifically - Optimizing or Optimising for, but in principle if the opportunity arouse where your Optimized or Optimised site brought in one of these as a contract would we know the difference - or would the client think to ask?
How many more similar variations are out there - lots!
<added> I personally do not manage, operate, or link from a SEO web site, first too much maintenance required.
I believe every web site must be tweaked daily and I don't have time for this, while managing client sites.
WOM is paramount in SEO - a web site is not. Viral marketing is exceptional in SEO circles.
What is more paramount is remaining current to new trends, the more tied you are to a web site targeting the globe the less likely you are to catch "what's new".</added>
[edited by: fathom at 10:49 am (utc) on Jan. 30, 2003]
So my main bias is towards my local market but I take into consideration the world-wide nature of SEO.
As an aside, wouldn't it be rather easy to insert a little js that would determine the country of origin and then replace the english words with the english words?
That can be done for visitirs who visit the site but if you do that for Search engines, it will be termed as 'Cloaking' which is an unfair practice!
Best case scenario seems to be ->
This way, when you are using optimization - you will get the people that want that. And when you are pitching to somebody looking for optimisation, they will respond appropriately, as well.
Too many (even small) differences in the language might confuse the audience you are trying to sell...you want them agreeing with your bullet points and then contacting you to pay you some cash and not sitting their, scratcthing their heads, wondering what you were trying to sell them.
