The effects of linking from a foreign site

[TheShortStack]

Has anyone noticed any problems from linking back to your site from foreign websites?

I guess I specifically mean those sites that are written using a completely different alphabet such as Russian or Bulgarian.

Is a good link a good link? Or does the native language of the linking site play a role in the effectiveness of a link.

Cheers,

[pamela]

such links are good because it means that you receive links from a wider source (wider by geography and language), and this increases your "authority".

[Michael Martinez]

However, if the number of foreign character set links is higher than your native character set links, I suspect the search engines might sit up and take notice (algorithmically).

It's good to have a mix of links from many sources. It's not good to beat any one type of source to death.

[pokeraussie]

Interesting discussion. I think that quality links from foreign sites can only be a good thing for seo.

@Michael

When you suggest the search engines might sit up and take notice, what do you mean exactly? The engine would deem your website to be more relevant to a specific geo, so you rank better in that location but worse on google.com ?

Let's say you have the content of your website translated to other languages to reach a wider audience. What would be the best strategy for seo? Should you publish the content in a sub-folder, sub-domain, or completely different domain name to avoid the problem you speak of?

[Ridge]

I cannot speak for what Michale said, but for this part:

Let's say you have the content of your website translated to other languages to reach a wider audience. What would be the best strategy for seo? Should you publish the content in a sub-folder, sub-domain, or completely different domain name to avoid the problem you speak of?

This has been discussed man times on here, and from what I have seen on other websites and my own which are translated into 7 languages, sub-domain like french.rakeback.com vs rakeback.com/fr/ or French/ doesn't seem to matter much if at all. Personally I use the /fr/ and not the sub-domain.

Once your translated pages are properly indexed google seem pretty smart about ranking you in the proper data center like google.fr for example. you can still have those pages show up in google.com, but overall your target should be /fr/ or w/e country you are going after.

This seems pretty standard for .com/net/org's but I have never used a .info or a country specific domain, but I would suspect rakeback.ru would have a hard time ranking in the google.fr center.

As for the Original post about links from foreign websites, as with anything else you want the most relevant links you can have. So if you have a US website with German pages, and you want to rank better for your German pages, it stands to reason getting a good link form a German page or website would be more powerful than a link form a US site. Non German links would provide value too, but I suspect it would be viewed as less relevant.

[pokeraussie]

Thanks Ridge. I would imagine it's the same for .info considering its a TLD. I'm leaning toward sub-folders because with sub-domains you are basically starting from scratch with regard to domain authority and rankings. My concern is that once you start getting foreign links to the foreign pages, will search engines begin to consider the site more relevant to a specific geo and you start losing traffic on google.com ? I'm guessing that you would maintain rankings on google.com and the foreign links might even give you a boost, but it can't hurt to ask.

Out of interest, did you start showing in other local datacenters straight after publishing the translated content, or were you required to get geo links to the new pages? I hope I haven't derailed this thread too much, I feel its quite relevant to the discussion when you look at the translated content/foreign links angle.

[Ridge]

Ah you bet man, and this is a great discussion you guys have started. I've been very sick the last couple weeks so its good to see a post where I have to do a lot of thinking before posting.

My concern is that once you start getting foreign links to the foreign pages, will search engines begin to consider the site more relevant to a specific geo and you start losing traffic on google.com ? I'm guessing that you would maintain rankings on google.com and the foreign links might even give you a boost, but it can't hurt to ask.

I have 7 sites that are translted into 3-8 different languages. So far I have not see that at all. What I have seen is more rankings in what I call the "General Search Engine" meaning google.com - so not only do I see new results in the .fr/.de/etc Search engines, but some pages will show in the .com general SE as well. Remember just because a person lives in Spain doesn't mean he has to use the geo targetted SE. He can use .com anytime he wants, just as we can use others.

So I have actually seen more searches not only from geo specific SE's but also from the general search. To me it is great to expand your content because you are telling SE's "Hey, I'm not just a one dimensional websites. I'm providing good solid content for all visitors.

Out of interest, did you start showing in other local datacenters straight after publishing the translated content, or were you required to get geo links to the new pages?

My pages didn't take long to index, and I had decent rankings right away. I often wonder but have never researched it, but I'm guessing a bug majority of websites are in English, so if you go after no US terms you will do well I think.

Also, I don't think I have but a few and in some cases 0 links from a non US website. I have links from English sites/pages to my non Us pages, but again very few. Either way it didn't take long for the new pages to show up.

[Michael Martinez]

@Michael

When you suggest the search engines might sit up and take notice, what do you mean exactly? The engine would deem your website to be more relevant to a specific geo, so you rank better in that location but worse on google.com ?

All I really mean is that they look for anomalies. A common practice is a two-sided coin/sword.

The fact everyone is doing something means it won't work well for anyone.
The fact everyone is doing something means it may be tolerated by search engines (but not always).

If your linking practices fall well outside the norm, search engineers might be flagged to take a closer look (human review is part of the process of refining and enforcing the algorithm).

-Let's say you have the content of your website translated to other languages to reach a wider audience. What would be the best strategy for seo? Should you publish the content in a sub-folder, sub-domain, or completely different domain name to avoid the problem you speak of?

I was referring to a potentially artificial linking pattern. Abnormal linking patterns may be completely natural. I would expect search engineers to tolerate a natural but unusual linking pattern.

I'm just trying to be a voice of caution in an industry that is so competitive that people focus on obtaining links.

[jimmyhudson122]

Getting a link from a foreign site is not very much valuable but you can get little value from it and there is no harm getting such a link. You can get link juice too.

[pheal]

Getting a link from a foreign site is not very much valuable but you can get little value from it and there is no harm getting such a link. You can get link juice too.

I have to disagree with this. From my own experience, I found that good links from foreign websites were extremely valuable and helped to improve results tremendously for local search.