Before we get into the details of Baidu SEO Optimization, please allow us to begin everything with a question, “When you think of China, what do you think of?” The vast geographical scale of the land, the huge population, or the great wall. China to everyone in the world means something different but we still can find some patterns related to keywords like big, huge, and great. From a business perspective, China means possibility and opportunity. In such a massive market like China, everything is possible, and everywhere presents an opportunity, particularly with its online market. As one of the most powerful internet communities in the world with over 721 million internet users (over 50 % of its population), China attracts way much more attention from international business brands than ever before.
Concerning the internet industry, Baidu’s search engine will not only meet all kinds of needs for your marketing campaign but also helps expose you to its huge user base (80% of the search engine market). However, it is not that easy to get things started online in China for businesses involved in the digital world. The complexity of the digital ecosystem, internet censorship, laws/ regulation, and a vast digital market might be very confusing but we are here to help brands overcome these drawbacks. With the information we have organized here, we will help you navigate through the maze of the Chinese internet community; whilst increasing your visibility among Chinese internet users through appropriate Baidu SEO and Chinese-specific marketing campaigns.
The following article will feature in-depth insights into the structure and rules of Baidu, how Baidu ranks websites, and cultural considerations to better manage your Baidu SEO while increasing your brands’ visibility. With this article, we wish to provide you with the answers you have seen seeking.
Baidu Seo Guideline
This Baidu SEO guide is for those who are optimizing their website on Baidu. For growing business firms and better search engine rankings comes the necessity for greater discipline in complying with the Baidu guidelines.
Domain Name & Host
Typically said, a domain name is the first impression that your brand leaves to someone else. Coming up with a domain name matched with your brands, service, culture, and more importantly, something easy to remember may take some time but it will be definitely worth it. For domain hosts, Baidu prefers sites using localized servers here in China, because the user experience will be better with faster navigation. Seeking ways to move your webserver to China or building a site now by using a local webserver could help you a lot on the SEO rankings. However, operating your website via a Chinese web server might be a little bit challenging for international brands because of the language barrier, unfamiliar environment, etc. Think twice before you make this important decision.
Title Tags & Meta Data
The title tags of your content are the most important element of on-site optimization but it is really simple to do. It is the title of your articles, discussions, announcements, and more which inform both internet users and search engines of your webpage’s topics. Through this title tag element, you tell users what you have inside of your website and how it will be defined.
Also, using keywords in your title tag will increase your visibility on the search engine. Unlike Google’s preference, Baidu recommends websites to use “_” underscore or “-” hyphen mark as a good title separator to make the keywords stand out from your title tags/
Wane/PPC/Baidu/SEO/coming are the keywords of this title tag where internet users can easily identify the content of your page.
Even though the meta content is not part of the ranking factor, it still provides good content as a page summary that should match with users’ questions (demand) and meet their needs (supply). And of course, it should be written in simplified Chinese.
On-page Content
As part of the site’s optimization, it is always better to organize a site dedicated to China with localized simplified Chinese. Avoid using Google or other online services to help you translate the unique content of your sites because the majority of them are not accurate and will not capture your nuanced message, use quality local Chinese translators. You will see the payback from keyword search engine tools as you invest enough time and money to structure a strong simplified Chinese website. Here we provide you with practical tips:
Choose SEO-friendly URLs:
Not too long or too ugly. Clear and simple is the key.
such as https://www.marketingtochina.com/china-make-use-big-data/
Only the first keyword counts:
Using keywords to start your tile will give you more authority and power to your sites on the search engine.
Mobile formating
These days, mobile phones play a more important role than 5-10 years ago. On average, people spend more time on mobiles than desktops or any other devices. Customize your sites for mobile-friendly design or you will be left behind in the ranking positions.
Baidu SEO Tools
As the biggest Chinese search engine, Baidu is starting to offer the best browsing experience by adopting the newest technology for its service and providing unique tools for users. The following tools are developed and designed by Baidu for capturing the vital data and information which needs to be collected from the Baidu search engine.
Feng Yun Bang means the list of the most populous searching results. This Baidu tool organizes the populous search engine results in the manner of different categories like news, entertainment, people, novels, and many more. For business brands, this is one of the most useful ways to understand the preference of Chinese consumers through the most updated data and information provided by Baidu. Having your team overview this tool will help them to create site content based on the interests of the Chinese people.
Baidu Index
Everything in the Baidu index is all about keywords. Optimizing your sites through keywords is an essential factor that will influence your rankings while building a good foundation for future visibility. However, it is often easier said than done.
Optimizing your content is not just filling out as many keywords as possible but choosing the most ideal ones to attract people to enter your site. Keywords must be related to your content. Baidu is smart enough to determine the site ranking by detecting the keywords you have used and how you use them as it indexes your sites. So make good use of the index tool Baidu provides to help you master your content optimization.
Baidu Statistics
Big data, also known as D&A (data & analysis), is one of the greatest sources of information where you can learn many details about consumer behavior, internet user habits, and many other digital marketplace factors.
Baidu Statistics offers reports of big data where they collect from the click (visit) history of your website users details like the length of their visits, which browser/website directs them there, and even some demographic data if possible.
As of now, many brands make business decisions by reviewing this big data just as online customers look at the product reviews before placing an order. There will be fewer chances to say definitively “what I think” about projects but better to focus on “finding out what the data tell us”. This Baidu Statistics will surely be a good consultant of yours if you treasure the information this big data provides.
Keys To Modify Your Baidu SEO
If you search Baidu SEO on Baidu, you will find a great amount of information telling you what you can do to optimize your sites. There are too many to choose from and too much to understand. The following content we prepare for you the most essential factors that will directly influence your ranking and visibility on Baidu.
Backlinks: Internal, External, Social
Besides the preference of domain name/host, the Baidu search engine system looks at websites very carefully in relation to their link building. The role of the back-link serves as evidence, proof, and endorsement of the quality of your website content. In most of the search engines guidelines, particularly for Baidu, back-linking is the key factor that actually gives power and authority to your websites.
There are three types of backlinks:
- Internal backlinks are the links that direct users to other content/ services within your own websites. First, this helps users to navigate your websites. Secondly, it helps your brands establish better web structures for user-friendly purposes. Thirdly, it helps the distribution of your page authority and ranking power throughout your websites.
They are also a great factor to examine both the quality and quantity of your websites. The internal link building should be specific instead of broad unless you want to confuse your visitors. For example, if you can use a paragraph to answer a question, why do you need to build another web page to do the same job. We put a backlinks to this page for example, this is internal Backlinks - External backlinks are the links that direct users to other websites with related information provided. Be thoughtful in your choice of external link since you are responsible for your readers’ browsing experience as you lead them to somewhere else. Using external links to provide your readers with more information and references shows the credibility of your content which will attract readers’ to return in the future.
Adding external links is actually an investment on the internet market. As you share someone else’s website, it is very possible that others will share your website too. - Social backlinks are the links that direct users to social platforms. In China, backlinks from Weibo, qq and WeChat DO NOT WORK; they are not taken into account by Baidu spider and have zero impact on the SEO. Using social links that are taken by Baidu are important, Douban, Tieba, tianya have a direct impact on your ranking and will also help you with building your community , while providing more insights to them.
Ever since technology evolved, browsing on search engines is not the only way or the best way to receive information anymore.
The answer is moving at an unbelievable pace towards social platforms. In this generation, many internet users might tell you that social platforms are one of the best resources to receive new information and knowledge. So direct your readers to your social media account which will also attract readers to follow your brands.
Website Authority And Credibility
Authority mainly comes from the credibility of the website authors. Authors here may refer to individual writers, business firms, or institutions. For instance, an author with a doctor’s degree has higher authority than a high school student. It is the education, title, position, and established status that determines the power of authority.
Even though we could not change the background of the author, we still can obtain high authority credits if we list the author’s background in a detailed manner including the author’s name, contacts, and even biographical information. It helps Baidu to better evaluate the authority of the website writer.
Credibility comes from the author, date of your research, sources, domain host, site design, and writing style. First of all, we would recommend inserting reasonable numbers of quality links (resources) and references into your page for it is the most important factor under this category. Later on, you can choose the next step to constantly improve your sites.
Refresh Your Content: Keep The Conversation Alive
Try to recall a guest visit experience of yours, what did you do to get everything ready? Before the guests arrived, you probably were striving to make your living room look welcome, appealing, and organized. If this is the way you treated your guests at home, updating your web content often is exactly the same idea just in a different setting.
Refresh by cleaning up the old content and replacing it with new content like news ideas, new data, and new research. It is an essential process to make your website look welcome and attractively organized to internet users.
For those who do not know how to start, let us give you an example. If your business doesn’t have that many things to update, you may try to build a news station into your website. Sometimes, it does not have to be exactly related to your brands or business, it could be an interesting event or big news that is happening around the world like “Pokemon Go”.
Inbound Campaign : Promote yourself
Believe it or not, marketing campaigns to internet users can be very annoying sometimes… Remember this, the purpose of your campaign is to attract visitors not to overly persist. Inbound marketing campaigns are all about aligning your marketing channels into one single purpose. This purpose can be the message (what we offer) or a goal (what we expect from our visitors).
If it is a message, you need to think about what is relevant or valuable to your target audience. Messages can be varied from guidelines, news, and webinars to product demos, coupons, and trials.
If your goal is expecting readers/ visitors to act upon your information, simplify the process as much as possible. As we are talking about simplifying the process, there is no better example than “QR codes”. Many of the business brands are incorporating QR codes into either their websites, marketing campaigns, and even on their products like Coca-Cola did in China. Here in China, you will see QR codes everywhere because it is so easy to act upon the requests/ goals (usually a reward is attached) of business brands.
China’s Unique Internet System
Domain Service Regulation
Ever since the Chinese government released a new internet regulation regarding a domain name registration, things are getting harder for foreign companies to reach China’s market. This regulation will force the domain registrars to obtain a license from the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) or another government body’s management system to oversee the operation of the domain’s operations.
Even though this regulation is still a draft, it might literally mean that any website without a domain service provider inside China will no longer be accessible to the country’s internet border in the future. If it truly happens, “the worst-case scenario means that basically the internet in China will be closed to the rest of the world” according to Lokman Tsui, an assistant professor of journalism and communications at the Chinese University of Hong Kong via Quartz.
Beyond user’s Engagement
For the early stages of boosting a business brand’s e-reputation, engaging with internet users is very important because your brands are slowly building up your followers and user base. Thinking about your brand’s target audience, what kind of service can you offer to meet their expectations? Particularly to Chinese consumers, they would actively express comments and opinions on the internet where they have the privilege to be well-served by business brands. Here are four types of common engagement:
Perception is one of the engaging approaches that intensely occupy your audience’s time and influences opinions through delivering quality information regularly.
Communication is a two-way form of engagement that is either directly or indirectly surrounded by a business brands’ promotional strategy. Consistency is key when communicating with potential consumers.
An experience is a form of participation for consumers as they share their brand experiences online (both good and bad). Promises from the business brand create strong credibility among business consumers, they develop trust in your company.
Conclusion
As we live in a digital world that changes and shifts at a breathtaking pace, learning how to adjust to the marketing strategies based on the situation is a very crucial skill to stay competitive in China’s market.
Apart from offering your information about Baidu, key indicators of Baidu SEO, and the unique internet community, we suggest you couple this approach with social media platforms in your digital marketing strategy to China. Social media and Baidu SEO is a catalyst that will not only shorten the time it takes to work but also enhance the power of reaction. Utilizing social media will surely help the organic growth of your e-reputation and rankings on search engines in the long term.
