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The site is not geographicall restricted so no worries there, Im thinking in terms of an international audience
I guess American spellings of words will be more competitive, and will also bring more visitors.
Either way, it seems that US spelling is going to be the 'norm'
Should I seriously be considering switching to US spelling?
as an example from my site...the word specialisation.
"keyword specialisation" brings 8700 results while "keyword specialization" returns 54000 results
55% of my visitors are american. Maybe consider the fact that they will note the UK spellings and maybe consider them typing errors...and leave the site?
This sort of thing is why I ask the question
I would suggest you use the spelling that your target audience is going to search for, since that is the qualified traffic you want to receive. If it is general, I would say use American English, but of course I am a little biased...
(I recall once I was staying in Portugal, and I overheard someone speaking English. I turned to my brother and said, no joke intended, "Hey, those guys are speaking human." Heheh)
This is something, though, that search engines (Google especially) should provide support for. I think the benefits that would be gained from not differentiating between "colour" and "color" would outweigh the downsides.
Sitting in class while a prof scrawled the immortal words of Yeats on the board the gentleman next to me turned and said,
"You would think that a college professor would know how to spell the word center."
Indeed, the centre cannot hold. So, when those rough beasts slouch 'round at last to your site maybe a sniffer and an American version of your site would work? If you can optimize for variations on keywords it would provide the best of both worlds.
I've heard more than one person remark that the word colour shouldn't have a u in it.
I also recall reading that Tolkien was quite upset when American editors turned his beloved dwarves into dwarfs and elvish into elfish. :) On an edcuational site I worked on all the interesting words were turned into hyperlinks, complete with definitions and spelling variations.
I think I'd start with seeing how many variations are involved. If some traffic can be gained by optimizing for variations I might pursue it. If it is simply a matter of explaining that words have spelling variants, I might do a page on UK v. American spelling and offer that up as a cultural bridge.
DG
one of the many reasons for this is because i run a dictionary....and obviously speeeeling comes into the equation. They aint gonna come back if they cant find their "specialization" are they? :)
A little point though - if you're running a dictionary - why don't you make it recognize both? .. or give the user the opportunity to choose between British and American English?
Why? Because it takes time
I dunno how people approach this whole thing, but this is why I start the thread. I am USED to using UK english, but it seems the US english, cultural differences etc etc etc is inevitably having an effect on everything online
I do hope to get some sort of script on the go that will redirect US spellings to UK words or vice versa to solve that little prob....but as each person keeps saying, content is content, english is english.......but in the "linearity" of a SE, its more than just a language...its cast in stone data that determines what SERPs appear :) no point making a dictionary in UK english in ignorance....only to find the people in WMW all knew everyone uses US english ;)
Essentially dr doc, the question you ask is the question I still ask ;)
I am pleased this subject is being discussed, because I didn't think to include the UK spelling of words in my 'keywords'. I have included as many misspellings as I could think of. Many European, Mid- Far-East people who speak English as a second language, speak and write the UK way.
Yes, I think its quite important too :) So do others...we talked about it a while back in a previous thread (which the site search will no doubt find).
We recognised that many of the old imperial colonies used UK english, though it seems the influences of the 'global village' are beginning to change this
On top of this, people in America and the UK, due to their different cultures, will no doubt invent their own unique words..... as mentioned here [webmasterworld.com...] !
I have often pondered how much effect the Net is having on the English Language and whether we will all simply be assimilated into American English over time.
If I am Writing sites specifically for American audiences then I use American spellings, but then sometimes I use both for clarification. (BoL, I would suggest using both in your Dictionary even though it may take a little time..)
Just the other day I found myself typing "Mom and Pop" in a thread here which is very UnAustralian. I guess what they say is right.
Resistance is Futile!
Onya
Woz
color - US english v. colour - English, i find this a nightmare in code, because i have spent 0-x years learning the english version.
my example above, is not what BOL was drawing to obviously, but just making things a little more explict.
trick is a site dedicated to English > .co.uk for Brits, and Europeans (though not all), and a .com or equiv for an American site. Hence seperate out the demographics by .co.uk to UK/Europe links and directorys, and the .com to US/Canadian links and directories. hence seperate out the differentations in spelling (more to the point inputted search terms).
IMO the decider in the long term is the likes of India...HUGE population. But I agree Woz, I find that what I read online is affecting my everyday language both verbally and written.
would the content meta tag
<meta http-equiv="Content-Language" content="en-gb">
<meta http-equiv="Content-Language" content="en-us">
would this be acceptable and advantageous ? :)
Also, anyone non native english speaker not from North or South America will probably use UK English spelling...
Overture consolidates US/UK spelling incl. singular/plural.
But then thats paying.
Should I seriously be considering switching to US spelling?
Obviously American spelling is more competitive, so I would nearly say title/H1 your page in US-spelling and SEO for that. But as a European, I of course refuse and revert to: getting a high Pagerank page anchortext the US spelling in the link to your page. I think Google appreciates the US-spelling to appear on the UK-spelling page if you want to appear anywhere tops. The ALt-tag could be an option for hiding this type of spelling, as could a simple spelling mistake, or a pull-down menu text.
Definitely its difficult to go for both, other than making two different pages with varying content.
(edited by: vitaplease at 11:01 am (utc) on May 16, 2002)
Perhaps we should make Jean-Luc Picard's version the standard one. :)
lawman
Luckily SEO for Dutch is now much easier!
Lesson: Colonies are bad for SEO!
[soapbox]
You and I both learned a set of grammar rules invented by the English upper classes in the 17-18th centuries in order to distinguish themselves from the proles. Much of the 'so-called' wrong American English is truer to the English language spoken in the 16th century.
[/soapbox]
'Real' English is still spoken in the UK counties, where the use of double negatives and 'slang' predates the imposed rules.
Although out of the original context, the following quote from and Old Lancashire Stalwart just about sums up the Lanky view on 'proper grammar':
Don't thee preich at me. Ah don't apologise for meself an' Ah don't need anybody else to apologise for me. My past is one o' high endeavour an' no heeltaps. Yours is full o' inhibitions. Don't do this an' don't do that. Yo' cannot knit a full life o' negatives. If ever Ah get to heaven Ah'll fly theer on positives.:)
Like, this is rully, like, coowel, like.
The division between US and UK English isn't the differences in spellings. It comes from words that appeared in language after the split.
Automotive words are a good example.
gas/gasoline vs petrol
trunk vs boot
BTW while this is interesting it is in know way unique to English.
Spanish is spoken in over 20 countries. ALL of them have unique words/spellings/slangs/dialects. In some countries words that are commonly used are offensive in other countries.
The differences come from many things such as what century were they conquered by the Spaniards (as Spanish changed in Spain but changes were slower in Americas) and indigenous languages were varied and influential.
example:
guagua - in Chile means baby, in Bolivia means bus
Just trying to illustrate how valid this thread is for anyone dealing with language issues.
Maybe a disclaimer 'This site best read in UK English' ;)
If the words you're concerned about are for SE use then yes, I can see definate advantages to changing a limited number of words. Like your keywords and perhaps description and limited key content like introductory paragraphs.
But actually going through all of your content (especially if this is the site I visited) I don't really see the need. In fact, I think it might actually help to have a mix (providing there's an explanation as to why for example: the spelling of some words on this site are Americanized for compatability purposes only and do not reflect their correct spelling :) )
That's the way I see at least.
25% of their search engine traffic uses the UK spelling and 75% uses the US version. The site would be minus a lot of business if we had been parochial.
Once people are on the site, I'm sure that the spelling variations are easily read by both "types" of users - but getting them to the site requires some catering to each.
"25% of their search engine traffic uses the UK spelling and 75% uses the US version. The site would be minus a lot of business if we had been parochial."
So what did you do to accomodate the need?
I have a question about the word "American". Do Canadians consider themselves "American" or merely "North American"? I sometimes feel that using the word "American" to mean "of the US" is a conceit. But it's SOOO widespread. And Canadians use mostly the UK variants.
