International SEO is optimisation for users in other countries or languages. Multi-language vs multi-country.
Domain structure
ccTLD (sayt.ru), subdomain (ru.sayt.uz), subfolder (sayt.uz/ru/). Subfolder is simplest; ccTLD is strongest.
Hreflang
HTML meta or HTTP header. All language versions linked. Self-referencing required. Reciprocal required.
Language codes
ISO 639-1: en, ru, uz. With region: en-US, ru-UA. uz-Cyrl for Cyrillic.
GSC geo-targeting
Settings โ International Targeting โ Country for each subfolder.
Content: translation vs localisation
Google Translate is low quality. Localisation: culture, terminology, keywords.
Keyword research
Each language separately. Ahrefs/Semrush geographic, Yandex Wordstat for Russia.
Hosting and CDN
Local or Cloudflare/Akamai.
Local backlinks
Each market โ local backlinks. Local citations.
Schema
Address per country. LocalBusiness if a local business.
Yandex and Bing
Russia โ Yandex Webmaster is mandatory. China โ Baidu.
Social
Local networks: Telegram, VKontakte, Facebook.
Tracking
GA4 plus Yandex Metrika.
Sayt.uz
4 languages: uz, uz_cyr, ru, en. Subfolder. Hreflang. Yandex Webmaster. Content localised. ru 25%, en 8%, cyr 5%, uz 62%.