Multilingual SEO

Multilingual search engine optimisation (SEO) applied to website translation

The globalisation phenomenon generated by the mainstreaming of the internet has made it possible for businesses of all sizes to advertise their products and services to markets that were formerly out of reach, simply by translating their websites into different languages.

The truth is that the Internet has revolutionised the way we shop, find information, communicate, work and manage our time and much more, both as individuals and businesses. With the democratisation of social networks and the appearance of Web 2.0, consumers have evolved from passive agents into "prosumers" who produce and consume at the same time. This results in information saturation, making it difficult to keep content relevant and guarantee that the site achieves top search engine positioning.

In this context, companies have had to adapt to the rules of a new marketplace where not only do they need to communicate in the users' native languages, but they also need to ensure that these translations include the right terms to generate web traffic. Web content and architecture must also be optimised according to certain parameters to guarantee a top position in search engine results to give your content greater exposure than that of your competitors.

Therefore, simply translating your website into other languages isn't enough. Within localisation services we can differentiate between two types: traditional localisation, which consists of adapting the content of the website to a target market according to cultural, linguistic and commercial criteria; and SEO localisation, which uses search engine optimisation criteria. The aim of the latter to provide a professional translation which, while remaining true to the original text, will also optimise the ranking obtained by the website in different search engines for each target language or region.

In other words, while in classic translation the only important aspect is the accuracy of the translation of the content and its suitability for the target country, in an SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) localisation process, priority is given to the keywords used in consumers' search patterns in the target region or language (in preference to ones that may be more appropriate from a stylistic or linguistic standpoint) and their distribution in the content and web architecture.

Using different web traffic monitoring tools, CPSL's SEO localisation team, whose members are always native speakers of the target language, optimise the glossary of terms to be used by translators to ensure that the content, once translated, contains the keywords featured in search patterns in the target language.

Other aspects taken into account when translating are:

  • keyword density (between 1% and 3%) on each site (percentage of keyword mentions with respect to all the words on the site);
  • keyword prominence (headings, titles, etc);
  • text formatting (bold, italics or underlined);
  • incoming and internal links.

At the same time, to improve search engine ranking, we also offer the possibility of optimising website architecture according to SEO criteria, by:

  • including keywords for each URL on a website:
  • use of the Alt attribute for photographs.
  • metadata optimisation for each site.

If you would like more information about how to take advantage of CPSL's experience to meet the challenge of internationalisation, please do not hesitate to marketing [at] cpsl [dot] com (contact us).