My current domain name is meow.fr. However, the website is in French AND English (we can switch the language, and it's not automatic translation, it's truly a multilingual website). Still, the websites is still visited mostly by French (coming from Google), and not many english speakers. Why that? Should I get a .com / .org instead?
2 Answers
You need to remember that the competition in google.com is much greater then the competition in google.fr as google.fr is localized to France. Google.com essentially is a search engine for every website in the world. Trying to rank well in Google.com is going to be much more difficult. Buying a .com or a .org is not going to help your chance in it as the TLD is not a ranking factor in Google.com. Your .fr is just as good as a .com/.org.
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I would also suggest that you build your website to detect browser languages and display accordingly then have either French of English be the default fall back. This way as Google crawls the site they see it in one language consistently. You can also set it's language in Google Webmaster tools.– AnagioFeb 21, 2012 at 14:07
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Normally it's done this way, if you go on www.meow.fr, aren't you getting redirected on www.meow.fr/en ? Feb 22, 2012 at 7:20
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1I'm in the UK and using Chrome, wasn't redirected to the English version– Vince PFeb 22, 2012 at 8:47
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Consider using the
hreflang
attribute? support.google.com/webmasters/bin/… Feb 22, 2012 at 11:00 -
I'm using <meta http-equiv="Content-Language" content="fr-FR" />, it's not the right one? Mmm, I will check why this redirection doesn't work properly... Feb 23, 2012 at 15:01
Well, one fact we tend to overlook is user's reaction when they see the search result. If I am facing a list of websites that meant to answer my quest about England, I would prefer a .com or .uk to a .fr. Simply because .fr might be in French, plus how could a French has anything just to say about Brits :P
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That's what I'm actually worried about! Would English-Speakers would click on a website with a .fr? Feb 22, 2012 at 7:33