Impact of slight character variations in anchor text

[bjalc2011]

Does anyone have experience of how Google deals with slight character variations, e.g. Facade v Façade?

From an SEO perspective, are these treated as two completely separate words or is Google clever enough to determine the intent of the searcher & the site?

[ninjamarketer]

I did a quick search for Facade and Façade and Google is able to understand the difference and display the correct results and it didn't asked me to correct the word. Google's language detection technology is pretty good. If you use Google translation then there might be some instances where you may not get 1x1 translation of the sentence but it is better than other tools available.

[kwoolf]

I watched a few SEOmoz webinars and Rand Fishkin mentions a bit about keyword vectors, which were explained to be a matrix of sorts that groups keywords with related words. The example given was a key word snowboard is associated with mountain, snow, cabin, etc., so I'm sure Facade and Façade are closely associated, but they're apparently treated as different terms when it comes to search results--just try searching for both Facade and Façade separately (and together) and you'll get different results. I'd venture to guess that versions of words like cafe and café, resume and résumé are prioritized by location and local language, but I'll need someone to confirm that.

I write copy in Chinese and English, but since I am not a native Chinese speaker, I creatively include all versions of questionable terms in anchor text and the content body at least once. To find the variation of the term I want to use consistently, I first check the local dictionary, ask my target audience, and then do a search of all variations in different search engines to decide where I want to rank highest. I've been happy with the long term results.