When expanding into new markets, translating websites isn’t just about adapting the body text—it starts from the top. Metadata, including title tags and meta descriptions, is often the first thing users see in search results. These small snippets capture attention, encourage clicks, and signal relevance to search engines. If done poorly, even high-quality content can be overlooked.
In SEO, metadata summarizes a webpage’s content that helps search engines index it properly. Accurate, culturally adapted metadata ensures that your website appears in the right place, to the right audience, at the right time. Even the best content may never reach its full visibility potential without proper translation. Now let’s break down why translating metadata matters, what pitfalls to avoid, and how to do it effectively.
What is metadata in the context of SEO?
Metadata is a crucial component that isn’t directly visible to users when they open a page, but it plays a significant role in how a page appears in search results. Metadata sends signals to search engines about the content of a webpage and helps them display the most relevant version to users based on keywords, language, and location. Additionally, metadata gives a first impression to potential visitors, as it is typically shown in search results and social media previews.
Here are the main metadata elements in the context of SEO.
- Title tag: This page title appears as the blue (or purple if previously visited) clickable text on Google’s search results page. It’s the first element users see and one of the most important signals for SEO. The title should be relevant, include the target keyword, and be compelling enough to attract clicks.
- Meta description: The meta description is a short text snippet below the title tag in search results. While not a direct ranking factor, it influences the click-through rate (CTR). A well-crafted, informative description that aligns with the search intent can increase the number of users who click on your site.
- Alt text (Image Alternative Text): Alt text describes images on a webpage for accessibility and SEO purposes. Search engines can’t “see” images, so alt text helps them understand visual content. Translating alt text into the appropriate language is vital in a multilingual SEO strategy.
Why translating metadata matter for multilingual SEO?
Metadata acts as the first entry point for users and search engines to understand the content of a page. In the context of a multilingual site, poorly translated metadata can lead to misperceptions, lower local search rankings, and decreased clicks from users.
Therefore, translating metadata is not just a formality, but an essential part of an effective international SEO strategy. Here are some reasons why metadata translation is essential for multilingual SEO:
- Increase visibility in local search results
- Tailor metadata to local user search behavior and intent
- Increases click-through rate (CTR) with relevant titles and descriptions
- Avoid content duplication and improve indexing with proper technical tags
- Provide a consistent and culturally appropriate user experience
- Optimize SEO performance across regions through multilingual metadata analysis
Common mistakes to avoid when translating metadata
Many website owners make common mistakes when translating metadata for multilingual SEO. These mistakes seem trivial, but have a huge impact on search performance. They can make content hard to find, confuse users, or ruin the local experience.
Some common mistakes should be avoided in the metadata translation process.
Translates metadata without local keyword research
The first common mistake is translating metadata directly without doing local keyword research. This causes the metadata to sound unfamiliar or incompatible with how local users search. For example, the phrase “cheap flights” may translate into many languages, but it’s not necessarily a phrase that is commonly used in search results in the destination country.
Without local keyword research, your metadata risks using terms that are rarely searched or less relevant, thus reducing its chances of appearing on the first page of search engines. Tools such as Ahrefs, Semrush, or Google Trends are highly recommended to explore keywords that fit each region’s cultural context and search behavior.
Not adjusting character length, formatting, or punctuation
Each language has different character lengths. German, for example, tends to use longer words than English. The title or description may be truncated in the search results if the metadata is not customized.
Apart from character length, punctuation, and writing format also need to be considered. Unique characters in Japanese, Arabic, or Russian can make metadata look strange if handled improperly. A simple tip:
- Always test metadata in different languages to see if it displays well on Google.
- Pay attention to the maximum number of 60 characters for the title tag and 155 for the meta description (may vary depending on the language).
Not applying hreflang tags correctly
The hreflang tag is an essential element in multilingual SEO. Without it, search engines don’t know which language version to display to users. Even if you have translated your metadata well, the results will not be optimal if hreflang is not configured correctly. Common mistakes that often occur include.
- Writing the wrong language and region codes (e.g. en-uk instead of en-gb)
- Not including self-referencing hreflang (the language version of the page itself)
- Skipping one or more language versions on a particular page
- If these tags are incorrect, users may be redirected to a language version they don’t understand, damaging the user experience and increasing bounce rates.
Relying 100% on automatic translation
Automated translation tools like these can provide quick results, but are often inaccurate. Machine translation cannot fully capture the nuances of language, local idioms, or cultural context. Automated translation metadata often sounds stilted, strange, or even confusing.
For example, an effective marketing slogan in English can change meaning if translated literally into another language. This is why many professional sites use a hybrid approach, combining automation with manual review by native speakers.
Forgetting image alt text and technical metadata
Alt text on images, technical metadata, and canonical tags are often forgotten when translating sites. These elements help search engines understand page content and improve visibility across multiple platforms.
Search engines can miss important visual context without alt text in the target language. Meanwhile, technical metadata that remains in the original language can be confusing when shared on social media or search engines, which display page snippets.
Therefore, ensure that all metadata elements—not just the title and meta description—are thoroughly translated and optimized.
Not translating slug URLs
URL slugs that remain in the original language can make localized pages feel inconsistent or unprofessional. For example, a product page in Spanish still uses the URL /running-shoes instead of /zapatillas-para-correr, making it less optimized for local searches. Still, it can also hurt SEO because it is less relevant to local keywords. Some benefits of translating URL slugs include.
- Increases relevance to local keywords
- Provides a more consistent user experience
- Helps search engines understand the local context of the page
However, don’t forget to create a 301 redirect from the old slug to the new one if it has been indexed, so as not to lose traffic from the previous link.
Best practices for translating metadata
After understanding the common mistakes that often occur in translating metadata, the next step is to implement best practices that have proven effective in improving multilingual SEO performance.
These practices help the metadata appear more relevant in local search engines and ensure the user experience remains consistent across all site language versions. Here are some practices that you can do.
Do local keyword research for metadata
Conducting local keyword research is the most crucial step in translating metadata. Instead of just translating keywords from the original language, it is important to understand how users in the target market search. The same language can have different search terms depending on culture, customs, and search habits.
For example, “running shoes” in English may translate to “zapatillas para correr” in Spain. But if research shows that users search more often for “zapatillas deportivas”, that’s the keyword that should be used. This research can be done using tools such as.
- Google Trends to understand search trends
- SEMrush or Ahrefs for search volume per country or language
- Google Keyword Planner to find local keyword variations
By understanding local keywords, the metadata you create will be more in line with user behavior and can increase the potential for clicks from search results.
Customize metadata to the characteristics of the target language
Each language has different characteristics word length, sentence structure, to punctuation usage. If the metadata is not adapted to the characteristics of the target language, the results can feel awkward, too long, or even cut off in search results. Take the following language examples.
- German tends to have longer words than English. Therefore, the page title must be reorganized to remain informative while not exceeding the character limit.
- Japanese and Chinese use more compact characters so that metadata can be shorter but still meaningful.
- Arabic or Hebrew languages written from right to left require special attention when displaying metadata in the site interface.
Customizing metadata to the local language style not only helps visibility, but also increases user trust and comfort when viewing your site in search results.
Ensure technical elements are configured according to language version
Metadata optimization will not be maximized without the correct technical configuration. One important element is the hreflang tag, which tells search engines which language version should be displayed to users based on their location or language. Here is an example of the proper use of the hreflang tag.
<link rel="alternate" href="https://example.com/en/running-shoes" hreflang="en" />
<link rel="alternate" href="https://example.com/es/zapatillas-deportivas" hreflang="es" />
<link rel="alternate" href="https://example.com/fr/chaussures-de-course" hreflang="fr" />
<link rel="alternate" href="https://example.com/" hreflang="x-default" />
Description:
- hreflang=“en” for English-speaking users.
- hreflang=“es” for Spanish-speaking users.
- hreflang=“fr” for French-speaking users.
- hreflang=“x-default” indicates the fallback URL if there is no language match.
Besides hreflang, there are a few other technical elements to be aware of.
- Canonical tags: Avoid duplicate content between language versions by tagging the main URL.
- URL slug: Use local language slugs to ensure that the URL is semantically relevant and easy to read by local users.
- Sitemap: Create a customized sitemap for each language to facilitate search engine crawling and support a clean site structure.
Errors in technical configuration, such as inconsistent use of hreflang or not including all language versions, can cause well-translated metadata to still not appear optimally in local search results. Therefore, it is important to test technical implementations regularly.
Apply a hybrid approach (both automatic & manual)
The hybrid approach combines the speed of automated translation with human translators’ accuracy and cultural sensitivity. This is ideal for metadata because it is short in character length, but it still requires an understanding of context and intent.
Remembering that a hybrid is not simply using an automated translation tool and leaving it at that. This means you can’t just rely on the results of tools like plugins or automated translation services. Ensure the tools you use have manual editing features, such as an in-context editor or live editor, so that you can customize the metadata with more precise local language, style, and nuances.
With this approach, you don’t have to choose between quality and speed- you can have both, provided you actively manage and manually fine-tune the translation when necessary.
Use business intelligence tools to analyze metadata performance
Finally, measuring performance metadata is important to know what’s working and needs improvement. Business intelligence tools like Sisense or Strategy can help you analyze CTR (click-through rate), keyword ranking, and regional performance differences. Through this data, you can:
- Find which metadata is generating low CTR and needs to be re-optimized.
- Analyze the relationship between local keywords and page performance.
- Identify opportunities for content development in specific markets.
Automating and optimizing metadata translation with Linguise
Managing metadata in a multilingual SEO project can be complex, especially if many pages need to be translated and optimized. This is where Linguise comes in. It is an AI-based automatic translation tool specifically designed for the needs of multilingual websites.
Here are some of Linguise’s key features to help you automate and optimize metadata translation effectively.
Automatic and real-time metadata translation
Linguise automatically detects metadata such as title and meta description on each page, and translates them in real-time into multiple languages. This process is fast and can be implemented immediately without having to manually edit each page.
For example, in the following example article, when searching in English, metadata such as title tag, meta description and slug will be available in English.
However, when you search using Spanish for example, it will automatically be available in that language.
Managing media and external links
Linguise handles text translation and gives you control over URLs that appear in content, including media and external links. This is important because effective metadata must be consistent with the links that support it. For example, if you have a page description in French that mentions a product guide PDF file, the link still points to an English file, which creates metadata inconsistencies that can disrupt user experience and lower SEO performance.
You can do some things with the URL management feature in Linguise.
- Edit links from the dashboard or frontend editor: You can change URLs from the Linguise dashboard through the Translations > Media and External Links menu, or directly through the visual editor on the frontend.
- Add new links per language: For example, a PDF file in English, https://www.yourdomain.com/file.pdf, can be replaced with the French version, https://www.yourdomain.com/fichier.pdf, so that users are not redirected to content in the wrong language.
- List all customized links: Linguise records and displays all customized URLs, so you can track and ensure metadata consistency across language versions.
- Image URLs can also be customized: You can specify different images per language. This is useful for metadata such as image alt text, which should accurately describe the image in the context of the user’s language.
URL management
URL management is an important aspect of maintaining metadata consistency and multilingual SEO effectiveness, as metadata such as page titles, descriptions, and image alt texts will lose their relevance if they are associated with URLs that do not match the language or cultural context of the user.
In Linguise, you can not only translate pages and metadata, but also manage all translated URLs centrally and systematically through the URLs Management feature in the dashboard. Here are some of the features you can use
- Filter by language or text: You can filter URLs by target language, original text, or translated results. This is very helpful for finding and editing specific URLs quickly, without having to search for them one by one manually.
- Edit directly from the dashboard: Translated URLs can be edited directly if they need to be adapted to more culturally or semantically appropriate terms. This is especially important so that metadata such as title and meta description remain relevant and accurate to the referring page.
Hreflang tag implementation
Linguise automatically generates hreflang tags for each language version so that search engines understand which version of content is relevant for each user based on their language and location.
In addition, this tool also optimizes technical elements such as canonical URLs and multilingual sitemaps automatically.
Conclusion
Properly translating metadata is one of the most important foundations of a multilingual SEO strategy. Optimized metadata helps improve site visibility in local search results and ensures that users from different regions find your site relevant, professional, and worth visiting. From local keyword research to technical configurations like hreflang tags and URL slugs, each element has a strategic role that should not be overlooked.
Try Linguise to ensure every metadata detail is accurately translated and optimized without spending much time. It offers intelligent automatic translation with manual enhancement options, supports multilingual SEO, and is fully compatible with technical tags.
