5 replies to this topic

[ttw]

Hi:

In January of this year our client created international sites targeted at specific countries or regions and they are slowly building links to each of these new sites. They have had their main .com site for many years and this site has lots of back links pointing to it. All the sites have fairly similar content except when there are product differences.

For each international site the client has identified in the .htaccess file the corresponding country. All the sites are hosted in the US.

The problem is that the correct country website is not being returned when you search in that country. For example, if you are in the UK and you search for their company name, the US site is returned in first and second position. The correct site does come up when you select "page from the UK" which appears directly under the search box but I suspect 90% of searchers don't make that selection.

My guess is that the age of the site and the low backlinks to the UK site are the cause of this. Does that seem like the problem? Do you have any recommendations?

Would there be much value in making sure the country name (i.e. United Kingdom or Spain) be in the footer of each page for the respective sites?

Thanks!

[Jill]

There are a lot of problems with the UK Serps right now.

[Randy]

Yes things are weird in some of the SERPs. I do have to also wonder aloud though how many people are checking their cookies, making sure they're signed out and possibly even grabbing a new IP number before they do a search. Google is still using all of those.

Just a week or so ago I happened to follow a link someone sent me to a Google Webmaster Help topic that was on their co.uk server. Well, strike that, the info was actually on their .com server but the link pointed to the UK version of Help.

Every time after that I went to the Google Webmaster Help centre (yes you read that right, it's not a typo) I got the Queen's English version of the help topic, even if I was on their .com domain. They'd set a cookie in my browser to tell them I was from the UK when I wasn't really from the UK, as evidenced by my middle of America IP number. The only way for me to get rid of that and get back to 'Murcan English was to go in and delete those cookies.

If they're using that type of personalisation (sorry, they've got me spelling stuff wrong now!) it is a pretty safe bet they're using it for other, more important stuff.

In other words, there may in fact be more than one cause causing the effect.

[OldWelshGuy]

Yep. lots of issues with the .uk Google SERP's at the moment. Also sites just disappearing and then re-appearing (more than usual).

They could be a victim of their own success, as if their .com site is really authoratitive, and English language, then Google might decide that is the version that is best.

[ttw]

Do you think it would help much to add a paragraph of text in the footer of each page that said:



www.client.co.uk provides product-specific information for customers in Great Britain (England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland)

Rosemary

[adibranch]

i cant see how that would make any difference at all unless GB and UK were in the search term.