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Multilingual SEO services with hreflang that holds up
A translated WordPress site can have every page in five languages and still show English to a searcher in Madrid or Montreal. The cause is nearly always technical. Book a call and I'll find which fault it is, then fix it at the plugin level.
// what it costs
- US$149Deep audit and growth report, one off, on Upwork
- US$999Audit and fixes, one off, on Upwork
- US$299 or US$750month to month, with a report every month
Audits from US$149, audit and fixes from US$999, and month to month plans at US$299 for maintenance or US$750 for growth. Booked and paid on Upwork.
What do multilingual SEO services fix on WordPress?
Multilingual SEO services on a WordPress multilingual website come down to three things: each language gets its own indexable URL, each declares itself canonical, and hreflang ties the versions together so Google shows the right one. When two versions in the same language are too alike, Search Console can report that Google picked a different canonical and fold one into the other.
Most providers ranking for this sell translation. I'm one multilingual SEO consultant, working remotely, and my part is the technical layer underneath: plugin settings, canonicals, sitemaps, hreflang output, the keywords each language should target and Search Console data by country.
How would I diagnose this on your site?
This is the order I check it in on a WordPress or WooCommerce site, before changing anything. You'll get the findings back in writing, each tied to a number in your own Search Console.
See my full diagnosis process- i.
Which version Google serves per country
The Performance report filtered to one country, then by path, shows whether searchers get their own language.
- ii.
The canonical on each translation
Translations under Alternate page with proper canonical tag are canonicalized to the default language.
- iii.
Which plugin writes what
Whether the multilingual plugin's hreflang and the SEO plugin's sitemap list the same URLs.
Spanish searchers landing on your English pages?
Book a call on UpworkHow does hreflang work, and why do return tags decide it?
Hreflang tells Google a page has an equivalent in another language or region. The value is an ISO 639-1 language code with an optional ISO 3166-1 region: es for Spanish anywhere, es-MX for Mexico, en-CA and fr-CA for a Canadian site in both official languages, and en-GB for the UK, never en-UK.
Every version lists every other version and itself, and x-default names the page for searchers nothing else fits. If the Spanish page doesn't name the English one back, Google can ignore the pair, and that's why hreflang fails site-wide while looking fine on one page.
How is keyword research done per language?
Market by market, never by translating the English list. Courriel is the word more widespread in Quebec, where French speakers in Europe often use e-mail or mail, and a literal translation targets the English keyword in another language, which often isn't what that market searches.
- i.
Start from what already earns
The English page's Search Console queries show which ideas matter, before any language is touched.
- ii.
Check each market's own words
Search Console filtered to the country, then a keyword tool set to that country and language, not a global average.
- iii.
A term list per page
Each translated page gets its target query, title wording and heading terms in a short brief.
- iv.
Handed to your translator
Translation itself stays with your translator or agency; I check the published page uses the terms.
Which hreflang errors are showing English to the wrong country?
Search Console has no hreflang report to lean on, so these are found by crawl and by country data.
| What you see | Likely cause | Fix |
|---|---|---|
| English page ranks for Spanish queries in Spain | Missing return tags, or the Spanish page isn't indexed | Return tags on both pages, and the Spanish URL's index status |
| Translations listed as Alternate page with proper canonical tag | Their canonical points at the default language | A self-referencing canonical per language |
| Hreflang pointing at redirects or 404s | Slugs changed or translations deleted | Regenerated language links, dead alternates removed |
| Googlebot only ever sees one language | Automatic redirects by IP or browser language | A language suggestion banner instead |
WPML, Polylang or TranslatePress: where does each go wrong?
All three output hreflang with no setup, which is why people assume it's done.
WPML
Each translation's its own post, and copied SEO meta can leave a custom canonical pointing at the original.
Polylang
Untranslated slugs and taxonomies, and URL settings changed on a live site without redirects.
TranslatePress
Translated slugs and titles need its SEO Pack add-on, or the Spanish URL keeps an English slug.
Subdirectory, subdomain or country domain for each language?
All three can rank. It's the choice that decides how much authority each language shares, and on a WooCommerce store it also decides how currency and product URLs are handled per market.
| Structure | Example | Trade-off |
|---|---|---|
| Subdirectory | example.com/es/ | Shares the main domain's authority, simplest on one WordPress install |
| Subdomain | es.example.com | It's often set up as a separate site, so authority builds more slowly |
| Country domain (ccTLD) | example.es | The strongest local signal, but each domain earns links alone |
| Parameter | example.com/?lang=es | Works, but it's the weakest option and the one I'd move off |
Where should you implement hreflang, head or sitemap?
Both work, and they're not equal. The head is easier to inspect, and the XML sitemap keeps big WooCommerce catalogues lighter. Whichever way you implement hreflang, one hreflang implementation beats two, because both methods must list identical URLs or you'll hand Google conflicting sets.
How are multilingual results measured per country?
By the share of each market's searches that land on its own language, which is the number the whole job exists to move.
The right language per country
Performance filtered to one country, then by path, shows what share of impressions reach /es/ or /fr/ pages instead of English ones.
Indexed pages per language
With a sitemap per language, the Page indexing report filtered to each one shows how many translations Google kept.
The canonical Google chose
URL Inspection on a sample of translations confirms each one is its own canonical, not folded into the default language.
What's in multilingual SEO work, and what isn't?
Canonical faults here are the same class of problem as duplicate content and canonicals, and moving to a new language URL structure runs as a site migration. There's no measured multilingual project among the case studies, so I haven't claimed one.
In this service
- Hreflang audit across every page: codes, return tags, x-default
- Canonical behaviour per language in both plugins
- A target query and term list for each translated page
- A move off ?lang= parameters where needed
- Hreflang set up as one consistent source
Not in it
- Translating the content itself
- Link building, ads or building the site
What happens after you book multilingual SEO services?
- i.
One country, checked first
Search Console filtered to one market, like Spain or Canada, shows whether searchers there land on the language they searched in.
- ii.
A full hreflang crawl
Return tags, invalid codes and non-200 alternates flagged on every page.
- iii.
A plugin-level scope on Upwork
Fixes in WPML, Polylang or TranslatePress settings, so new translations inherit them.
- iv.
The same country, read again
The share of impressions going to the right language is the number that should move.
What else do people ask about hreflang and multilingual?
How much do multilingual SEO services cost?
The number of languages and templates sets it, so there's no price on this page. You'll get a quote on Upwork once the hreflang crawl's done.
Is multilingual SEO the same as international SEO?
They overlap. Multilingual SEO is about languages, international SEO about countries, and a site targeting English and French speakers in Canada is multilingual without being international. Hreflang handles both, which is why the codes can carry a language, a region or both.
Do Yoast SEO or Rank Math add hreflang tags?
Not on their own. The multilingual plugin writes hreflang, and the SEO plugin handles canonicals and sitemaps beside it, so both need checking together.
Is translating content enough for multilingual SEO?
No. A literal translation targets the English keyword in another language, which often isn't what that market types, so each language needs its own keyword check.
Should a multilingual site redirect visitors by country?
I'd avoid it. Googlebot crawls mostly from one region, so automatic redirects can hide the other versions from it.
Adding a language, or moving one to its own folder or domain, changes URLs, so the migration checklist applies alongside the hreflang work, and changing a WordPress site's domain covers a language that moves to a domain of its own. Both sit with the other migration posts.
Is Google showing the right language?
Send me the URL and read-only Search Console access. I'll check which version each country gets, test the return tags and canonicals on every translation, and fix what your translation plugin gets wrong.
Book a call on Upwork