| Are English speaking websites based in the US | | | | Japan, Italy, |
| simply insular | | | | Mexico and dozens of metropolitan cities around |
| and uncaring about foreign web traffic or are we | | | | the planet |
| actually | | | | without fear that we'll be unable to find English |
| Xenophobic?Xenophobia - a phobic attitude | | | | speaking |
| toward strangers - comes from | | | | hoteliers, restaurateurs, and even cabbies - it is |
| the Greek words xenos, meaning "foreigner", | | | | an |
| "stranger".Trolling through the "referrers" section in | | | | arrogant expectation. I've been to each of those |
| my web site | | | | countries |
| traffic logs routinely shows hundreds of Google | | | | and didn't need any Japanese, Italian or Spanish |
| foreign | | | | language |
| language searches. Those foreign language search | | | | skills while on either business or pleasure.But |
| referrals | | | | we've got to be realistic if we are to take part in |
| usually total just slightly more than the combined | | | | the |
| total of | | | | global medium of the web. Those web pages are |
| Yahoo and MSN English language search referrals. | | | | viewable by an |
| So doesn't | | | | estimated 700 million people around the world |
| it make sense to pay more attention to foreign | | | | and millions |
| language | | | | of those would happily visit and read your web |
| search in SEO than to fiddle with Yahoo and MSN | | | | site if it |
| optimization? | | | | were available in the world's top languages and |
| My traffic logs routinely show hundreds of | | | | indexed in |
| translation tool | | | | foreign search engines. So why not provide that |
| referrals.Those referrals come from foreign | | | | option?Major corporate web sites in the U.S. will |
| language searchers that | | | | inevitably require |
| REALLY want to read the pages. Foreign | | | | polished human translation of their major web |
| language visitors | | | | pages, with |
| who don't know about online translation tools (like | | | | variations for international tastes and preferences |
| Google's) | | | | - most |
| will leave the search result pages without visiting | | | | small and medium business sites cannot afford |
| your site. | | | | that option.This leaves machine translation as the |
| Why not provide your pages in the most | | | | best remaining option. |
| common European | | | | While it is possible for any site visitor to use |
| and Asian languages with your text in their native | | | | translation |
| language | | | | tools online to convert your English language text |
| already? Look in your logs for the following | | | | into |
| referrer URL: with URL's of your own | | | | foreign tongues, it sends the visitor away from |
| site appended. This query at "Google English" is a | | | | your site to |
| request by | | | | the translation service. Not ideal.The best option |
| a foreign language user for a translation of that | | | | is to use translation software to put those |
| page on your | | | | foreign language variations on your own site and |
| site. The most common of them are from | | | | host them |
| Google.es (Spain) and | | | | from your own server in the languages you |
| Google.de (Germany) and Google.pt (Portugal). | | | | offer. The reason |
| Last month | | | | to host them is, very simply, that if you provide |
| there were nearly 1,000 of these queries from | | | | machine |
| Google | | | | translated foreign variants of all your pages, they |
| translation tools in my logs. Check that tool out | | | | will be |
| here: translation - or "Language Tools" page at | | | | crawled by foreign search engines and indexed |
| Google is | | | | and ranked on |
| helpful in escaping our insular attitudes about | | | | European and Asian search engines.The web |
| English | | | | audience in China was roughly estimated at just |
| language search by showing us that Google | | | | over |
| currently supports | | | | 100 million in 2005 and is expected to balloon in |
| 34 languages and hosts servers in 141 countries - | | | | the near |
| literally | | | | future. Simply being indexed for Chinese language |
| from A to Z. (United Arab Emirates) to | | | | searches |
| (Zambia)Google has 117 languages listed on that | | | | and reasonably ranked could increase traffic for |
| page, but they've | | | | U.S. sites |
| buried a few ringers in there with "Elmer Fudd", | | | | dramatically. The European audience is |
| "Klingon", | | | | fragmented with many |
| and "Pig Latin" to throw linguists for a loop. While | | | | more language options - the main representative |
| it's | | | | languages on |
| interesting to use those funny options, clicking | | | | the web are Spanish, French, Portugese, German |
| the "I'm | | | | & Italian, |
| Feewing Wucky" on the "Elmer Fudd" language | | | | while Chinese, Korean and Japanese make up the |
| produces the same | | | | bulk of the |
| results as does the English language search, it's | | | | remaining web audience. Those eight languages |
| just cuter | | | | are offered in |
| with the letters "L" and "R" replaced with "W's" | | | | popular machine translation software packages.If |
| on the | | | | a site has already been optimized for English |
| search page. we need to look at the fundamental | | | | language |
| reason that Google | | | | search, the SEO will have included the most |
| offers this "Language Tools" page and the | | | | important |
| machine translation | | | | keywords. While machine translation is not |
| there. It is because web site owners in the U.S. | | | | entirely reliable |
| don't offer | | | | for proper sentence structure and grammar |
| multiple languages on their own sites.While it is | | | | once translated, it |
| not uncommon to see a row of four to six flags | | | | at least gets most words and many word |
| representing the top few languages on many | | | | combinations correct. |
| European based | | | | Content sites, who often rely on advertising for |
| sites (especially Italy, Spain and France based | | | | income, |
| companies) - | | | | would love to see the extra pageviews and ad |
| it is actually rare to see multiple language options | | | | clicks coming |
| on U.S. | | | | from foreign visitors reading their pages in their |
| based business sites.There are manifold reasons | | | | native |
| for this lack of communication by | | | | language.Once a content site owner sees their |
| English speaking countries with the rest of the | | | | largest foreign audience |
| world. The | | | | trends (through web traffic analytics statistics), |
| top reason is that we simply don't need to know | | | | they can |
| other | | | | fine-tune their SEO for individual languages and |
| languages to live our daily lives in this country, so | | | | actually pay |
| we | | | | for professional translation and foreign language |
| rarely think of using other languages online. While | | | | SEO of the |
| English | | | | most profitable pages. But simply getting a |
| is a primary language spoken around the world, | | | | content site |
| including | | | | indexed by search engines in more than eight |
| Canada, Australia, India, Britain and is a second | | | | new countries |
| language | | | | will bring waves of new visitors and increase |
| spoken by millions of primarily foreign language | | | | advertising |
| speakers.While it is common to visit major cities in | | | | income substantially. |