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Using the Correct Hreflang Tag: A New Generator Tool |
Using the Correct Hreflang Tag: A New Generator Tool Posted: 17 Sep 2013 04:27 PM PDT Posted by Aleyda One of the challenges that International SEOs face is correctly targeting the right web presence to the appropriate search audience. Let's start with a couple of scenarios with these challenges so you can see clearly what I'm talking about. If I search from a Mexican IP (using a Proxy service, to simulate being in Mexico) in Google Mexico for "comprar zapatos en linea," which in English means "buy shoes online" I get the following results:
As you can see, Dafiti has a Mexican website version that is ranking no. 1, which is relevant in this case; but also has a Colombian version ranking no. 3 and an Argentinian version ranking no. 7. All of them are using ccTLDs, which should "ideally" give geolocation signals to Google. Additionally, there's a Spain site ranking no. 2 called Sarenza, also using a ccTLD. Here's another example, this time for a couple of branded searches, first only for the brand, "edreams" in this case, which is a popular travel site with a strong international presence and then for "vuelos edreams," which in English means "edreams flights:"
In the previous image you can see how:
The easiest way is to take a look in Google Analytics at which countries your organic search traffic is coming from, by going to the "Audience > Demographics > Location" report (along the appropriate organic search segment) and identifying which landing pages and keywords are bringing those visitors. You can do something similar with the language, with the "Audience > Demographics > Language" report. You can also verify potential misalignment issues of any website, by checking their top rankings in the different Google international search results (not only your own but any site, which is great if you want to analyze the competition) by using Search Metrics and SEMRush. For example, checking the rankings of the Spain version of eDreams in Google Mexico:
What can we do to prevent those issues? How can we avoid ranking with the incorrect web version in some international search results, or cannibalizing them with many non-relevant Web versions? How can we provide a relevantly targeted web version to the right international audience? The rel="alternate" hreflang="x" annotation came to the rescue, initially released at the end of 2011 and updated in April of this year to support the x-default value. It's used by Google (and Yandex too) to correctly identify the language and the country targeting of web pages, that can include them as a link element in the HTML head area, in the HTTP header or XML sitemap.
So why can we still see the misalignment issues in international search results, as the ones shown in the previous examples? From my experience, most of the time Google does a good job in these scenarios when the hreflang annotations are correctly included. You can take a look at:
Nonetheless, many sites are still not making use of the hreflang annotations. Some of the issues I've seen come from the fact that sometimes we don't correctly use the hreflang annotations. Take a look at the number of questions about hreflang in the Moz Q&A Forum and Google's Internationalization Webmaster Forum; there are still clearly many doubts about how to use it. One of the error scenarios is the misuse of the hreflang link element by including non-supported values, especially for the region, in the HTML's <head> area. Google specifies in its official documentation that they support the ISO 639-1 format for the language, and optionally the ISO 3166-1 Alpha 2 format for the region. Let's use the web code search engine Nerdy Data to find sites that, instead of including the "en-gb" value to specify that a page is in English targeting the UK (since the ISO 3166-1 Alpha 2 code for the UK is "GB"), are mistakenly including "en-uk":
Or, as another example, pages that are including "en-eu" to specify they're in English and targeting to the European Union (the "EU" code in this case is not supported, since regions are limited to countries):
You can see more specifically the case of Hollisterâ"that was shown in both of the previous cases in the Nerdy Data resultsâ"how they're targeting the UK with the "en-uk" value and also, for their general English, German, French, Italian, and Spanish versions targeting to the European Union, they add the "eu" value for the region, which is not supported:
As you can see, although we already have a couple of tools that facilitate the hreflang validation and its inclusion in sitemaps (check out the hreflang validator from DejanSEO and the hreflang sitemap tool from the Media Flow) it would be useful to have another, even simpler tool, that would serve to generate the required hreflang tags according to the languages and countries, thus helping us to avoid the previous issues. To fill this need, I've published the hreflang tags generator tool: The tool's goal is to assist you in the generation of the correct hreflang annotations for the different language or country versions of a specific page. You will need to place these in the HTML <head> area of each of its URLs, and that will serve as a reference to generate the rest of the hreflang tags for all of your site pages, with the correct syntax and formats. When you generate the hreflang annotations the tool allows you to copy/paste the results or download them as a CSV file, so it's easier to use than other tools, too:
This is only the first version of the tool, and I'm already planning to include more functionality to assist with hreflang annotation generation on a massive scale. If you find any issues with it, or any feedback or ideas, please contact me via Twitter or send me an email at aleydasolis at gmail. I hope the tool, although very simple, can be helpful to clarify the doubts about how to generate the correct hreflang annotations in your specific case. If you have any questions, please let me know in the comments! Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but want to read! |
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It's more of a skirmish, actually.
Plenty of recruiters and those in HR like to talk about engaging in a war for talent, but to be truthful, most of it is about finding good enough people at an acceptable rate of pay. Filling slots.
More relevant and urgent, though, is that it's not really a search for talent. It's a search for attitude.
There are a few jobs where straight up skills are all we ask for. Perhaps in the first violinist in a string quartet. But in fact, even there, what actually separates winners from losers isn't talent, it's attitude.
And yes, we ought to be having a war for attitude.
An organization filled with honest, motivated, connected, eager, learning, experimenting, ethical and driven people will always defeat the one that merely has talent. Every time.
The best news is that attitude is a choice, and it's available to all. You can probably win the war for attitude with the people you've already got. And if you're looking for a gig, you'll discover that honing and sharing your attitude goes a lot farther than practicing the violin all day.
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Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis |
Posted: 17 Sep 2013 01:27 PM PDT Move over Detroit. The fiscal crisis in Chicago is far bigger.
Via email, Ted Dabrowski at the Illinois Policy Center writes ... While all eyes are focused on a solution for Illinois' state-run pension systems, Chicago's own debt crisis is looming.The Hidden Bill You can view the entire report at The hidden bill: Chicago taxpayers and the looming crisis. A closer look at the "Hidden Bill" shows the problem is even worse than stated by Dabrowski above. Pension funds have long assumed unrealistically high investment returns, which make the funds look healthier than they actually are. Moody's Investors Service now calculates unfunded pension liabilities using more appropriate discount rates.If you adjust pension obligations for a more realistic rate of return, the problem looks like this. Chicago Obligations Chicago Pension Funding Four Long Term Solutions
The above long-term solutions will stop the problem from growing as well as ensure labor costs are market-priced, not union-priced. I wish that was enough but it isn't. Those things will slow the rate of growth of the problem, but cannot address 77% pension underfunding. Two Short Term Solution
Pension and benefit cuts are necessary, but how best to do it? I propose the burden of pension cuts spread out in an equitable manner with those receiving the highest benefits taking the biggest percentage cuts. All pension income above a certain cap could be taxed at a very high rate. This would protect the smaller pensioners from massive haircuts. The alternative, as we saw in Central Falls, Rhode Island Bankruptcy, was an across the board 50% pension haircut. Someone with a $200,000 pension had it cut to $100,000. Someone with a $25,000 pension had it cut to $12,500. My proposal would cap the top-end rather than applying uniform haircuts. If one picks the cap carefully, a majority of union members would fare better under my plan than bankruptcy. The Union Choice Public unions can scream all they want, but the entire defined benefit pension system is insolvent. There is no choice other than pension haircuts. There is a choice as to how:
Bankruptcy Here We Come Unfortunately, unions are highly unlikely to accept my common sense proposal. Ultimately, Chicago will play around with superficial remedies just like Central Falls, Detroit, and several cities in California (all of which succumbed to the inevitable). In the meantime, Chicago will probably follow some other major cities into bankruptcy, such as Oakland and Los Angeles. Investors better pick their municipal bonds carefully, because some major hits are on the way. Mike "Mish" Shedlock http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com Mike "Mish" Shedlock is a registered investment advisor representative for SitkaPacific Capital Management. Sitka Pacific is an asset management firm whose goal is strong performance and low volatility, regardless of market direction. Visit http://www.sitkapacific.com/account_management.html to learn more about wealth management and capital preservation strategies of Sitka Pacific. |
Grand Coalition or Grand Discontent, Mistrust and Disrespect? Political Poker Revisited Posted: 17 Sep 2013 11:44 AM PDT After saying "nein" to a grand black-red CDU/CSU + SPD coalition led by CDU (Angela Merkel), SPD party candidate Peer Steinbrück changed his mind and said he was willing to form such a coalition. Political Poker Revisited I discussed the reasons for the switch in Political Poker in Germany. Was Steinbrück lying then, or now? Or both? Is this a game to win votes? Or a real change of heart? Or no change of heart, just a lie the entire time?Grand Coalition or Grand Opposition? Today, Der Spiegel discussed the power play in Possible SPD coalition with Merkel: Gabriel's power issue. The translation is particularly difficult, but this is what I have. Here Steinbrück, There Steinbrück, Everywhere SteinbrückGrand Coalition or Grand Discontent, Mistrust and Disrespect? Reader Bernd, who sent me the above link wrote... Hello Mish,Grand Coalition More Complicated Than It Looks Everything is more complicated than it looks. If a "Grand Coalition" is in the works, don't expect it to be very stable. And this is why CDU/CSU hopes to attain a majority without depending on any alliances. If AfD and FDP do not make the 5% threshold, CDU/CSU can get an outright majority. But if AfD totals 7% or more it is going to be very difficult if not impossible. CDU/CSU will then have to form a coalition with someone. What poison will it be? Mike "Mish" Shedlock http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com Mike "Mish" Shedlock is a registered investment advisor representative for SitkaPacific Capital Management. Sitka Pacific is an asset management firm whose goal is strong performance and low volatility, regardless of market direction. Visit http://www.sitkapacific.com/account_management.html to learn more about wealth management and capital preservation strategies of Sitka Pacific. |
Posted: 17 Sep 2013 02:13 AM PDT Here are a few interesting charts of M1 money supply vs. Real GDP/10 from reader WendyBG. Data M1 consists of: (1) currency outside the U.S. Treasury, Federal reserve Banks, and the vaults of depository institutions; (2) traveler's checks of nonbank issuers; (3) demand deposits; and (4) other checkable deposits (OCDs), which consist primarily of negotiable order of withdrawal (NOW) accounts at depository institutions and credit union share draft accounts. Click on any chart to see a sharper image. M1 vs. Real GDP/10 1959-Present M1 vs. Real GDP/10 2000-Present M1 vs. Annualized Change in Real GDP The third chart shows annualized change in GDP vs. M1. Increases in M1 no longer have the same effect on growth or jobs. M1 as Percentage of GDP M1 money supply has increased under Bernanke at a faster pace than ever before relative to GDP. I will take a look at GDP vs. other money supply measures later this week. Mike "Mish" Shedlock http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com Mike "Mish" Shedlock is a registered investment advisor representative for SitkaPacific Capital Management. Sitka Pacific is an asset management firm whose goal is strong performance and low volatility, regardless of market direction. Visit http://www.sitkapacific.com/account_management.html to learn more about wealth management and capital preservation strategies of Sitka Pacific. |
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Damn Cool Pics |
Posted: 17 Sep 2013 11:12 AM PDT The Mexican army's Museum of Drugs, which isn't open to the public, is designed, to educate military personnel about the historical roots and modern-day methods of the drug trade the army has been called upon to fight. But after spending a couple of hours there, it's strikingly clear that the fight is very far from over. |
Hot Girls of San Diego Comic Con 2013 Posted: 17 Sep 2013 10:11 AM PDT |
Posted: 17 Sep 2013 09:36 AM PDT |
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