In Belgium, the language split is the whole job.
Flanders reads Dutch, Wallonia reads French, and a single language Belgian site is competing for half its market. The regulator's own name is written in two languages, which tells you how seriously the country takes this.
Start with the free 15 point site check. Two working days, no call required.
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What is actually different about selling into Belgium
The specifics that change the build, not a list of countries I will work in.
The regulator
The Autorite de la protection des donnees, also the Gegevensbeschermingsautoriteit. One body, two official names, which is the clearest possible summary of doing business here.
What the site must publish
The Belgian transposition of the same European provider information duty: identity, place of establishment, electronic contact details, company number and VAT number.
Checkout
Bancontact is the rail Belgian buyers expect, well ahead of cards for domestic purchases. Euro, so no currency work needed.
The language reality
Dutch in Flanders, French in Wallonia, German in a small eastern area. Brussels is officially bilingual and practically both.
What usually goes wrong on a Belgian site
One language, half a market
A Dutch only site invisible to Wallonia, or a French only site invisible to Flanders. Either way the search volume you are competing for is roughly halved before you start.
Dutch written for the Netherlands
Flemish and Netherlands Dutch differ in everyday vocabulary enough that copy written for Amsterdam reads as foreign in Antwerp. Buyers notice immediately.
No Bancontact
A checkout with cards and PayPal, selling to Belgian consumers who reach for Bancontact. The abandonment shows up at the payment step and gets misdiagnosed.
Two half built language versions
A site with a language switcher where one version has twelve pages and the other has three, no hreflang, and the two competing with each other in search.
Not sure which of those it is? Send the web address and the written 15 point check says so in two working days, free.
What the work actually is
The same list whether you are in Belgium or anywhere else I work.
The 15 point technical check
Speed, indexing, structured data, redirects, consent and the rest, written out in the order worth fixing rather than the order a crawler found them.
Pages for what buyers search
Built from real search data in the language your buyers type, not translated from an English page and hoped over.
A redirect map before anything moves
Every old address mapped to a new one and tested before launch, because this is the step that loses rankings when it is skipped.
Tracking that waits for consent
Nothing loads before a choice is made, and the banner says what it does. This is the part regulators are actually acting on.
Google Ads on a flat fee
A fixed monthly amount whatever the spend, so the advice does not get more expensive when the budget does.
Shopify and WooCommerce moves
Products, variants, media and URLs moved with the search positions held, on the same domain where that is possible.
Custom systems when software is the problem
Order flows, stock feeds and internal tools, when the honest answer is that no amount of marketing fixes the process underneath.
Plain monthly notes
What was done, what it changed and what is next, in a page you can read without a glossary.
Want the number first? Every price is published, including the ones I would not charge you.
Two languages done properly, which is cheaper than it sounds
A bilingual Belgian site is not two websites. It is one structure with two sets of copy, connected with hreflang so that search engines serve the right version to the right person and the two versions stop competing with each other. The expensive mistake is building one language first, launching, and bolting the second on later, because by then the URL structure and the navigation have been designed around a single language and the retrofit costs more than doing it once.
The useful part is that Belgian search is less contested than either the Dutch or the French market it sits between. Competing for a Flemish phrase is easier than competing for the same phrase in the Netherlands, and the buyer is just as real. That is the whole argument for building both versions properly from the start.
The consent work is the same as its neighbours, and worth doing early
Belgium sits between two of the more active enforcement environments in Europe. The Dutch regulator has been checking banners systematically since April 2025, and German competition law puts a price on faulty legal pages. Belgian practice has not produced the same volume of public action, which makes it the easy place to be sloppy and the cheap place to get it right.
The build is the same discipline everywhere: nothing non essential loads before a choice, refusing is as easy as accepting, and the privacy policy describes what actually runs in both languages. The reasoning, with the regulator positions set side by side, is in the guide to GDPR and analytics.
A furniture retailer: three storefronts, three ad accounts and a CRM
A Dutch furniture retailer with three brands and a ten to twelve week order cycle, where the online numbers alone made a busy business look like a failing one until the measurement was fixed.
What I will not do
Said before you ask, because it is usually the deciding part.
Promise a position
Nobody controls Google's results, and anyone who promises a ranking is either guessing or lying. I will tell you what is winnable and what is not, with the search data in front of you.
Hold your accounts
Analytics, Search Console and every ad account are registered in your name from day one. If you stop working with me you lose nothing but me.
Bill a percentage of ad spend
A percentage pays me more when you spend more, which is the wrong incentive. Advertising is a flat monthly fee whatever the budget.
Take the work if it is the wrong spend
If the free check says your problem is not a website problem, the report says so and I tell you what would actually move the number.
Rather just ask? One question by email or WhatsApp is fine.
The rest of the Benelux
Neighbouring markets, each with its own regulator, language and checkout.
Every market I work in is listed on where I work, with what differs in each one.
Fair questions before you get in touch
You are not based here. Does that matter?
It has not so far. Everything runs by email and WhatsApp, the accounts are in your name, and the work is the same work wherever it is typed. I am in Pakistan and I say so on every page, because finding that out later is worse than reading it now.
Can we start in one language and add the second later?
You can, and it costs more than doing both at once. The URL structure, the navigation and the hreflang setup all get designed differently if a second language is coming. Tell me at the start even if the second version is months away.
Is Netherlands Dutch good enough for Flanders?
It gets understood and it reads as foreign. Everyday vocabulary differs enough that a Flemish buyer can tell within a paragraph, and the search phrases differ too, which matters more. Flemish copy for Flanders.
Do we need German as well?
Only if you actually sell into the eastern cantons. For most Belgian businesses the answer is no, and the effort belongs in making the Dutch and French versions complete instead.
Why are the prices on the website?
Because the alternative is a quote form, and a quote form exists to get you on a call before you know the number. The free 15 point check, the 290 euro audit and the monthly and rebuild prices are all published. You can decide before you ever write to me.
How long before any of this shows up in search?
A new page on a site that already carries some authority can move within weeks. On a site with very few links pointing at it, expect months, and expect the first movement on specific questions rather than on the obvious commercial terms. I will not give you a date, because nobody controls the result. What I will give you is the order of the work and what each step is meant to change.
Send your web address. That is the whole first step.
The written 15 point check comes back within two working days, free. It says what is holding the site back, in the order worth fixing.