The following articles have been written by Mathias Levarek who is the new guest speaker for Global Vibration's new SEO Seminar World Tour 2007-2008.
Articles are updated regularly.
What are the largest & most lucrative online multilingual markets aside from English?
With Google reporting that over 50% of their traffic comes from multilingual searches, it has become crucial to consider developing a multilingual online presence. However, the question remains the same: Which markets to target? Which ones are the most important in terms of users, etc.?
First of all, let's see which parts of the world feature the most users. Contrary to general belief, it is not North America! With close to 400 million users, Asia definitely takes the lead, followed by Europe with approximately 315 million users, in comparison to 232 million in North America (North America being defined as the U.S., Canada, and Mexico). Read more...
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French from France, or French from Quebec? Spanish from Spain, or Spanish from Mexico? Which one for my website?
When approaching multilingual markets, it is always important to consider the idiomatic cultural ramifications involved with languages like French, Spanish, Portuguese... Let's take French, for example (since it is my mother tongue!).
I have been asked numerous times which one is the most appropriate. It is to be said that, except on a few words that have transcended to different meanings, the grammatically correct French from Quebec is the same as the French from France. I do agree that French can be spoken and written differently depending on regions (Quebec, Polynesia, Africa, etc.). However, if you free the text of a website from any form of colloquialism, the French from France will be the only proper French which can be used as a cultural common denominator when targeting all French-speaking communities worldwide. Read more...
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International shipping charges should not be a deterrent to global marketing.
Lots of manufacturers and distributors in the U.S. have been hesitant about marketing their products internationally when considering the shipping rates.
Of course, shipping internationally involves a much steeper charge than when sending goods domestically. However, those marketing products and services internationally should consider that their rate card is in U.S. dollars. For instance, if you were trying to market a product to the European community (let's not forget that Europe has close to 100 million more users than North American), the Euro has been consistently stronger than the U.S. dollar over the last five years and today is about 35% stronger than the U.S. dollar. Furthermore, the average sales tax in Europe is about 20%. Such sales tax does not exist on international orders.
In other terms, a potential buyer in Europe would save 35% just on the rate of exchange and another 20% from not paying sales tax. Read more...
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LINK ENHANCEMENT IS “HARDCORE LABOR”:
When it comes to the subject of link popularity, most people think that it is just a matter of exchanging links with other sites.
Reciprocal links are very important indeed, but limited in terms of SEO results. They are just part of the overall strategy of a link building campaign. In fact, if a website features more than a certain amount of links (generally 50 -75), search engines might interpret that such website is exchanging links to fake a strong link popularity rating. This is why one-way-links weigh so much more in terms of SEO.....Read more...
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Let’s not confuse being bilingual and being a translator!
DK: What is the biggest mistake that people make when contracting a translation agency or a freelance translator?
ML: People confuse being bilingual with being a translator.
DK: What do you mean?
ML: Oftentimes I will hear from customers and business prospects, "I will get this translated by my wife...she's from Mexico" - "I will get your Chinese translation reviewed by my brother-in-law...he is from China", etc., etc. Well, I can only say that it is not because someone was born and raised in the US that I would use such fact to benchmark his copywriting abilities in English! It is not because someone is from France that such person is a qualified French translator...such person may have averaged a “C-” in French when in school! As far as I am concerned, being bilingual does not qualify someone as a translator. Read more...
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Ranking Eligibility of Foreign Domain Extensions
Internationally minded online marketers have to choose between publishing their multilingual content under their main URL (i.e., www.website.com/language.html) or as a subdomain (i.e., http://language.website.com). Where should you publish your multilingual content? Under a regular section of your site? A subdomain? Or should you consider registering new domains with foreign extensions?
To answer these questions, let’s take a look at the cultural and ranking ramifications involved with the aforementioned options, and let’s evaluate the pros and cons accordingly. Read more...
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Enhancing Ranking Eligibility on Foreign Search Engines in English
When considering a true online global presence, multilingual search engines do represent the largest online market share. However, an international online presence would not be complete without prime rankings on search engines in English from the USA to Australia, from New Zealand to the UK, and from Canada to South Africa.
I have consulted with many customers worldwide who wanted to improve their presence on specific foreign search engines in English. First, it is obvious that if the U.S. is the prime market, it is important for the website to be hosted in the U.S. on a U.S. IP address. Read more...
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Multilingual markets and the collapse of the US dollar
This first 2008 quarter is about to end, and the US dollar keeps on dropping against other major currencies to reach some of its most embarrassing low records: It is over 50% weaker than the Euro and, for the first time in so many years, weaker than the Canadian or Australian dollar.
Anyway, I am not going to comment herein from an economic or political perspective. It is not the time and place to voice my opinion in regards to prognostics or other financial assessments. Although it is obvious to everyone that it will get worse before it gets better, I am a big advocate of seeing the positive in today's awkward US economy. Read more...
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Meta tags: What’s the real deal? Demystifying one of the most misperceived notions of SEO
Many “SEO experts” claim that, in today’s internet context, the use of meta tags is unnecessary...some even assess that meta tags bear no ranking relevancy...is that true? What’s the real deal?
Back in the mid-90s and all the way until 2002, the SEO industry (companies like ours!) used and abused meta tags to promote keywords! Back in those days, meta tags reflected a powerful ranking relevancy. Major search engines would take keywords reflected in the meta tags very seriously...Read more...
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Webmaster & Servant: When Ignorance is not Bliss
Back in the late 90’s, it was common to delegate everything and anything to the “WEBMASTER”. The term “webmaster” back in those days had an mysterious connotation...Webmasters were the “cyber magicians”, with powers that involved not only computer knowledge, but also the newly, still enigmatic internet. In most cases, webmasters handled everything from domain registration, website design and management, email accounts, and SEO. They were the “all-powerful”.
“Old school” business executives still had the luxury to claim that “the computer is not my thing” or “I have nothing to do with my website, I have a webmaster for all these issues.” It was the time when “ignorance” could still be considered as bliss, since everyone had a webmaster, after all! Read more...
