Before you plan to enter the foreign speaking market, you need to know that there’s already a lot of competition going on there. Also just uploading content in their language won’t help.
So here are some necessities of a multilingual website and localization project you shouldn’t be proceeding without.
- Perfect Translation
Platforms such as WordPress and Sitecore do offer content translation options, but entirely relying on them can be the biggest mistake you’re making. You need to make sure you’re opting for professional translation services. Considering the best is always the key.
- Language Choice
The two ways you can provide the user to select the right language when they visit your website are:
- Location detection
You get to use the location of the user to enter the local language by default.
- Language selection page
The user gets to choose the language so that it can direct them to the relevant version of your website.
- Varying Content
Don’t go for shortcuts by translating the same content to the different target audience. People with different languages have somewhat different tastes too. Provide them with relevant, content that represents them.
- Localizing graphics and images
One of the repeated mistakes seen on multilingual websites is failing to localize graphics and images. This might sound racist, but you don’t want to show images of white people using your products to your users who are black. Don’t use insensitive icons. Use text labels such as ESP and EN to avoid any problems.
- Offsite multilingual channels
Even though your website is the core of your online presence but being busy on other social media platforms, e.g., during email marketing makes it necessary for all of the other connecting platforms to be multilingual too.
- Multilingual SEO
Websites are all about rankings. If you want your website to rank well for searches in all languages, you will have to be skilled in multilingual SEO. No doubt its hard to master search optimization in a bunch of languages but things won’t be easy, but even get more robust when it comes to code, URL structure, and server locations. Which means other factors effect how much rankings your website may achieve.
As you’ve seen above, multilingual website and localization project is not a piece of cake; it needs a lot of patience and dedication.