5 ways to scale global search management

Relying solely on content and technical SEO is no longer enough to achieve sustainable success, especially for businesses operating in multiple markets.

While these elements are crucial, they fail to fully account for the diverse factors influencing a website’s global performance.

The complexities of managing SEO across different regions, languages and market conditions add layers of challenges, many of which fall outside the direct control of local SEO teams.

To effectively navigate these hurdles, companies must adopt process changes that promote consistency, reduce friction and enhance performance across all markets.

This article will explore how integrating uniform frameworks, centralized reporting and streamlined processes can help maintain and improve SEO performance on a global scale.

1. Ensure consistent reporting 

Performance reporting is the first area that begs for consistency in many global search programs. 

Too many companies lack consistent reporting across their markets, making it impossible to roll up data to understand global, regional and market performance. 

Finding opportunities that can be leveraged in other markets is even more challenging.

In one of my initial global team meetings with a client, I observed how search teams from various markets presented their reports in completely different formats. 

Many reports included similar data points, such as keyword rankings and some Google Search Console metrics. Still, only a few mentioned organic traffic and none provided ROI metrics, such as search-influenced leads or sales.

To address this inconsistency, we created a standardized reporting template that all markets could adopt.

This template could be easily integrated into the global reporting dashboard, enabling management to assess market performance and identify areas that require additional resources.

After establishing a consistent reporting framework, the next step is to expand the data set to include additional search variables. 

One of my preferred metrics to monitor is the global performance of “always on” keywords. These keywords represent the business’s core offerings across different markets and must consistently appear in search results.

For example, a global search manager at a company like Lenovo or Dell might want to track how many markets rank in the top positions for a key product category like laptop computers, helping to identify areas of focus and potential keyword cannibalization.

By centralizing data, you can spot market or regional trends to apply in other areas, adding value. 

For instance, during a meeting in Japan, a global manager noted significant traffic boosts from blog posts that highlighted how their product outperformed competitors. 

This strategy was successfully implemented globally. Additionally, analyzing data on a global scale and encouraging markets to report increases and anomalies can reveal new opportunities.

2. Centralize SEO development tickets 

Companies with centralized web development often struggle to manage multiple, conflicting support tickets, particularly when SEO responsibilities are decentralized to local teams or agencies.

This decentralization leads to inefficiencies, as teams spend significant time consolidating and prioritizing tickets, especially when requests conflict or need further clarification.

A centralized review process minimizes ticket redundancy and ensures that changes to key SEO elements do not negatively impact other markets. For instance, there have been cases where a local SEO team or agency has requested changes based on the latest techniques or aggressive strategies, which could lead to penalties affecting all markets.

While advising on a global search project, I examined Jira tickets submitted by local SEO teams and agencies.

I found a dozen tickets, some over six months old, all requesting the same task: correcting links in the header to prevent 404 errors.

The requests varied in detail, from simple fixes like “fix the links in the header” to one that specified exact links needing revision, but only for the local market.

By reviewing these requests centrally, we developed a comprehensive solution that framed the issue as a global concern. This resulted in the ticket’s acceptance and implementation in the next sprint.

Dig deeper: How you can deal with decentralization in international SEO 

3. Be consistent in your approach and philosophy

The ticket review highlighted a significant inconsistency with the organization’s SEO philosophy and best practices. Many requests included outdated techniques that could undo existing positive changes.

Companies with a Search Council have a structured process for reviewing and approving market requests.

Even without formal procedures, in-house SEOs should assess the requests for their validity, viability and impact at both local and global levels.

We’ve all encountered situations where Agency A insists on a critical action while Agency B claims it’s not essential and prioritizes other tasks.

Also, there are times when web guidelines or the CMS restrict changes. How is this reconciliation handled?

A major challenge is the lack of SEO expertise in local markets.

Often, these markets do not have a dedicated SEO agency or personnel, as SEO is just one of many responsibilities.

They could greatly benefit from shared experience and documented guidelines to clarify focus areas and CMS capabilities.

All markets can enhance their SEO strategies and maintain a unified approach by collaborating to develop consistent guidelines, processes and templates.

Dig deeper: International SEO: How to avoid common translation and localization pitfalls

Don’t forget your templates

In a centralized development structure, most markets use the same templates, particularly for product pages. When a change is made to one template, it affects all websites, making template-related tickets and optimization actions crucial.

While consistency in webpage templates and SEO presents challenges, it also offers opportunities. Focusing on templates can lead to significant improvements; once fixes are deployed globally, everyone benefits.

It’s surprising to see many multinational websites with identical templates undergoing numerous audits. If all markets share a common template, there’s less need for individual audits, allowing budgets to be allocated to unique market needs instead.

It’s beneficial to share site audits, especially when multiple markets use the same template. Auditing the template infrastructure should yield consistent results.

Agencies can check for any deviations from the template, ensuring a more efficient use of resources. This allows teams to concentrate on content, backlinks and other important areas rather than redundant audits.

4. Use centralized solutions 

Many SEO activities, from analytics to tools, could be centralized at a global level or in markets with more resources. However, despite the potential efficiency, I’ve found this is often more challenging in practice. 

Centralized funding and management of SEO diagnostic tools can be more effective than having each market fund various tools independently.

For example, I’ve seen mid-sized companies use an old desktop computer with a single Screaming Frog license to crawl all markets and store reports on a shared drive.

After discovering that many of their CMS-generated XML sitemaps had errors, they created validated XML sitemaps for all markets and stored them centrally.

While discussing keywords is often discouraged, collaborative teams can benefit by sharing paid search keyword lists, ad copy and negative lists.

This collaboration is crucial for same-language markets, allowing them to build on existing work and focus their time and resources on adaptation and expansion.

5. Consider global and local

Local markets may see the shift toward consistency and standardized processes as restricting their autonomy and may resist if they believe it could impact their KPIs.

They need web elements and processes unique to their markets. Still, they should recognize that adopting consistent templates, centralized task alignment and best practices can help them focus more on local activities.

Getting SEO initiatives into the development pipeline is a significant challenge at any level, but a consistent workflow and aligned markets enhance effectiveness.

This uniformity facilitates the integration of cross-market analytics and AI solutions, creating further opportunities for scaling.

Dig deeper: The best AI tools for global SEO expansion

Streamlining global SEO: Centralized strategies for sustainable success

Incorporating standardized frameworks and centralized processes into global SEO strategies promotes consistency, efficiency and scalability across markets. 

Organizations can more effectively allocate resources and uncover growth opportunities by streamlining reporting, ticket management and template usage. 

This holistic approach improves site performance and enables local markets to focus on region-specific initiatives, driving sustainable SEO success on a global scale.