If you or your clients have a global or international market, then it can be difficult to understand how your SEO is performing in those countries due to the localisation of search results in Google.

Over the past few years, Google has worked to "regionalise" most of its search results.  This means that with each search request, it takes into account which Google domain you are using (e.g. google.co.uk), where you are physically located (usually based on your IP address), any geographical indicators in your search (e.g. Portsmouth), etc.

We have a few clients who are marketing their services globally.  This used to be simpler.  Google.com was always the "international" or "global" search engine.  If you wanted UK companies, you searched Google.co.uk.  If you wanted to see how you were doing internationally, then you searched Google.com  – because all the results in Google.com used to be the same – no matter where you were located.  But regionalisation has changed this. 

A number one ranking in Google.co.uk with the "search the web" option is not the same as Google.com.  Furthermore, if you search Google.com from the UK you will not see the same results as you would if you searched Google.com from Dallas, Texas.

This really hit home when client’s would brag to their friends in the USA about their SEO company and the number one position in Google – only to be told that when they performed the same search in the States, they were on the second page and not even the first.

Google provides a search parameter that you can use to see how the search results look from different geographical locations – "gl".

The syntax is something like this:

http://www.g

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