The first major decision in international SEO is URL structure: a country-code top-level domain (example.co.uk) sends the strongest geo-targeting signal but requires managing separate domains and their own authority-building; a subdomain (uk.example.com) or subdirectory (example.com/uk/) both keep authority consolidated under one root domain, with subdirectories generally considered slightly easier to manage and marginally favored for authority consolidation. Beyond URL structure, international SEO requires hreflang implementation to connect language/region variants correctly, genuinely localized content (not just machine-translated text, which both users and increasingly search engines can identify as lower quality), and awareness that search engine market share itself varies by country — Baidu in China and Yandex in Russia matter more than Google in those markets.
Example
A company expanding into the UK and Germany chooses subdirectories (/uk/, /de/) over new ccTLDs, consolidating domain authority under one root domain while still using hreflang to serve each market its own localized pricing page.
Related terms
Related terms
Related Reading
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A 404 error is the standard HTTP status code returned when a requested page doesn't exist on the server — the classic 'page not found' response.
A/B Testing (SEO)
A/B testing in SEO is the practice of showing two versions of a page element — usually a title tag, meta description, or on-page element — to see which one earns a better click-through rate or ranking outcome.
AI Citation
An AI citation happens when an AI assistant like ChatGPT, Perplexity, Claude, or Gemini references or links to a specific page as the source for part of its answer.
