As many companies of all sizes expand into international markets and establish themselves with a global brand, it becomes necessary to deliver a user experience that is both linguistically and culturally adapted to local conditions—both on mobile apps and through websites.
An advantage for multiple Hubs, including HubSpot Marketing Hub and HubSpot Service Hub
And specifically, HubSpot CMS Hub offers a wide range of tools for managing multi-language websites and multiple domains, which can help optimize your digital presence across various regions and languages—something that can lead to more trustworthy customer relationships.
This can also potentially improve the use of your internal resources.
The solution allows you, among other things, to easily customize content and SEO strategies for specific markets and cultures.
It's also important to point out that the solution is not only relevant for HubSpot CMS Hub but can also positively impact the other Hubs. For example, HubSpot Service Hub can benefit from providing customer support, handling inquiries, and adapting services to different markets, while HubSpot Marketing Hub can help you better allocate your marketing budget.
What does multi-language and multi-domain mean?
Multi-language refers to creating multiple language versions of your website. This means you can present the same content tailored to specific markets as your business grows.
With HubSpot, you can easily translate and edit content for different markets, ensuring a localized user experience. The platform provides tools to manage multiple languages from one centrally controlled platform. This allows you to synchronize and maintain language versions without losing consistency in your global strategy, while still keeping a customized platform.
Additionally, you offer your visitors the option to choose which of the languages you’ve set up they want to engage with your business in. This freedom is something many customers, clients, and leads will appreciate.
SEO optimization across languages is also supported through features like hreflang tags, which inform search engines about the language and market a specific page is targeting.
Multi-language
Multi-language refers to the ability to create multiple language versions of your website—completely without the need for developers.
In HubSpot CMS, you can create language variants of your pages, translate content, and tailor messages for different markets. To make it even easier, the built-in AI features, Breeze, can even assist with your translations. For example, you can automatically create translated content as new language variants or replace existing content with a new translation.
Learn more about the AI translation capabilities in Breeze and view available languages and other relevant information here.
Please note that several features in Breeze are currently (as of 18/10-24) in BETA.
Additionally, HubSpot can integrate with external translation services.
HubSpot supports all major languages and has built-in language management, giving you full control over content across languages. This ensures that users from different countries experience the website in their own language—which can mean increased trust and higher conversion rates for you.
Does multi-language have any impact on SEO?
As mentioned, HubSpot also supports the use of hreflang tags for SEO optimization. Hreflang tags are specifically used to indicate to search engines which language version of a page should be shown to users based on their linguistic and geographical preferences.
When you create multi-language versions of your pages in HubSpot, the system automatically ensures that these tags are correctly implemented. This ensures that search engines, like Google, can identify and display the most relevant language version of your website to a user—depending on their location and browser settings.
Multi-domain
Multi-domain allows you to manage multiple domains or subdomains. This is ideal for most businesses operating in different geographical markets, as each domain can be customized with regional content and branding.
You can configure different types of domains in HubSpot:
- Primary domains: Used as the default for content like pages, blogs, and landing pages.
- Secondary domains: Can host HubSpot content but are not the default domain for it.
- Redirect domains: Used to redirect traffic from one domain to another.
The benefits of using multi-language and multi-domain
There are several benefits to implementing multi-language pages and multiple domains in your digital strategy. These include:
- Improved user experience: Users prefer reading content in their native language, which increases engagement and conversion rates. This also leads to better feedback.
- SEO optimization: Proper use of hreflang tags and localized content helps search engines display the most relevant language version to users. It also reduces the risk of duplicate content and improves your visibility in different markets.
- Targeted marketing: With multiple domains, you can easily adjust your marketing strategy for each country, allowing you to tailor the content and marketing messages to local preferences and regulatory requirements.
Setting up multi-language pages in HubSpot CMS
To set up multi-language landing pages and website pages in HubSpot, you need to start by creating the primary language version of your page. This will serve as the base for the other language variants. In HubSpot CMS, you can then create a language variant of an existing page, making the process simple, as you don't need to create separate pages for each language from scratch. Instead, you can reuse the structure and content from the primary version and adapt it to the desired language.
To create a multi-language page in HubSpot, follow these steps:
- Go to the settings menu (More) for the existing page and select 'Create Multi-language variation.'
- Choose the desired language for the new page.
- Use HubSpot’s tool to automatically copy the content from the primary version to the language variant, which you can then translate and adjust.
After publishing, you naturally have the option to monitor the performance of each language layer. You can either choose to view analytics for all language layers of a given page or only view the analytics for the specific language variant of the page.
You can read more detailed instructions on how to work with multi-language pages in HubSpot here.
HubSpot supports an unlimited number of languages.
This means you can add as many language versions of your website as you need. Each language version of a page is treated as a separate entity, providing flexibility to customize both content and SEO strategies for each language.
URL structure for multi-language pages
When setting up multi-language versions of your pages in HubSpot, it is crucial to understand how the URL structure impacts both the user experience and your SEO strategy.
HubSpot supports a subfolder structure, where each language is placed in a separate subfolder under the same main domain. This means that if you have a Danish version of your website, it will have a URL like mywebsite.com/da, and an English version will have a URL like mywebsite.com/en.
This structure is not only practical but also advantageous for your SEO efforts. By gathering all language versions under one domain, you build a unified domain authority. This means that all SEO value from the different language versions contributes to the same domain, making it easier to rank higher in search results. At the same time, it provides users with a more consistent experience, as they can easily navigate between languages without switching domains.
You can also maintain centralized control of your site—all managed through one flexible platform. This simplifies maintenance and administration, as you only need to focus on one domain, reducing the risk of technical issues or inconsistencies between language versions.
As a result, it is also a task that can be easily handled collaboratively by multiple employees.
DNS configuration in HubSpot CMS for multi-domain setup
When setting up multiple domains in HubSpot CMS using a multi-domain configuration, proper DNS configuration is essential to ensure that your domains function optimally.
HubSpot requires you to update your DNS settings with your domain provider to point your domains to HubSpot's servers. This typically involves changes to CNAME and A-records, depending on whether you are configuring a subdomain or a root domain.
The steps include the following:
CNAME Records
When setting up a subdomain, you need to create a CNAME record that points to HubSpot's servers. HubSpot will generate a specific CNAME address that must be used to ensure that all traffic to your subdomain is correctly directed to your HubSpot site.
A-records
If you want to connect a root domain, you need to use an A record. Here, you point the domain to HubSpot's IP addresses, which are provided during the setup.
This ensures that the root domain can also be directed to HubSpot's servers and deliver your website correctly.
SSL certification
HubSpot automatically handles the creation and maintenance of SSL certificates for all connected domains. This means your pages will have secure, encrypted connections (HTTPS) without any additional effort.
SSL certificates are important for protecting user data and improving your ranking in search engines.
Domain validation and DNS update
After you have updated your DNS settings with your domain provider, it typically takes up to 24 hours for the changes to take effect. HubSpot automatically validates the domain, but if any errors occur during verification, you will receive notifications with guidance on how to resolve the issues.
Read more about how to connect your domain to HubSpot here.
Measuring and monitoring performance
Once you have implemented your multi-language and multi-domain setup in HubSpot, it is important to measure how the different language versions and domains are performing.
HubSpot provides access to a range of reporting features and smart dashboards, allowing you to monitor your KPIs such as traffic, engagement, and conversions across languages and markets. You can set up custom reports and dashboards to get the exact insights and overview of specific pages, languages, or domains that you need.
Or you can use the standard reports that are already available.
Both are designed to help companies (both small and large) evaluate performance across their global operations.
Use A/B testing in HubSpot
You can also take advantage of A/B testing in HubSpot, allowing you to experiment with different versions of your content in multiple languages. This means you can identify the best versions of your pages based on user interactions.
You can test everything from headlines and images to call-to-actions and text formulations, ensuring that you always deliver the most relevant and effective experience to your visitors.
HubSpot’s intuitive dashboard makes it easy to monitor the results of your tests in real-time and adjust your strategy based on the data.
Does multi-domain and multi-language in HubSpot have any impact on social media, email, and marketing in general—even with limited budgets?
When you create a multi-language and multi-domain setup in HubSpot, it has several important implications for your marketing, including your social media, Google Ads, and email marketing—regardless of budget, whether for large or small businesses. This is not only beneficial for your potential customers but also for your existing customers and their interactions with your company, as well as your internal resources.
Social media
HubSpot makes it easy to integrate with various social media platforms, allowing you to tailor your social media strategy for each market when working with multiple domains and languages. You can create posts that are customized in both language and tone, targeting specific regions or countries.
This ensures that your campaigns and paid advertising across multiple channels are locally relevant, increasing the chances of engaging users and driving more interaction on social platforms.
This means you can get more out of the budgets allocated for advertising on social media.
Google Ads
A multi-domain setup also makes it easier to manage Google Ads campaigns across different markets. With HubSpot, you can create unique landing pages optimized for each language and market, allowing for better advertising.
You can also use different domains to target campaigns to specific regions (e.g., .dk for Denmark and .de for Germany), which increases relevance for users and improves your Quality Score in Google Ads—something that can eventually lower your cost per click (CPC) on all paid advertising.
Email marketing
In HubSpot, you can of course create multi-language email marketing campaigns and email marketing automation tailored to local markets. This is especially important if you have a global customer base, as users prefer to receive emails in their own language.
By using the multi-language setup in HubSpot, you can easily segment your email lists by region and language, ensuring that each customer receives a personalized experience that is both relevant and customized. Each email will therefore be more strategically grounded.
HubSpot also allows you to track the performance of your email campaigns across different languages and markets, so you can measure open and click rates for each campaign.
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