hreflang is an HTML tag which can be added in thesection of a page to tell (primarily) search engines about different language variations of the same content.
The tag is used for Internationalization.
Using hreflang tags correctly can, therefore, help a page to avoid duplicate content penalities, and also assists with the ranking of language and regional variant pages.
These tags are really important even for English -> English pages (for example, if you have the same content in Canada and USA or Australia and New Zealand – or UK and USA) even though they are “both” English, you can specify the exact URL that visitors from those regions would be better off visiting.
Can be used in conjunction with front-end features like flags.
Contact us at Silicon Dales for assistance in implementing hreflang tags in your complex WordPress websites or online stores. We’ve done this for clients before, and seen excellent results.
UPDATE: 8-4-2022 Since writing this article back in 2018, the team at Digital Darts in Australia have developed a very handy Shopify app that does all the heavy lifting for you when it comes to international stores and hreflang tag implementation. You can read about the Multi‑Store Hreflang Tags app here, and install the app …
