How Do You Optimize Content For Bilingual Or Multilingual Voice Search Users?

Story Based Question

You manage SEO for a popular travel agency with a global customer base. The company recently noticed an increasing number of voice search queries coming from bilingual and multilingual users. Potential customers ask about travel packages, flight availability, and hotel accommodations using different languages. Some voice queries come in both English and Spanish, while others mix English with local dialects of various countries.

The marketing team wonders how to optimize the content so that these multilingual and bilingual voice search users can easily find the information they need. They ask: “How do you optimize content for bilingual or multilingual voice search users?”

This leads to the key question: How do you optimize content for bilingual or multilingual voice search users?

Exact Answer

To optimize content for bilingual or multilingual voice search users, you should create content in multiple languages, use hreflang tags for language targeting, ensure your schema markup supports multilingual content, and focus on natural language processing (NLP) that understands different language patterns and accents.

Explanation

Bilingual and multilingual users often make voice search queries in their native language, which can include slang, regional dialects, and informal phrases. Optimizing your content for these diverse users means accommodating various languages and language patterns. By following these steps, you ensure that your content shows up in voice search results, regardless of the language or dialect used by the searcher.

Here’s how to optimize for bilingual and multilingual voice search users:

1. Create Content in Multiple Languages
   Providing content in multiple languages ensures that users can find the information they need, regardless of their preferred language. For example, if you operate in both English- and Spanish-speaking regions, create separate pages or sections in both languages.
   • Action: Translate your most important pages (e.g., product descriptions, FAQs, service details) into the languages of your target audience. Make sure that the content is accurate and natural, rather than just a direct translation.
2. Use Hreflang Tags
   Hreflang tags help search engines understand which language version of a page should be shown to users based on their location or language preferences. This is especially useful for bilingual and multilingual content, as it ensures users see the correct version of the page for their language.
   • Action: Add hreflang tags to your website’s code to specify which language or regional version of the page to display. For instance, if you have a Spanish version of a page, the hreflang tag would look like this:

Example

Imagine your travel agency operates in both English and Spanish-speaking markets. Here’s how you would optimize for bilingual and multilingual voice search users:

Step 1: Create Content in Multiple Languages
You start by translating the most visited pages of your website into both English and Spanish. For instance, the page for “Top 10 Places to Visit in Paris” is translated into Spanish as “Los 10 Mejores Lugares para Visitar en París”. You ensure the translation is fluid and not just a literal translation.

• Action: A Spanish-speaking customer in Spain asks, “¿Cuáles son los mejores lugares para visitar en París?” (What are the best places to visit in Paris?). Your Spanish page is ready to show up as the answer.

Step 2: Use Hreflang Tags
You add hreflang tags to your pages to specify which language version should be shown based on the user’s location and language.

• Action: On your English page, you add this hreflang tag:
  
  <link rel=”alternate” href=”https://www.example.com/en” hreflang=”en”>
  
  On the Spanish page, you use:
  
  <link rel=”alternate” href=”https://www.example.com/es” hreflang=”es”>

Step 3: Optimize Schema Markup
For your travel packages page, you add schema markup to indicate that the page is available in multiple languages.

• Action: In your schema, you use the inLanguage property to specify both English and Spanish versions:
  
  {
  “@context”: “https://schema.org”,
  “@type”: “Product”,
  “name”: “Travel Package to Paris”,
  “inLanguage”: [“en”, “es”],
  “description”: “Explore the top attractions of Paris with this all-inclusive travel package.”
  }

Step 4: Focus on Natural Language Processing (NLP)
You focus on making sure that both English and Spanish content sound conversational and reflect how people speak in real life. You include phrases like “best hotels near me” in English and “los mejores hoteles cerca de mí” in Spanish.

• Action: A customer speaks to their voice assistant in Spanish: “¿Cuáles son los mejores hoteles cerca de mí?” Your page with the appropriate Spanish content responds with the relevant information.

Step 5: Test and Optimize for Accents
You run tests to check how your content performs when voice queries come from different regions (e.g., from Spanish speakers in Mexico vs. Spain). You tweak your content to better match the speech patterns and slang used in each region.

• Action: A voice search in Mexico asks: “¿Dónde está el mejor hotel en Cancún?” (Where is the best hotel in Cancun?). You ensure that your page is optimized for this dialect and regional phrases.

Optimizing for bilingual or multilingual voice search users means creating content in multiple languages, using hreflang tags to specify language versions, implementing schema markup that supports multiple languages, and ensuring your content speaks in natural, conversational tones. By testing for different accents and speech patterns, you can make sure that your content reaches a wider audience and provides accurate answers in voice search.