The Digital Advantage: Topical Authority for Translation & Interpretation SMEs

The Digital Advantage: Topical Authority for Translation & Interpretation SMEs

Search engine optimisation (SEO) brings more visitors – and therefore leads and customers - to your website.

But it’s a broad field comprising different aspects (technical SEO, on-page SEO, off-page SEO, etc.). It can be challenging to know where to start.

One of the most effective ways to improve SMEs’ SEO is to build topical authority.

Let’s look at what this means and how you can do it.

What is topical authority?

Topical authority refers to a website’s expertise on a specific subject.

In practical terms, consider how comprehensibly a website demonstrates its knowledge using blogs.

The more blogs you have on a subject, the more topical authority you have, and the more Google (and users) will trust you.

Topical authority example: two Chinese translation company websites

Imagine two websites specialising in Chinese translation: Website A and Website B. Everything about the companies that own these websites is equal, including their size, services, certifications, reviews, etc.

Their websites even have the same number of main website pages: home page, about us, blog listings page, and contact us.

However, Website A has no blogs about the Chinese language, but Website B has 50.

These 50 blogs cover everything about Chinese translation and interpretation. They answer questions about what the Chinese language is, how many people speak it, how it is written, what its dialects are, etc.

They also have blogs about translation, interpretation, quality assurance, and even Chinese culture.

Collectively, these blogs bring in thousands of visitors a month because a) they are well-researched and well-written, and b) they are optimised for search engines.

Google can measure time spent on a page, so it knows that most users are satisfied with the search result when they read Website B’s blogs.

So now, when it comes to keywords related to Chinese translation and language services, Google trusts Website B more than it does Website A.

Think of it from Google’s point of view

Google wants to put the best results in front of its users. After all, if it doesn’t, they will become frustrated and migrate to other search engines.

So favouring websites with more topical authority (like Website B) over those with less (like Website A) makes sense.

Google doesn’t have time to send its employees (human or robot) out to check your knowledge of your field in person - but it can crawl your website to gain a good sense of it.

Benefits of topical authority

By gaining topical authority through informational writing blogs, your commercial pages (including your home page and service pages) will also be more likely to rank.

In a sense, you can look at this as Google rewarding websites for topical authority. In other words, a bit like a deal whereby you submit several informational blogs in exchange for gaining a commercial page ranking.

So, if you write 20 blogs about Language A, your commercial page for ‘Language A Translation’ is more likely to rank. (Of course, you may need more or less than 20 blogs depending on how competitive ‘language A’ is).

Another benefit of this approach is it helps you systemise your own (and your employees’) knowledge. You refresh your memory on key points that might help you answer client questions.

And the blogs themselves can give you great material for social media posts, videos, newsletters, or sales outreach.

How can you make your blogs stand out from your competitors?

To stand out from your competitors, you should aim to cover information about your services and the languages you work in both more concisely and in more depth than they do.

Your competitors, in this case, are both your known competitor companies and other websites ranking for the same keywords you are targeting.

The information you provide in a blog should be both easier and quicker to understand than your competitors’ blogs on the same subject.

At the same time, you should cover the subject more comprehensibly than they have (if possible). In some cases, this will mean adding sections to your blog that they don’t have. In others, it will mean creating a separate blog on that aspect of the subject that links to the original blog.

From a broader content point of view, you should aim to cover your core subjects as in-depth as possible by covering all the keywords that have traffic you can find related to them.

You can even also consider going after keywords with zero known search volume (according to SEO software estimates – which aren’t 100% accurate). If you, a subject expert, know that the matter is related to your field, then writing about it first will get you ahead of your competitors.

Example: a blog about the history of localisation

Imagine you want to target the keyword ‘history of localisation’. You check the current ranking results for it and find all blogs of approximately 4,000 words.

Once you have read the top 3 results for this keyword, you realise you can cover the subject in the same depth they have in 3,000 words. You also notice that none of them covers some important points about the subject, which you add to your blog.

The end result is that you also have a blog of around 4,000 words which covers the same information as your competitors (more concisely), and also provides more depth on the same subject.

Who should write your blogs?

If you wanted to read an article about how to fix a broken lock, would you rather read one by a locksmith or an SEO expert?

Most people would answer: the locksmith. The problem is that the locksmith is often too busy fixing locks to spend time writing blogs about it.

So, the ideal situation is to read a blog written by an SEO expert and informed by a locksmith, or a blog written by a locksmith and edited by an SEO expert…

In practical terms, this means that you should have a blog-writing process that is informed by quality assurance.

I personally find that the blog writer should first do some basic research and then ask the expert for notes/opinions on a few key points. The writer should incorporate these notes into the first draft, which the expert reads, edits and then signs off for publishing.

The blog should ideally be published under the expert’s name, too. This is because Google increasingly values E-E-A-T (experience, expertise, authority, and trust).

Should you use AI to help you write blogs?

?Using tools like ChatGPT and Bard to help write blogs can save time and energy. However, at present, the keyword here is help.

As of right now, June 2023, many different SEO and marketing experts are giving a range of opinions on how much AI can and should help with writing.

My current personal opinion is that 90% of each blog should still be written directly by a human. But advances in AI technology and my evolving use of it might cause me to revise this position in the near future…

What does this all mean for translation companies?

You know you are experts in your field - but does Google? Having a website simply saying you are an expert isn’t enough.

You need to prove it.

Begin writing blogs aimed at keywords related to what you do and what you know. Here are a few basic questions you should consider to get the ball rolling:

• What services do you offer? (What are these services exactly? How long have they been around? Are some of the services you offer similar? If so, what is the difference between them?)
• What languages do you offer? (Where are those languages spoken? Are there dialect versions of them? What is the culture like where they originate?)
• What industries do you work with? (Are there translation or interpretation challenges in them?)

By asking these kinds of questions, you can begin building a list of all the subjects and blogs you should be writing about.

The chances are your competitors have covered a lot of the same information. Your challenge is to cover it both more concisely and more comprehensibly.

Kain Jagger is an SEO expert specialising in a number of industries, including language services, based in London. If you would like to contact him, you can reach out to him on LinkedIn.