<link rel=”alternate” href=” https:\/\/www.belgianumbrellas.com\/be\/fr” hreflang=”fr-be” \/>
\n<link rel=”alternate” href=” https:\/\/www.belgianumbrellas.com\/be\/nl” hreflang=”nl-be” \/>
\n<link rel=”alternate” href=” https:\/\/www.belgianumbrellas.com\/fr” hreflang=”fr-fr” \/>
\n<link rel=”alternate” href=” https:\/\/www.belgianumbrellas.com\/nl” hreflang=”nl-nl” \/><\/p><\/blockquote>\n
<\/p>\n
This basically tells Google: This page exists in 4 versions to be served to different users so don\u2019t panic, this is not duplicate content. This example is only for the homepage, but the same logic applies to the rest of the pages. The fr-be version of the product page should have hreflang tags pointing to itself and the nl-be, fr-fr, and nl-nl product page, and so on. If a page in French doesn\u2019t have an exact duplicate in Dutch, then point to the most relevant Dutch page.<\/p>\n
Our example is made out of 2 dimensions.<\/p>\n
Language:<\/strong> The first bit (2 letter code from the ISO 639-1) indicates to Google crawlers the language of the page. That way, Google knows the page should be served for searches made from browsers set in French, or made from IP addresses in French-speaking countries. This works if you are only proposing content to be read by users. In our case, the delivery costs, contact phone numbers, and legal addresses change in the 3 markets. That\u2019s why there\u2019s a second bit to the hreflang, the one after the hyphen. Yes hyphen, not underscore. Never an underscore.<\/p>\n Location:<\/strong> The second bit (2 letter code from the ISO 3166-1 Alpha 2) is used by Google so it knows which page to serve to someone in a specified country. In our example, if the hreflang tags only contained languages, which page would show to a user based in Belgium, whose browser is configured in French. Google would have to choose between the Belgian-French and French-French versions of the page itself, based on other signals. But as the hreflang contains location as well, Google knows to serve the Belgian French version to the user. Hreflang tags can also work cross-domain. So if you use several sites for your language\/location versions, you can still implement hreflangs :<\/p>\n <link rel=”alternate” href=” https:\/\/www.belgianumbrellas.fr” hreflang=”fr-fr” \/> <\/p>\n So, if you\u2019re only displaying a few short stories you wrote on your website, you don\u2019t need hreflang tags. If you\u2019ve translated your stories, and\/or propose to print and deliver them worldwide, you\u2019ll want to use hreflang tags containing language and\/or location.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Like the hreflang tag, the canonical is a small piece of code talking to Google crawlers.<\/p>\n The difference is the message. Hreflang tags are used to inform Google that a page is devised for users of a certain language and location. Canonical tags, on the other side, are used only to tell Google: this page is almost identical to another, but please I\u2019d like the other one to rank higher. The canonicalized page may still show in the search results in some cases.<\/p>\n This is what a canonical tag looks like :<\/p>\n <link rel=”canonical” href=”https:\/\/www.thepageyouwanttorank.com” \/><\/p><\/blockquote>\n <\/p>\n When talking about \u2018almost identical\u2019 pages, we mean duplicate content, which comes in many forms<\/p>\n 1) Url variations of the exact same page. The simpler way is to redirect all of these to the one of your choosing, but if for some obscure reason you can\u2019t do that, you can canonicalize these<\/p>\n https:\/\/www.belgianumbrellas.com\/ <\/p>\n …you\u2019ve got the point<\/p>\n 2) The mobile or desktop versions of the same page<\/p>\n 3) Having parameters in your URL which indicate a small change in content. For instance, you are checking a page with umbrellas, but filtered on the red ones only):<\/p>\n https:\/\/www.belgianumbrellas.com\/products <\/p>\n 4) You\u2019ve got B2B and B2C sections on your website, but some pages are identical<\/p>\n 5) Etc etc<\/p>\n So the question now is: ok I\u2019ve got \u201cduplicate\u201d content, what\u2019s wrong with that exactly? Why would I want to redirect Google crawlers only to one version? The answer is twofold.<\/p>\n Taking the umbrella example again, let\u2019s say you\u2019ve got a main page selling pocket umbrellas, and 3 different sub-pages, based on the color of the product.<\/p>\n https:\/\/www.belgianumbrellas.com\/pocket-models <\/p>\n First, to make things clearer and easier for Google. Each subpage is ranking nicely on its own color search term, but you want to consolidate that ranking on the pocket umbrella main page. Using canonicals, you\u2019ll point Google to the main page to have it rank higher, and benefit from the ranking of all 3 subpages.<\/p>\n Second, the same principle applies to link equity (the principle with which your page authority benefits from internal or external links). If you\u2019ve got different external links landing on your subpages, it might be a good idea to bring that link equity to the main page. People will still land on your subpages, but your main page will gain authority.<\/p>\n Side note – syndicated pages: canonical tags are not limited to your own domain. Let\u2019s say you wrote an article, which you then shared to be republished on another website. If that site has a globally better rank than yours, their page with your syndicated article will probably show up higher in search results. What you want to do then, is to add a cross-domain canonical tag to the syndicated content, and a self-referencing canonical tag to the original content. As a basis, self-referencing tags are recommended, as it shows Google which page you want to be indexed, and how the url should look when indexed. For example, articles on our blog have self-referencing canonicals:<\/p>\n <\/p>\n All in all, adding hreflang and canonical tags to your website isn\u2019t that complicated. However, you might want to be careful if you need both types of tags.<<\/p>\n Let\u2019s say Google tries to analyze the following page :<\/p>\n https:\/\/www.belgianumbrellas.com\/be\/fr\/pocket-models?color=red<\/p><\/blockquote>\n <\/p>\n And you\u2019ve added to that page both hreflang tags for all language\/location versions,\u00a0 as well as a canonical directing Google to the main page<\/p>\n As a reminder :<\/p>\n With the hreflang you signal Google that the page should be indexed to be served for people in Belgium, with a browser set in French,<\/p>\n With the canonical, you\u2019re telling Google to go look at the following instead<\/p>\n https:\/\/www.belgianumbrellas.com\/be\/fr\/pocket-models<\/p><\/blockquote>\n <\/p>\n You can understand that this doesn\u2019t really work. The tags are telling Google at the same time to index that page and other versions, but not to look at it, and go index another page.<\/p>\n The solution: don\u2019t use hreflang tags on pages that are canonicalized. That way, you make the crawler go in steps. First, the crawler is directed to the page you actually want it to look at with the canonical, then it discovers the language and location of the page, as well as its translations.[\/vc_column_text][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row type=”in_container” full_screen_row_position=”middle” column_margin=”default” column_direction=”default” column_direction_tablet=”default” column_direction_phone=”default” scene_position=”center” text_color=”dark” text_align=”left” row_border_radius=”none” row_border_radius_applies=”bg” overflow=”visible” overlay_strength=”0.3″ gradient_direction=”left_to_right” shape_divider_position=”bottom” bg_image_animation=”none”][vc_column column_padding=”no-extra-padding” column_padding_tablet=”inherit” column_padding_phone=”inherit” column_padding_position=”all” column_element_spacing=”default” background_color_opacity=”1″ background_hover_color_opacity=”1″ column_shadow=”none” column_border_radius=”none” column_link_target=”_self” column_position=”default” gradient_direction=”left_to_right” overlay_strength=”0.3″ width=”1\/1″ tablet_width_inherit=”default” tablet_text_alignment=”default” phone_text_alignment=”default” animation_type=”default” bg_image_animation=”none” border_type=”simple” column_border_width=”none” column_border_style=”solid”][nectar_global_section id=”31229″][\/vc_column][\/vc_row]\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" [vc_row type=”in_container” full_screen_row_position=”middle” column_margin=”default” column_direction=”default” column_direction_tablet=”default” column_direction_phone=”default” scene_position=”center” top_padding=”50″ text_color=”dark” text_align=”left” row_border_radius=”none” row_border_radius_applies=”bg” overflow=”visible” advanced_gradient_angle=”0″ overlay_strength=”0.3″ gradient_direction=”left_to_right” shape_divider_position=”bottom” bg_image_animation=”none” gradient_type=”default” shape_type=””][vc_column column_padding=”no-extra-padding” column_padding_tablet=”inherit” column_padding_phone=”inherit” column_padding_position=”all”…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"two_page_speed":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[232],"tags":[242],"level":[199],"class_list":{"0":"post-38827","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-seo","7":"tag-international-seo-fr","8":"level-channel-specialist-fr"},"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n
\n<link rel=”alternate” href=” https:\/\/www.belgianumbrellas.be\/fr” hreflang=”fr-be” \/><\/p><\/blockquote>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/clicktrust.be\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/international.png\")
<\/h2>\nCanonicals tags<\/h2>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/clicktrust.be\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/duplicate-content-300x300-1.png\")
<\/p>\n
\nhttps:\/\/www.belgianumbrellas.com
\nhttp:\/\/www.belgianumbrellas.com\/
\nhttps:\/\/belgianumbrellas.com\/<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
\nhttps:\/\/www.belgianumbrellas.com\/products?color=red<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
\nhttps:\/\/www.belgianumbrellas.com\/pocket-models?color=red
\nhttps:\/\/www.belgianumbrellas.com\/pocket-models?color=green
\nhttps:\/\/www.belgianumbrellas.com\/pocket-models?color=blue<\/p><\/blockquote>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/clicktrust.be\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/Self-reference-1-1024x71-1.jpg\")
<\/h2>\nHreflang & canonicals used together<\/h2>\n