Welcome to the Q&A Forum

Here at Distilled I think it's fair to say we've also adopted a TAGFEE approach.

I think it's really good to keep in mind when building relationships with clients and I know our Exec team (Will, Duncan, Tom and Rob) also work hard to make sure that Distilled are a 'TAGFEE' company (we often talk internally about making Distilled 'the best place for the best people to work').

Outside the office? Well I think a TAGFEE human being is the kind of person I'd like to know and I'm guessing most would agree

Hi Keith,

In my experience Google mainly crawls from the US.

You're quite right, GeoIP redirection can cause major issues with indexation - as if you're redirecting everything from the US to the .com googlebot can't see the .co.uk site.

As such, I'm not a fan. Rather than implementing a hard redirect I prefer Amazon's approach. If you visit the amazon.com site from a UK IP you get a javascript overlay that invites you to visit the .co.uk version of the site instead - they let the user decide which site to view rather than actually redirecting them.

This is a nice solution as it ensures that the search bots can crawl both versions of the site, and rankings aren't endangered.

I hope this helps,

Hannah

Hello there,

I'd definitely encourage you to think about how you might go about getting some higher quality links to add in to the mix.

Guest posting (as Donnie suggested) would definitely be something that I'd encourage you to engage in, plus I really like your ideas for getting links from government / universities etc.

Something similar could also be applied if you were providing services for companies with websites.

Other opportunities might include:

Press release opportunities (either local or national).

• Do you have an interesting story to tell about a particular project you are working on? Are people in your company doing something for charity? Obviously it will need to be a genuinely good story in order to get coverage - but local press are often easier to engage with than national.

'Linkbait' Content

• Can you create some content to garner links? Perhaps something environment-related around window recycling or decreased heating bills? Or something around home improvement?

Competitions

• Could you run a competition to give something away? Doesn't necessarily have to be a full set of windows

Sponsorship

• Are there any local events that you could sponsor? This sort of thing can often result in both links from event websites, plus links from local press / other sites which cover the event.

Speaking at local events

- Similar benefits to sponsorship (see above).

I hope this helps,

Hannah

Hi Keith,

If I were you I'd stick with the .com - I've not seen any evidence to suggest that using a .co.uk makes any difference to UK rankings. I don't think you'll see any major issues with CTR either.

I'm assuming that you're not having any US v UK  issues right now E.G. - you're ranking better in the US than the UK, receiving more US than UK traffic etc. However if this is the case you could implement geo-targeting via webmaster tools, claim a Places listing (if you haven't already) etc to send some more signals about where you're located.

I hope this helps,

Hannah

Hi Sara,

Where you host really isn't considered a major ranking factor - there are many UK sites which are hosted in the US and they don't have issues with ranking.

I'm assuming you're not suffering with poor loading speeds - if you are - go ahead and change your hosting but I wouldn't worry too much about whether that's UK or US

You've not said whether your domain is a .co.uk or a generic (e.g. a .com / .net etc). If you do have a generic domain I'd recommend that you geo-target via Google Webmaster Tools - see http://www.seo-chicks.com/1463/geotargeting-on-the-same-domain-using-xml-sitemaps.html

I hope this helps,

Hannah

Dan - great shout on using a proper translator rather than Google translate

Hi Neil,

Ranking for a person's name in the US with a 'name.co.uk' is possible - for example I think if you do a search for 'Jane Copland' in the US you'll see janecopland.co.uk ranking 1st.

Do you know how well or otherwise the site is ranking in the US right now?

Essentially the ability to rank will likely be impacted by how common or otherwise the person's name is and how strong their site is.

In terms of actions from you I wouldn't be inclined to change hosting as that's unlikely to have an impact on it's own - however if as you say you're looking to change the hosting in any case then moving it the US probably wouldn't hurt. I'd also encourage you to build links to this domain to strengthen the site.

I guess I'm saying it's not necessarily impossible, but in an ideal world you'd get some sort of generic domain (.com / .net etc).

I hope this helps,

Hannah

Hi Philip,

The short answer is yes - it can do. As Google crawl from the US, if they're redirecting US traffic it may mean that their site doesn't get crawled. If Google can't crawl... well, you get the picture.

As such this sort of redirect isn't something I'd readily recommend. That said, as long as Google can still crawl the 'live' version of their site they should be ok.

Nevertheless, typically in a case like this I'd recommend either:

1. Redirecting to some sort of international choice page (where all links are crawl-able). Cheap Flights do this pretty well - for example if you visit cheapflights.com from a UK IP - they push you to this page: http://www.cheapflights.com/workers/profile-select.aspx?sref=CFUK&redirect=GeoIP&geoip=GB&cfref=CFUS&spt=Home&rp=/

or

2. Using IP detection to show a javascript overlay with appropriate messaging - in this case I'd probably display a message to international visitors which said something like -

"It looks like you're visiting from (XX country). Unfortunately we're not able to ship to you just yet, however our (XX country) site is being developed right now. Click here and we'll email you once our new store opens."

I hope this helps,

Hannah

Hello there,

I'd suggest that employing redirects is unlikely to result in the .com.au site ranking instead of the .co.uk version - essentially all you're doing is pushing any Australian visitors who come to you over to the Australian version of the site.

In order to try get the appropriate versions of the site ranking you might try implementing rel-alternate-hreflang annotations in your sitemaps - see http://support.google.com/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=2620865

I'd also recommend including things like local bricks and mortar addresses, local telephone numbers, displaying local currency etc to help the search engines understand which locations you're trying to target.

I hope this helps,

Hannah

Hi Matthew,

The hreflang tag which SEOBrent mentioned below may help here - if your content is duplicate.

In terms of implementation you need to place the tag on all versions of the page -

So on http://yourdomain.com/us/page-whatever you'd need:

http://yourdomain.com/uk/page-whatever; /> http://yourdomain.com/us/page-whatever/>

And on http://yourdomain.com/uk/page-whatever - you'd need:

http://yourdomain.com/us/page-whatever; /> https://plus.google.com/u/0/115984868678744352358/posts/9zA3a96XahN

Please also note, you need to pick one canonical version - I've picked the US as I've assumed you get more US traffic - obviously if you get more UK traffic then that should probably be the canonical version. See here - http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Webmasters/thread?tid=5299f52953459957&hl=en&fid=5299f529534599570004b9a18f1d46fe

Re your GEO-IP redirect - this isn't an approach I favour - as Google normally crawl from a US IP it can cause indexation problems. As such I prefer something like cheapflights.com implement - if you visit cheapflights.com from a UK IP you are pushed to this international choice page - http://www.cheapflights.com/workers/profile-select.aspx?sref=CFUK&redirect=GeoIP&geoip=GB&cfref=CFUS&spt=Home&rp=/

This allows user to select the appropriate site, and allows both versions to be crawled.

I hope this helps,

Hannah

Hi Edward,

I'm really not a fan of GeoIP detection - not because of cloaking - broadly speaking you're fine on that front.

That said I have seen sites that have clearly tripped some sort of cloaking filter and been penalised as a result; they were using GeoIP to deliver either US or UK content on the same page - rather than pushing to .com or .com/uk. But that's kind of off-topic

The potential issue of redirecting people based on GeoIP is that if you don't make your whole site crawlable for the search bots, they'll typically only be able to access and therefore crawl / index the US content (Google mostly crawls from a US IP).

As you can well imagine - if only your US content is accessible to the bots, then that's the only content that ever stands a chance of ranking.

Just an aside - I also don't like it from a UX perspective; just because I'm in the US right now doesn't necessarily mean I'd like to see US content.

As such I prefer to use GeoIP detection, then let the user decide which content they'd like to view. Cheapflights handle this pretty well - if you visit cheapflights.com from the UK you get pushed to this international choice page - http://www.cheapflights.com/workers/profile-select.aspx?sref=CFUK&redirect=GeoIP&geoip=GB&cfref=CFUS&spt=Home&rp=/ - you can then decide which content you'd like to see. Plus the bots can crawl both versions easily.

Hope this helps

Hannah

Hi Robert,

Whilst what you're proposing could be considered cloaking, my understanding is that the search engines don't see this as manipulative and you should be fine.

However it's impossible to offer any guarantees - implementing this could cause you problems.

For what it's worth I really don't advocate the use of IP redirects - they can cause problems with indexation for example if you inadvertently end up redirecting GoogleBot (which normally crawls from the US) you can render any non-US content invisible. Furthermore I don't think it's necessarily great for users either.

For example, they may just be away in US, but actually want to see UK content. There are also various pecularities which make IP detection less reliable (for example if you're using WiFi with a major train network in the UK you actually come via a German IP).

Rather than doing a hard redirect I prefer Amazon's approach - if you visit Amazon.com from a UK IP you'll see a message which says: "Shopping from the UK? Visit Amazon.co.uk.". That way the user gets to decide for themselves which content they'd rather see.

I hope this helps,

Hannah

Hi Paul,

In the UK people are pretty comfortable with either a .co.uk or a .com - and likewise I've not seen any evidence to suggest that the search engines favour .co.uk sites.

As .com is stronger I'd be inclined to go with that

Hope this helps,

Hannah

Hi Ralph,

Using an IP redirect to serve country-specific content to the user is fine (i.e. it isn't considered to be cloaking as your intent isn't manipulative). However, there are issues with doing so - as you've highlighted - you're also redirecting the bots so have seen the UK site suffer.

Because of these issues I don't normally recommend the IP redirect approach. I also think that it can be bad for users too - just because someone is in the UK right now - doesn't necessarily mean that they want to see UK content - e.g. they may just be here temporarily on holiday / on business etc.

Personally I would prefer the javascript overlay (your option two) which allows users to pick the relevant country rather than implementing a hard redirect. This will also allow the bots to index both versions of your site.

I do understand the ecommerce team's concerns over this increasing bounce rate - but I'd suggest that if it's implemented well - check out amazon.co.uk from the US - this shouldn't cause you problems with bounce rate.

Likewise I understand their concerns re US / UK customers seeing the wrong content and therefore exposing the price differences - however, again I'd suggest that it's probably more important to have both versions of the site indexed.

I hope this helps,

Hannah

Hi Nick,

I think I'd echo what Alan said. Just because your manual penalty has been revoked doesn't mean you're not still suffering from an algorithmic one. As such I'd probably be inclined not to 301 the whole site.

Assuming your second site is topically similar you might consider reaching out directly to those high quality sites that are linking to you and asking them if they'd be willing to link to your other site instead.

Similarly you might consider moving the link worthy content to your second site and (assuming all the links to your content are 'good') just 301 those pages.

I hope this helps,

Hannah

Hi Jason,

Personally I would go with a .com or other generic TLD, however this is more from a user experience perspective than anything else. I'd suggest that if you're targeting Spanish speakers internationally they'll all be equally likely to click through and transact with a .com - whereas a .es may affect click through and conversion rates in say Mexico.

By way of reassurance re generic TLD versus ccTLD, I've not personally seen any evidence to suggest that a .es will rank better in Spain than a .com - (i.e. I don't think that using a generic TLD like a .com will hamper your SEO efforts at all).

I hope this helps,

Hannah

Hi Dan,

uk.com is the domain - but your site is effectively sitting on a subdomain - i.e. yourdomain.uk.com

As such I'd expect that technically speaking you could geo-target something like yourdomain.uk.com/fr/ via webmaster tools, but I wouldn't recommend it.

Partially because I don't think it will actually work - overall you're giving off a really mixed signal, but also from a user experience perspective - I don't think French users will want to transact with a uk.com site - it just looks like a site for people in the UK.

Thanks

Hannah

Hi Kate,

In my experience you may have problems with getting your sites to rank in their respective locales. I've also seen sites like this treated as duplicate content (even though they shouldn't be really).

There's a couple of things that I'd recommend that you do:

• Target the sites via webmaster tools to US / UK as appropriate see - http://www.seo-chicks.com/1463/geotargeting-on-the-same-domain-using-xml-sitemaps.html

• Take steps to ensure you're targeting the right keywords (there are plenty of differences between US and UK English)

• Implement rel-alternate hreflang see - http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.co.uk/2011/12/new-markup-for-multilingual-content.html

• Include local signals - e.g. local telephone numbers, bricks and mortar addresses etc to help the search engines understand which locales you're targeting

I hope this helps,

Hannah

Hello there

Whilst these links are followed (or at least some of them are - it depends on how you're sharing your content) my view would be that they aren't particularly valuable in terms of improving your rankings.

This is for a couple of reasons:

1. It's too easy to manipulate. If these links really 'counted' all you'd need to do is post hundreds (or thousands, or millions) of times to dominate the SERPs. This is not the sort of activity that Google wishes to reward.

2. These are links from specific properties (which Google own). Whilst these links are followed, you've no clue how their handled by the algorithm. Despite being followed, they may not actually be 'counted'. Moreover it's really easy for Google to switch this off i.e. - they could very easily decide to make all of these links no-follow.

I hope this helps,

Hannah

Hi Matteo,

I think it's generally accepted that IP redirection in this scenario isn't considered cloaking by the search engines.

However I have previously seen sites seemingly penalised (possibly because they're tripping some sort of cloaking filter) but in my experience this more commonly happens when different content is shown on the same URL based on IP detection, rather than redirecting to an alternative page.

Cloaking issues aside, you rightly point out that the redirect can cause indexation problems (as the bots may only see your US content) - as such this isn't a solution which I'm keen to recommend.

If you really need to implement something like this, you could try doing what cheapflights.com do. If you visit cheapflights.com from a UK IP they redirect you to this international choice page -

http://www.cheapflights.com/workers/profile-select.aspx?sref=CFUK&redirect=GeoIP&geoip=GB&cfref=CFUS&spt=Home&rp=/:

However, my preference would be to either -

a) Don't do any IP redirection, but upweight the links to the international sites so that there is a clear route for users to find the right version of the site.

b) Use IP detection to show a JavaScript overlay suggesting UK users might want to visit the UK site - but don't actually redirect them.

I hope this helps

Hannah