Localization and Translation

Udemy serves learners globally across 18 language subdirectories (ar, de, ro, ja, id, th, pl, es, ru, ko, it, pt, tr, fr, nl, vi, zh-tw, zh-cn), providing localized versions of our course catalog and category pages. Currently, we have significant international content that is invisible to search engines:

• Noindexed “good” localized pages: Tens of thousands of high-value localized pages across 18 languages are currently marked with noindex,follow directives. These are being indexed as a part of the Crawl Efficiency Cleanup work.
• Noindexed “poor” localized paginated pages: More than a hundred thousand paginated versions of language subdirectory pages are marked noindex,follow. These are being indexed as a part of the Crawl Efficiency Cleanup work.

To follow best practices and benefit from language clusters, pages that are translated or localized versions of default pages should be grouped using hreflang references in their <head>.

• Primary users
  • International learners searching for online courses in their native language (Portuguese, Spanish, Japanese, Korean, etc.)
  • Local market users who prefer or require content in their language for discovery and decision-making
  • Search engine crawlers attempting to discover and index international content
• Users with characteristics
  • Language preference: Users searching in non-English languages on Google, Bing, Yandex, Baidu, etc.
  • Geographic location: Users in Brazil, Portugal, Spain, Mexico, Japan, South Korea, Germany, France, and other international markets
  • Search intent: Looking for courses, skills, or learning paths in their native language

Udemy currently has tens of thousands of translated pages, spanning 18 languages and thousands of root “default” pages. By connecting these with proper hreflang use, we’ll create thousands of distinct clusters that allow crawlers to understand the depth and quality of our translated content and localized courses, resulting in greater referral rates from organic traffic sources directly to a user’s preferred language page, where they’re also more likely to convert.

By clustering localized pages with their default, we will increase organic visibility, traffic, and conversions from international search markets without negatively impacting site quality, crawl budget, or existing rankings.

• Increase in total number of indexed language pages
• Increase in organic sessions to language version pages
• Increase in conversion rates on default pages
• Increase in conversion rates on language version pages
• Net-neutral organic session count on default pages

The root page, or “default,” should refer to itself as the “x-default.” For example:

<link rel="alternate" href="http://example.com/" hreflang="x-default" />

The root page should refer to all language versions using hreflang and each version page’s language. For example:

<link rel="alternate" href="http://example.com/es" hreflang="es" />

The language versions of pages should refer to their full cluster of the x-default and other language versions. For example:

<link rel="alternate" href="http://example.com/" hreflang="x-default" />
<link rel="alternate" href="http://example.com/es" hreflang="es" />
<link rel="alternate" href="http://example.com/pt" hreflang="pt" />

• Google hreflang guidance

Because language clusters are only powerful in their aggregate, this work will be completed and rolled out in full or at the speed and scope recommended by our engineering partners based on the changes needed to such a large volume of pages.