Hi all, I own a cyrillic domain which is http://www.xn----btbgfprt6aza.com/ in English it will mean hotels-bg... It's a directory of the hotels in Bulgaria. I'm now translating the whole site to English. My question is, in terms of SEO, what would be the best structure i.e. http://www.english.xn----btbgfprt6aza.com/ http://www.xn----btbgfprt6aza.com/english or I just go and buy a new domain (the existing one is 7 months old, and if I go for a new domain, wouldn't google thing the sites are the same and ban me for using different domains for same content). In general, what is the best think to do if I want my site to appear in search engine results around the world (or at least when you type in English) Many thanks
I would get a new domain that is in English for the English translation. Google does not have issues with translations of websites however you may want to see what other people think about that first but I never had an issue with Google having any issues with translations.
Thanks for the quick reply. Wouldn't then google ban me for their index because the sites are with the exact same content but in different language? Or it's far away from "exact the same" as in different language. In webmaster tools I can see which are my strongest keywords but they are all Cyrillic words.
To what I recall, Google has no problem with translated content but you may want to wait to see what other users say about it. To me, I have never had a problem with it at all when I done it on websites.
I went for the new domain option and registered www.hotels-in-bulgaria.co.uk . It'n now up and running. Another SEO question that arises - shall I wait until I translate the whole site and the submit it to google or to submit it now so bots can gather information? If I submit it now, I'll have many linked pictures and texts that will lead to not existing pages, is that too bad?
You definitely made the right choice! If you're still constructing your site and the user will get 404 errors, then don't submit. In fact put a robots.txt file excluding search engines while you build it. Google hates sites with lots of broken links and might not trust you for a while. If you're adding content regularly and nicely though - with no broken pages - then start submitting now. Google likes things that change every time it visits, so it will actually do you a favour.
Is having different domains for the same site really a problem? I have a domain called http://traduccion-espanol-aleman.net and one called GB Translation, pointing to the same URL.