Search Engine Optimizing (SEO) - Page Titles
Search Engine Optimizing (SEO) - Image Alt Tabs
Spanish adwords for English browsers

 

Search Engine Optimizing (SEO) your Spanish language web site - Page Titles

Organic search rankings constitute a major part of helping online consumers find your web pages and to enter the site at the most appropriate point. Most corporate web sites have invested to some extent in SEO (Search Engine Optimization) and many organizations think that they carry this over to their Spanish sites, especially if these sites are basically translations. Let's skip the issue of translations and their value for the time being and deal with a common but easily avoidable error.

Page titles weigh heavily in search engine algorithms. They offer the engines a single, concise statement of what the main topic is for each page. Google (and the others) examine word importance not only by keyword density, but also by location on the page, size of font, title positions and any pullout such as bolding. But high on that list is page title.

What is a page title? 'Just asking this question explains why this is a problem on general market sites, but even more so for Spanish SEO. The page title has historically been similar to a file name for saving the code for a particular page and has been designated by the programmer - a person who definitely wasn't chosen for SEO or copywriting abilities. With the evolution of browsers, the page title has become more noticeable. You can see the title for most pages by minimizing the page and hovering your cursor or arrow over it on the bottom of the page. You should see a small pop-up with the page title.

So what is the problem with page titles on Spanish web sites? Most companies provide translated text and leave the page title to the programmer. While most programmers will choose a similar title to the English title, it may not be consumer friendly and it definitely doesn't emphasize the collection of words important to the SEO. Remember that just 1 word in a page title can be worth 4 or 5 on a web page.

The page title can easily be changed as it is not part of linking pages, sites or data, so it is easy to change. It just requires a request from the internal person in charge of the Spanish site, and a small amount of cooperation between your programmer and your Spanish-language content provider. Just ask your Spanish-language content provider to recommend titles for each page that include the primary keyword for each page. This is one easy step towards better organic rankings for your website with the major search engines.

 

Search Engine Optimizing (SEO) your Spanish language web site - Image Alt Tags

You spend a lot of time, energy and money designing, programming, creating the content for and maybe even SEO optimizing your site. Let's hope that you went the extra step and chose images relevant to your Hispanic consumers rather than use the stock photos from the general market site. Congratulations.

But what if your reader is blind? Well, not literally, but spiders for the search engines can't see images or video. They read text, They are hungry for text and love your 250 word keyword dense and properly divided text content, but they miss your photos and Flash. This can be an important part of the page and because of the key real estate that it occupies, it can be very important for search engine optimization. Think of it as bolded text near the top of the page. It is important or would be if you could read it.

Well, help the spiders to read. Place an alt description for the photo in the code. This is a common and easy alternative for people that do have a handicap or who choose not to display images on their pages. Since most people rarely hide their images, little effort is generally placed into these descriptions and the naming process is left up to the programmer. Even when and where to use the tags is often left up to the programmer since most clients don't know to review them.

Every image should have an alt tag for SEO purposes and the name should be chosen to complement and support the important keywords for that page. The description should explain what the image is, but it need not be blunt or short. Rather describe in terms as it relates to the purpose of the page, the content of the image and the important keyword.

So this isn't about Spanish sites? Oh yes it is. Spanish sites have all of these problems, and then, most of the images tags are done by an English speaking programmer. Even if the images are described in Spanish, they may not have SEO friendly keywords or relate to the intent of the page. An easy example is a photo of a mother and son. Is it "nurturing mom reading current magazines to teenage son" or "mom preparing a nutritious afternoon fruit snack for hungry son after baseball game"? Which do you think a spider prefers? Which best relates to your page's content and the keywords for that page?

The image alt tag is not the file name and can easily be changed and is not part of linking images, pages, sites or data, so it is easy to change. It just requires a small amount of co-operation between your programmer and your Spanish language content provider. This is one easy step towards better organic rankings with the major search engines.

Spanish adwords for English browsers

It sounds like an easy question, but with Google ads, in what language should you advertise Spanish language adwords directed at Spanish language consumers directing them to your Spanish language site? If you said English, you probably made a lucky guess. But it makes perfect sense.

Most of the internet browsers (Internet Explorer) allow the user to customize their experience and choose a language, but in the United States, they are installed with English as the default choice. Most Spanish users never switch out of this default. Some estimates say that as many as 90 % operate from a browser that is designated as English.

What does this mean? For search, there is probably very little effect on the results the user receives. The Google algorithms automatically determine relevant keywords according to their own analysis of language. But for Adwords, the adword chosen is displayed according to the browser and the language requested in the adwords bid.


As an example, Google traffic estimator estimates around 100 clicks per day at an estimated ad position of 1 to 3 at a cost of about $2 per click for hipoteca (Spanish for mortgage) in English and none in Spanish.

So when purchasing adwords, choose the best keywords in Spanish. Then choose the best related and synonymous keywords in Spanish. Make sure to use negative keywords to avoid buying clicks that are fruitless. Then, make your bids choosing English and then make bids choosing Spanish. The price may differ and you can use traffic from either source.