Link building For International Targeting

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Barcelona International Search Summit Rad Paluszak Husky Hamster Link building for international targeting

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Link building For International Targeting Rad Paluszak What to do and what NOT to do?

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Agenda 02 Google’s View 03 The Data 04 Case Studies 05 Takeaways About Me 01

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Rad Paluszak About Me

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▪ In SEO since 2010 ▪ Web developer since 2001 ▪ Software engineer and computer systems architect ▪ I love simplifying possibly everything, because most of the things don’t have to be complicated – AKA Pragmattic ▪ Technical SEO Artist ▪ Social media @radpaluszak About Me Rad Paluszak

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About Me | Agencies x

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About Me | From The Life of SEO…

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About Me | From The Life of SEO…

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About Me | From The Life of SEO…

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About Me | From The Life of SEO… Set geo-targets for gTLD domains! Generic top-level domains: .com .net .org .co .social .me .agency …

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Part 2: What Google Says About Links?

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Google’s View | Links

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Google’s View | Links “It’s something, I imagine, over time (…) the weight of the links, at some point, will drop off a little bit, as we (…) can figure out a little bit better how the content (…) fits in withing the context of the whole web. To some extent links will be always something that we care about because we have to find pages somehow. (…) But my guess is, over time, it won’t be such a big factor as (…) sometimes it is today. (…) That’s something that’s been changing quite a bit.” ~ John Mueller

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US9400849B1: Scalable system for determining short paths within web link network Google’s View | PageRank II Your Site L i n k P r o f i l e Seed Site 2 Seed Site 1 Seed Site 4 !Seed Site 3 ! ! ! Link Link Link Link Link Link Link Link Link Link Link Link Link Link Link Link Link Link Link Link Link Link Link Link Link Link

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Theory: Google STILL pays attention* to the language profile of your links, BUT … Google’s View | Multilingual PageRank? ! Seed sites are topic-dependent. ! The closer your are to the seed, the better. Seeds are “spam-free” websites calculated/selected by Google’s algorithm ! ! If topic-dependent, they are also country-dependent!

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Google MUM BUT… It can understand it perfectly.

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Part 3&4: Data & Case Studies

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The Data 1 | Cross-Country Linking ▪ Domain: .com ▪ Niche: Gambling ▪ Target Countries: Spain , Colombia , Peru (mostly), LATAM ▪ Site’s Age: 18 months (since the site built) ▪ Links Built: 4-10 per month

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Case Study 1 | Cross-Country Linking 4-5 links per month ES only No Link Building 5-6 links per month ES + LATAM 8-10 links per month LATAM + ES + EN Only LATAM links

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The Data 2 | Cross-Country Linking 2 ▪ Domain: .ar ▪ Niche: Lottery ▪ Target Countries: Argentina (mostly), Peru , LATAM ▪ Site’s Age: 0 (auctioned empty at 5 months old) ▪ Go Live Date: 25-02-2022 ▪ Links Built: 10 initially, later 4-10 per month ▪ Total Pages: 45

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The Data 2 | Price List Domain ………………..…………………… Website …………………………………….. Time ……….…………………………………… Links ……………………………………………. 200 $ 50 $ 100 $ 0 $ Total …………………………………………… 350 $

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▪ Research: Approximately 20h ▪ Content: 200 words (GPT-3 generated) ▪ Other: Building API ~ 40h The Data 2 | The REAL Price List ~3 000 $ 350 $

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Case Study 2 | New Site’s Traffic in Under 1 Month Start 3 weeks later

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Ostatni Projekt | Frazy

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Case Study 2 | Keywords in Under 1 Month 1.1 Million MSV Keyword in TOP10 under 3 weeks!

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Case Study 2 | Cross-Country Linking 2 Initial Growth Helpful Content Added EN Links 4-5 links per month LATAM + ES

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Case Study 2 | Cross-Country Linking 2 Initial Growth Helpful Content Added EN Links 4-5 links per month LATAM + ES

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The Data 3 | Cross-Country Linking Goes Wrong ▪ Domain: .cam ▪ Niche: Gambling ▪ Target Country: Thailand ▪ Site’s Age: 2 years ▪ Problems: Seriously affected close to the May ‘22 Core Update ▪ Average Link Velocity (built by client): 60 per month 60 links per month

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The Data | Cross-Country Linking Core update

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Case Study 3 | Cross-Country Linking Goes Wrong EN TH EN TH EN TH

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Part 5: Takeaways

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▪ Folders (e.g. /es) let you keep “everything under one roof” ▪ Link power compounds at the domain level. ▪ Subdomains are usually treated as different entities. ▪ If something goes wrong, you can still “cut off the limb” With subdomains you are forced to start anew. Use /folders instead of subdomains.

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▪ In the past only gTLDs were affected by international targeting Google could disregard the user setting and apply the country of its own, algorithmic choice. ▪ Currently, the ccTLDs can also change their country targeting and it’s all controlled by the algorithm. ▪ “Foreign” links are subject to PageRank and other standard mechanisms. ccTLDs and gTLDs can undergo language change

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▪ Hreflangs are A MUST for a multilingual website. ▪ Hreflang tags create a powerful, virtual connection between pages. ▪ They allow you more leeway (and safety) in cross-country linking. (TBC) ▪ If noindex on one page in an “hreflang cluster” affects the whole cluster – so will links. Implement hreflangs – duh!

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▪ Keyword taken into consideration “buy bitcoin” in local language. ▪ It’s obvious that the difficulty changes from country to country. ▪ When 2 (or more) countries have the same language, go after links from a country that is easier. Be smart ▪ huskyhamster.com/iss Leverage same-language links

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▪ Never pay for links They just appear on their own. White hat only! ▪ The total monetary value of a link includes salary, time, linkable asset price, content, business overheads, etc. ▪ An average link from Brazil is $60 “cheaper” than a comparably powerful link from Portugal. ▪ When looking at LATAM vs Spain, the difference is $110 . International link costs

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▪ Links from other countries can get you A LOT of link juice ▪ They can also swap the “language” profile of your domain. ▪ Use hreflangs. ▪ Link from the language you have on the targeted page ▪ Don’t overuse links from languages or locations you don’t support, because if you mess up it WIL HURT YOUR RANKINGS ACROSS THE BOARD. Solution: Supplement, supplement, supplement! International link building rules

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Thank You! huskyhamster.com rad@huskyhamster.com https://huskyhamster.com/iss