English Results SEO Question

[Deliguy]

Got a SEO question.

I got a newer site (can't say much about it) but when you do the site command in google it says:

[SIZE=-1]Results 1 - 10 of about 1,410
[/SIZE][SIZE=-1]Tip: Search for English results only. You can specify your search language in Preferences[/SIZE]

Then when you click on the english results only.

[SIZE=-1]Results 1 - 10 of 393 English pages from[/SIZE]

Its an all english site is the confusing part. I see no reason why google would think its another language. Isn't there a meta tag that allows you to specify what language the page is in? Do you think putting it in all the pages would actually help, or is this a natural happenin in the google index these days?

 

[Jenn]

I just tried this with a few of my sites - looks like anything that's in the supplemental index doesn't show up in a search that's limited to English. Odd and extremely annoying.

 

[stefanjuhl]

Remember that result count sucks - and that adding a keyword/phrase that's on all pages improves correctness of the result count.

Also, check if the pages are supplemental which as said will make them not show up for limited searches.

If they aren't supplemental then consider the inbound links. Many links from non-english pages will sometimes make Google determine the site or pages thereof to be in another language than they actually are. (btw. the same thing can mess with localization.. And do I need to mention that by throwing a heavy bunch of foreign links to your competitor you can actually hurt their rankings if they gain advantage due to localization factors..)