International SEO: An In-Depth Checklist

Under normal circumstances SEO can be a tricky business, especially if you don’t have a lot of experience with the subject. Expanding your business internationally can turn your SEO campaign into what looks like a daunting project. Fortunately, while it can be hard to optimize your site in a language you don’t speak, there are steps you can take to help make your international SEO go smoothly. We’ll cover those five steps in-depth to help get you on your way to ranking overseas.

1. Find Your Current International Audience

Before ever launching your international site, or before even deciding to expand globally, research where your current international demand is coming from. Gauge current and potential interest by looking at your site traffic by country in Google Analytics. Open the Location report under Geo and sort by sessions to find the countries that your traffic originates from. These should be your top candidates to get their own targeted sites or pages.

Open up the Google Search Console Search Analytics report and filter by country. Check the boxes for impressions, click-through rate (CTR) and position. Countries that already send you lots of clicks, receive a large number of impressions and have higher average positions are good starting points for international targeting. It will be easier for you to rank well in countries where you’ve already gained some traction.

2. Determine Language vs. Country Targeting

Does it make more sense for you to create sites in alternate languages, or to target them geographically? This might seem like an insignificant difference, but it will actually have a big impact on how you go about creating your international site. There are advantages and disadvantages to each:

• Language: Optimizing your pages by language has fewer restrictions on the audience you’ll reach. Your site in French will be relevant and accessible to French speakers all over the world. It will also make translating/creating content simpler since you won’t need to optimize it for specific cultures or markets. The downside is that your content will have to be generic and free of idiomatic phrases that may not be used globally.
• Country: You’ll be able to really target your content, so you can have discounts, sales and other offers. You also won’t have to worry about linguistic variations like the differences between British, Canadian, Australian and American English. The downside is that you’ll be limiting your audience to a single country and you’ll have to do market research to optimize your content for local buying behaviors.

3. Decide which URL Structure is Best for You

We’ve discussed site structure for international SEO before. Whether you decide to go with regional or language targeting, you’ll have three options for URL structure for international websites:

• County code top-level domains (ccTLD): example.fr
• Subdomains: fr.example.com
• Subfolders (also called subdirectories): example.com/fr/

Each option has its strengths and weaknesses, and there’s really no "right" answer.

ccTLD

ccTLDs are pretty self-explanatory: They use country codes as the top-level domain, instead of the generic .com, .org or .net. Perhaps the biggest advantage to using a ccTLD is that it does your geotargeting for you. When Google sees example.co.uk or example.it, it knows to serve those pages to users in the United Kingdom and Italy, respectively. In fact, ccTLDs provide such a strong hint that they will override a conflicting hreflang value. ccTLDs are best for you if:

• You have a physical presence in that country.
• Have a well-established and globally-recognized brand.
• Have products and/or service whose availability differs by location.
• You have the resources to build, maintain and promote several different sites.

Before you decide, remember that if you use ccTLDs, you’ll need to research, devise and implement a separate SEO strategy for each one, and you’ll water down your site’s ranking power. Each ccTLD has its own requirements, so you’ll need to research those as well.

Subdomain

Using language or country-specific subdomains could be the way to go for a company that hasen’t built up a lot of brand awareness globally, or you won’t be consistently creating regionally unique content. If you do create geotargeted subdomains, make sure you use Google Search Console’s International Targeting. This will make sure that Google will use that subdomain in searches in the appropriate country.

Like with ccTLDs, you won’t really be able to share link juice and authority across subdomains, because Google treats subdomains as separate domains.

Subfolder

Subfolders are the fastest and easiest option to implement, as they just require you to create a few extra folders for each country and/or language. They’re a great option for smaller companies that have built up lots of authority and backlinks, don’t have any variation in products or services offered in different geographies, don’t have the resources or don’t meet the requirements for ccTLDs.

The main drawback to subfolders is that they can be somewhat ambiguous for both human users and search engines. They may not be able to tell if your subfolder /fr/ is meant for users in France or for all French speakers. You also run the risk of the wrong content ranking if you have different subfolders in the same language (ie: your American pages could outrank your Canadian pages for English SERPs). You can overcome this by using International Targeting in Search Console or hreflang tags, but that won’t help your human users.

4. Localize Your Content

Localizing your content is one of the biggest challenges you’ll face when you start expanding to other parts of the world. Simply translating your site word for word isn’t going to be enough to rank - you need knowledge of your actual market to truly be effective. You’ll face these challenges continuously at almost every step of creating your multilingual or multi-regional website.

Keyword Research

Obviously your new target audience isn’t going to be searching for your current list of keywords. Even if they speak the same language as you, they’ll use it differently - think of the differences between British, Canadian and American English. As a result, you’ll need to do keyword research specific to the new language and/or country you’re targeting. Ideally this should be done by a native speaker.

• Google Keyword Planner: Select your keywords by country and language to make sure you see search volume and competitiveness for the right market. If you’ve already got a few keywords in the relevant language, use them to get ideas for other keywords in the right language. Enter your landing page, if it’s already built, to get a list of suggestions if you don’t know where to start.
• Google Trends: Another useful free tool from Google. See how people use keywords in other languages and what they’re looking for. Particularly useful in this tool is the related queries at the bottom. You’ll see what keywords people are using in their native language when searching for that subject. You can toggle between top all time and list of keywords that have recently received the biggest increase in searches. You can use this to tailor your content for relevance.
• SERP Checker: If you’ve got a Pro or Premium plan with WooRank, SERP Checker is a great tool for international keyword research. Toggle between Google domains to track keywords in each of your regions. If you’re targeting a new country that speaks the same language as you, see how your keywords are already ranking and how much search volume your current keywords get on that Google domain. Once you’ve got some keywords in the local language, add them to the tool to see if they get enough traffic. Add up to three competitors to find out how they rank and what keywords they target.

• Translation software: Both Google and Bing have free translation platforms available. You don’t want to use these to translate your whole site, but you can run a few keywords through them to get started, and then use Keyword Planner to get related keywords and volume.

Localize On Page Elements

Once you’ve done your research, get your translated keywords onto your pages in the most important places:

• URLS
• Title tags
• Meta descriptions
• Image titles and alt texts
• Content

It’s not enough to simply run your pages through a translator, especially your content - people can tell and you might end up embarrassing yourself. (You don’t want to end up like these guys.) You’re best off hiring a local (or at least native speaking) copywriter to craft a compelling sales message in the language. Unless you’ve done some serious market research, they’ll have the best knowledge of local customs and culture and what will resonate with your audience.

We talk about this a lot when discussing international SEO, but that’s only because it’s so important: hreflang. Check to make sure you’ve correctly implemented all your hreflang tags for every language version of your site that you have. This will help you avoid duplicate content issues. Use hreflang="x-default” to designate your default global landing page.

Aside from just translations, you also need to localize other aspects of your site as well. Make sure things like currency, addresses, phone numbers and times are correct for the local audience. Listing product prices in dollars is going to be a major turnoff to someone in the EU.

5. Link Building

Once you’ve created some good content in the local language, it’s time to get some local link building. Most link building techniques are still relevant, the main difference is that there probably won’t be as many chances for you to reclaim lost or broken links, especially if you’re entering a market for the first time. Fortunately, the basics of outreach remain the same. Find bloggers that:

• Are interested in/relevant to your niche or industry,
• Cover topics that are relevant to your content,
• Already link to content similar to your own,
• Have authority to pass link juice.

If you’ve hired a native speaker to craft your on page content, have them help with blogger outreach. They’ll come across as much more authoritative and trustworthy just by writing in the language at a native level. If they’re an expert they can also help you identify the local influencers in your niche.

Wrap Up

There’s a lot going on when you optimize your site for global audiences. If you follow our checklist you’ll be in an excellent position to start ranking in international search results.

Did you decide to target by language or region? What URL structure did you use for your global website? How did you address the challenges of localizing your content?

Resource: https://www.woorank.com/en/blog/international-seo-an-in-depth-checklist

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Writing for SEO: How to Write Blogs That Rank on Page 1 of Google

Did you know that 91% of web content gets no traffic from Google? While creative marketing tactics like blogging will boost brand awareness and show that you have expertise on an industry, not writing a post properly for SEO could mean it misses out on all the great SEO traffic it could get.

Numbers don’t lie. If you want to climb to the top of search engine results pages (SERPs), well-written, engaging content alone won’t cut it. You also need to focus on writing SEO-driven, keyword-focused content that attracts not only website traffic, but the right kind of traffic. You might be thinking, “That sounds great, Courtney! But, how do I get started?”

We’re sharing seven essential tips for creating SEO-friendly blog posts without sacrificing user experience and engagement, tips you can start using today:

How to Write Blog Posts for SEO

1. Identify highly-effective keywords when looking for post ideas.
2. Naturally integrate those keywords throughout your posts.
3. Link to influential websites.
4. Aim for scannable, longer posts.
5. Internally link words or phrases to other posts on your site.
6. Optimize pictures for the fastest possible page speed.
7. Preform link building strategies.

1. Identify highly-effective keywords when looking for post ideas.

Google handles over 40,000 search queries a second. Staggering, right? If you want to cut through search result clutter and outrank your competitors, you need to target the specific keywords and phrases your potential customers are searching. How else will they find your content and website?

To identify those hot keywords, head on over to the social platforms your target audience frequents and see what’s trending. Pay close attention to the exact phrases they use and monitor popular industry terms and topics.

Google Trends can also give you a feel for what keywords are popular at any given time. If you see searches are steadily declining over time for a specific keyword, you know that’s probably not the right keyword to target for your marketing and vice versa for increasing trends.

If you’re ever running low on keyword ideas, get inspiration from your competition. Use tools to see what keywords they’re currently ranking for — if these keywords are relevant to your business, consider using them too! SEMRush lets you enter a competitor and see the keywords they’re ranking for, their position in search results, traffic received for that keyword and other key metrics.

Keep in mind that the most obvious keywords aren’t always the best keywords. Searchers tend to use very specific “long-tail” keywords, keyword phrases and questions when they’re looking for something.

Long-tail keywords comprise up to 70% of all search traffic and can unlock the door to successful SEO. When WPBeginner, the largest WordPress resource site for WordPress beginners, adopted a long-tail SEO strategy, they increased their organic search traffic by 20% in just two months!

Because you face fierce competition for shorter, more general keywords, you often have a better chance of ranking in the top results for long-tail keywords. And, long-tail keywords allow you to zero in on higher quality website traffic that often knows what they’re looking for and may be farther along in the buyer’s journey.

Once you’ve done your research and built a list of what you think are the most valuable, relevant keywords, plug them into a keyword research tool like Google’s Keyword Planner, Moz’s Keyword Explorer, Ubersuggest, Keyword Tool and so on. Many keyword research tools give you the monthly volume for any given keyword. Test out different keyword tools — marketers are drawn to different ones for different reasons.

Depending on your business or industry (or budget or bandwidth for SEO efforts), it may be important to rank for high competition, short tail keywords. Still, try to also optimize for a healthy dose of long-tail keywords that are high in search volume but low in competition. You may find it’s much easier to rank for these words.

Remember that your focus keywords will evolve over time as trends shift, terminology changes or your product/service line changes. Be sure to conduct keyword research periodically to ensure you’re still focusing on the right keywords for your target audience and not missing out on vital ranking opportunities.

2. Naturally integrate those keywords throughout your posts.

Once you’ve decided on a list of target keywords, it’s time to write a blog post focused on one of these keywords. Brainstorm blog topics with your team and decide on a topic that will entice and engage your target audience.

Keep your buyer personas, their motivations, challenges, interests, etc. in mind throughout the brainstorming process. Choose a topic that will emotionally resonate with your potential customers and their needs, desires or pains.

As you write your blog, your keyword and natural variations should be regularly interspersed throughout the post. Your primary keyword should appear in these key places:

• Title
• Headings and subheadings
• URL if possible
• Image alt text (search engines can’t read images)
• Meta description
• Throughout the content

Remember that you’re writing for humans, not search engines. Focus on engaging readers with a natural writing style that takes their needs and interests into account.

Be sure to avoid overusing any keyword (also known as “keyword stuffing”) at all costs. Keyword stuffing may lead to a website being penalized or banned in search engine results pages either temporarily or permanently. But even more importantly, if your keyword appears too often and feels forced, you sacrifice a reader’s experience, insult their intelligence and compromise the article’s quality. Don’t give readers any reason to hit the back button and turn to a competitor’s blog for answers.

3. Link to influential websites.

As you build out your blog post, don’t be afraid to link to other articles or blogs.

Linking to applicable and reputable websites not only offers blog readers additional reading material to expand their knowledge, but it also shows Google and other search engines that you’ve done your research. And the blogger or writer may even return the favor and link to your site.

Nothing strengthens a blog post like hard-to-argue-with, research-backed statistics from influential websites. Compelling stats help you build a more convincing and concrete argument that will get your readers thinking (especially when they’re from trustworthy sites they know and love).

4. Aim for scannable, longer posts.

In an age of short attention spans (average of 8 seconds for humans), you would think shorter blog posts are the way to go. But search engines actually prefer longer, in-depth blog posts.

The longer your blog post, the greater its chance of appearing in the top search engine results. SerpIQ found that the 10th position pages have 400 fewer words than 1st position pages. Longer posts will rank more easily for your target keyword.

Think about it: the more content on the page, the more clues search engines have to figure out what your blog is about. We recommend writing a minimum of 300 words per blog post. This length gives search engines plenty of keywords and text to crawl and helps them understand what your blog is about.

The downside to longer blogs is that they may scare off your readers. We live in a world of skimmers and scanners. In a heat map analysis, CoSchedule learned that only 10-20% of their readers were making it to the bottom of their posts. So, the million dollar question is, how can longer blog posts appeal to today’s online readers?

You can write scannable, readable blog posts that hook online readers by tightening up your sentences and paragraphs. Turn a long-winded sentence into two. Keep your paragraphs to 2-3 sentences max.

Also, take full advantage of bulleted lists and subheadings that grab reader’s attention. By following these tactics, you’ll create blogs that are easier to read (especially on a mobile device!) and less intimidating to the scanner’s eye.

5. Internally link words or phrases to other posts on your site.

Linking to other pages or blog posts on your website helps search engines crawl your website and create a more accurate sitemap. It also helps your audience discover more of your content and get to know you as a trustworthy, credible source of information.

Internal links to other valuable content keep users on your site longer, reducing bounce rate and increasing your potential for a conversion (and isn’t that what it’s all about?).

When linking to any pages on your website, or even outside sources, use natural language for your anchor text. Avoid using spammy or generic text such as “top-rated cheap laptops” or “click here.”

Instead, use descriptive keywords that give readers a sense of what they will find when they click on the hyperlink, such as a search engine optimization guide.

Never force feed links to your top webpages, featured products or discounted items. These types of links will only turn off readers and could lead to search engines penalizing your website.

A word of caution: don’t overdo your internal linking or any linking. We know it’s tempting to link to all of your blogs and webpages, but only choose the ones that best enhance the point or insight you’re writing about in any particular blog. Always think about whether or not these links naturally tie in with the subject matter and if they will offer significant value to your readers.

6. Optimize pictures for the fastest possible page speed.

Google rewards pages with faster page speed and places those that lag lower on its rankings. So, it's important to make sure your page-load times are as quick as possible.

One of the leading culprits of page lag is large photos. If the photo you uploaded is too big, it will make the page take a longer time to load -- even if the image doesn't seem huge on screen. Luckily, you can keep your posts visually interesting without sacrificing crucial speed.

Once you pick a photo, use a free compression software, like Squoosh.app to make it as small as it can go before it loses any quality. Any removal of excess photo data will speed up loading times so readers won't have to wait.

If you suspect that your SEO issues are related to low page speeds, Google offers a free tool that can score your page and give you suggestions for speed improvement. Here's a guide on how to use it and boost your score.

7. Preform link building strategies.

Traffic from places other than Google is crucial to your search rankings. Why? Think of search results like a competition where the winners get the most votes. Each webpage that links back to you is considered a "vote" for your website, which makes your content more trustworthy in the eyes of Google. In turn, this will make you rise farther up on search results.

So, it's good to write posts that other websites or publications will want to hyperlink within their own posts. You can also write posts on other business' websites that link back to your website in some way.

To make your website's blogpost more linkable, include valuable assets or information, such as your own data, original thoughts, infographics, definitions, or other facts that people might not find anywhere else.

Here's an example of how this mindset could help you. If you write a post titled "How to Make a Video Tutorial," or "13 Stats about Video Tutorials," bigger sites that are writing about something similar might hyperlink words like "video tutorials" or "research from [Your Company Name]" to your post so they can give their reader more context without repeating your work.

Once you've written the post, you might want to start sending it to other publications or websites that might want to discuss it or link it to their other posts. This outreach lets other publications know of the post and might also help you grow link building alliances with them in the future.

You can also consider doing promotion, such as interviews or guest posts that link to your website's blog post to further encourage link building.

These strategies can be key to your SEO success, but they can be time consuming. To help you, consider trying out one of these softwares.

How to Title Blog Posts for SEO

Even with a great, SEO-friendly post body, a bad title could hurt you in search engines. To title your post with SEO in mind, draft a clear understandable title that both shows the reader what they're about to read and integrates the keywords you identified in the first step. As mentioned above, write something that pleases Google's ranking algorithms, but is also understandable and enticing to humans.

Here are a few examples:

• If you're a beauty blogger and you see that people are searching "how to wear matte lipstick," your post could be titled, "How to Wear Matte Lipstick: A 5-Step Guide."
• On the other hand, if your blog covers artificial intelligence and you see that people are searching a new AI app, you could write a blog post called "How to Use [Insert AI App Name]," or "We Tried the New [Insert App Name] App: Here's What Happened"
• If you blog about farming or sustainability and find out that "what to buy at farm stands" is a regular search, you might write a listicle titled "What to Buy at Farm Stands This Summer."

The Bottom Line

If you want your blogs to rank at the top of page one (and why wouldn’t you?), your main focus should be on creating blogs that both users and search engines will love. By optimizing your blogs for both, you can earn higher rankings in SERPs, get more qualified web traffic and increase conversion rates.

Wasn’t that the exact reason you started blogging to begin with?

Resource: https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/blogging-for-seo

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Digital Advertising Basics: What is CPM, eCPM and rCPM?

What is CPM, eCPM and rCPM 

Learning about Digital Advertising: Think Small..

The digital advertising landscape is an ever changing ecosystem with thousands of interconnected elements, buzzwords, technologies and people who make it all work each and every day. If you are new or a veteran of the industry, it is always important to brush up and practicing defining the keywords of the industry. Personally,  when I think about digital advertising i like to picture the smallest molecules of all that is digital media and work my way up to the more advanced concepts that are taking place in the industry. Here is a refresher course at the basics: Learn what is CPM eCPM and rCPM.

What is CPM?: Cost Per 1000 Impressions

What is CPM? CPM (cost per mille simply means cost per ad 1000 impressions. In the digital advertising ecosystem, CPM is the measurement tool, baseline, a minimum, or however you want to phrase it  for buying and selling ad impressions.

 Example CPM Calculation

For Example: is an advertiser pays $6.00 for 6,000 impressions, the CPM they are paying is $1.00. For every 1,000 impressions the advertiser credits the publisher $1.00. This is a fixed CPM model which makes it easy to forecast earnings.

eCPM: Effective Cost per 100 Impressions

eCPM is the effective cost per 1000 impressions, or the actual revenue per 1000 impressions earned by a client. There are factors that can lower a publisher eCPM such as lost impressions in a CPM waterfall, low fill rates and discrepancies. It is important for a publisher to understand exactly how much they are earning from an ad network.  

Example eCPM Calculation

For Example: if a publisher is using an ad network to monetize and they send 1000 impressions and are compensated $5.50, then that publisher has an eCPM of $5.50. It is important as a publisher to understand exactly how much you earning from a revenue source and what true eCPM they are backing out into. If you send an ad network 10,000 ad impressions but they only track 9,000, then there is a 10% discrepancy. The best way for a publisher to protect themselves from lost revenue is to have a discrepancy clause in the contract that implements a max discrepancy.

rCPM (RPM) Revenue Per 1000 Impressions

The rCPM is a simple calculation of the revenue generated per 1000 impressions and is calculated: Revenue divided by impressions times 1000. This term is commonly used when understanding the profitability of an ad campaign.

Example rCPM Calculation

For Example: If an advertiser is paying a CPM of $5.00 and has an RPM of $4.00, then they are unprofitable and loosing $1.00 for every 1000 impressions. Want to Learn more about Digital Advertising? See:

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80+ High PA & DA Do-follow Social Bookmarking Sites 2020

 BEST HIGH PAGE AUTHORITY AND DOMAIN AUTHORITY SOCIAL BOOKMARKING SITES FOR BACKLINKS

A list of high page authority and domain authority do follow social bookmarking websites. You can use these sites to submit your blog posts and create backlinks.

Now, coming back to the social bookmarking sites; there is a discussion going on if the social bookmarking sites still work? It surely does but depends on the kind of sites you use for bookmarking your article.

It is better to submit your article to ten top-quality bookmarking sites then submitting it to 200 spammy sites. So, the quality of the sites matters.

In this article, we have listed only the sites that are active and have good trust and domain authority and page authority; so these sites are surely going to help your site.

What is Social Bookmarking?

You can look at the social bookmarking sites as the library of articles, you can go to those sites and find the articles of your interest and then read it on the main site.

There are many general bookmarking sites and there are niche bookmarking sites that revolve around a particular niche.

These bookmarking sites are very active as many users keep visiting those to bookmark their articles, hence the search engines also keep crawling those sites frequently to find the fresh content.

Before we go ahead with the complete list of social bookmarking sites, a few sites where you must submit your content immediately after publishing.

Bookmarking Sites	Domain Authority
Facebook.com	95
Twitter.com	93
Pinterest.com	94
LinkedIn.com	93
Reddit.com	87
Scoop.it	68
GrowthHackers.com	62
Mix.com	65
BoingBoing.net	91
betapage.co	41
refind.com	43
techspy.com	49
500px.com	89
linkarena.com	77
feedly.com	92
flipboard.com	87
linkagogo.com	69
weheartit.com	95
blogbookmark.com	48
imgur.com	94
blokube.com	42
blogengage.com	54
techdirt.com	83
foursquare.com	92
managewp.org	54
url.org	74
flickr.com	97
evernote.com	92
dribbble.com	92
behance.net	93
webdesignernews.com	42
designernews.co	48
apsense.com	79
alltop.com	75
quora.com	92
medium.com	93
hubpages.com	91
instapaper.com	86
pearltrees.com	91
list.ly	75
growthhackers.com	59
growth.org	16
twicsy.com	75
bizsugar.com	67
folkd.com	86
dzone.com	81
slashdot.org	92
scoop.it	92
diigo.com	92
fark.com	81
tumblr.com	99
stumbleupon.com	95
reddit.com	97
plus.google.com	100
Linkedin.com	100
Twitter.com	100
Pinterest.com	100
Facebook.com	100
Triberr.com	59
Google.com/bookmarks	98
Utoms.org	45
Sociopost.com	51
Viesearch.com	60
Blogmarks.net	76
Whitelinks.com	39
sfcsf.org	49
Tracky.com	46
Techspy.com	49
Linkarena.com	77
Myspace.com	95

About Me: Hello All, I am Vipin Kumar, SEO Expert in Delhi, If you are looking for services then contact with me.

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