SEO for Foreign Markets

One thing we're beginning to do with one of our clients is Non-English SEO. The company, Fracmo (a large manufacturer of DC Motors), ships their products around much of western Europe. As a result, as well as an English language site, they also have two sites, one of which is in Italian, the second is in German. So how do you go about optimizing a site in a language you don't speak?

Well, there's still a lot of things you can do even if you don't understand what you are writing about. The first is making sure your back end is in order. A great way of getting ranked in google.it (Italian Google) and google.de (German Google) is to use the domain names .it and .de for the main pages. This is the cheapest and easiest way to get ranking, and businesses that plan to expand into different markets would be advised to secure their name in as many different country TLD's as possible.

Secondly, hosting on servers located in the country you are targetting is extremely desirable, if not vital. This will require some research, although the bigger hosting companies may be able to help you out.

Both these things will have a positive effect on your rankings, even before getting out your phrasebook!