Crafting an SEO Localisation Strategy: Paired's Dimitris Drakatos in Conversation

For global SEO and content specialists it can be tricky to answer if there’s a point where true translation ends and SEO begins.

The best translation projects go beyond flat localisation and actually support commercial and business goals – and for digital businesses, earning rankings in Google is a critical priority.

In this short interview, we’re pleased to feature Paired’s Dimitris Drakatos, as he shares his views on the interplay between translation and SEO.

What can you tell us about Paired and what's your role?

Paired is the #1 app for couples. I joined Paired two years ago to lead all things SEO & ASO as their first Head of SEO & ASO. My goal was to help Paired become a recognisable brand for couples who search on search engines or app stores for help improving their relationships, and most importantly, to increase the company's organic revenue.

We started with a bit less than 5,000 non-branded monthly organic visits, and now we get more than 250,000 visitors each month on our website. However, we still have a lot of work ahead.

When creating an international SEO strategy, what's your starting point?

I always try to understand the potential for each market. In most cases, companies don't want to invest in all languages/regions. So, we need to ensure that through SEO, we can help them make a data-driven decision. This means I analyse the traffic potential and try to project the impact (in business metrics like installs or revenue) of investing in a specific language, along with the effort/resources we will need.

At the same time, you want to start with the pages that have the highest potential. Identify the English-written website pages that generate the most revenue for you (or installs, MQLs, or any other crucial business metric you’re using) and start translating them.

For marketers there are lots of decisions to make around content creation when growing globally - what are some of the benefits of using translators who understand contemporary SEO?

I’m strongly in favour of using translators who understand SEO. It will help speed up the translation process. Let me explain this in more detail.

When you request a translation for a page that has SEO value, you want the translated page to be as great as the original one in terms of SEO. You will definitely provide the translator with an SEO brief specific to the language you want the page to be translated into.

Sometimes, you need to make adjustments to the original content, but you need to ensure you’re not hurting the overall SEO of the page. This is where an SEO-savvy translator makes a real difference.

What's your view on blended approaches like 'transcreation' for SEO growth?

In my opinion, it’s the way to go. Often, each language requires its own unique approach, but you also want the translated text to follow the original’s tone of voice, context, brand identity, and of course, SEO.

You want to work with people who can easily understand all of the above and will not simply translate your content robotically. They should be able to come back and say, "In French, this is not used, but we can use that instead."

The SEO principles remain the same, but you need someone who can help you take your localised content to the next level and compete with local players.

What are some of the best ways to carry out international keyword research in multiple languages?

 I always try to stick with a process that’s proven to work for me. It’s not something fancy, but it works. I always follow these steps:

1. Translate your English keywords into your selected languages. I usually use tools like ChatGPT to help me in bulk, but I always use a translator afterward to QA the translations and ensure they catch any mistakes or wrong translations.
2. Once I have my translated keywords list ready, I start performing my usual process of keyword research. Sometimes, you may see that a few translated keywords don’t have the same demand (monthly searches/traffic potential) as the original English ones. In this case, I try to expand my research because sometimes there’s another keyword that is contextually/semantically related to the original. This happens with the English keywords sometimes. For example, with EN-GB, you have ‘annual leave,’ but with EN-US, you have ‘paid time off/PTO.’
3. The final step is prioritisation. Here, I always go with the ‘money’ (most valuable) keywords along with the ones that will help us build topical authority in the new territories.

Google's Helpful Content updates have hit some brands hard - do you feel that these updates are impacting brands equally across all countries? 

From what I’ve seen so far, the English-written (mostly US) sites are the ones that have been hit harder. I’m not saying that the non-English content websites weren’t hit, but based on what I’ve seen over almost a year now, I feel that the HCU was lighter with them - at least for now.

‍Thanks to Dimitris for taking part - to learn more about ICS-translate's processes for international localisation, click here.