Is your website international-friendly?

The number one rule in marketing is to show how you will solve your customer’s problem. When you serve an international audience, this becomes more challenging.

Language is a powerful business tool. As a professional, harnessing the power of the local language on your website can have a dramatic impact on your sales. Here are just a few of the benefits to making your website friendly for a variety of foreign markets:

You create a faster connection with your audience.
Search engines rank you higher because you incorporate foreign language keywords.
You send a clear signal that you are open for business in other countries.

Planning your translation project

At first glance, translation of your web copy seems relatively easy. When you dive in deeper though, you quickly realize that there is a lot more to this process that goes beyond a basic word-for-word rewrite in another language. You must taken into consideration non-verbal cues on your website, and the context of each marketing message you write. You must also decide how you will display each language once the translation is complete.

Here are three main ways to display your translation to your international audience.

1. Display the same content regardless of language or geographic location

The easiest approach is to display the same content to every person who visits your website. Although easy, this option will make it very difficult to boost your sales in foreign markets. Here’s why:

On the web, you only have a few seconds to capture the attention of your visitors. If they see your content is in another language, they will go to your competitor.
Sales happen when people feel that the person behind the screen is speaking directly to them. With content in another language, it becomes much harder to form that connection.
The images you display on your homepage may delight some audiences…and infuriate others. With the same homepage showing for all languages and regions, you risk upsetting certain markets.

2. Let users select their language

This approach turns your homepage into a linguistic gatekeeper. It requires that your visitor take it upon himself to find his language, and then click further to a website translated into his native tongue.

Having a language selection barrier as your homepage can benefit your reader. Here’s why this is not a bad option:

The choice your visitor has to make is an easy one in this scenario. Most people will click further.
People will appreciate that you have different offers for their language or region. This can establish a sense of trust with your brand.

3. Automatically redirect your visitor to a page in their language based on their location

In your website’s code, you can tell your website to detect where your visitor is in the world, and then redirect him to the region’s dominant language. For example, if your visitor pulls up your website in Denmark, it will automatically show him the Danish version of your website.

This approach has more benefits than downfalls.

Your visitor immediately sees his language when he visits your site, making it easier to form an instant connection with your business.
You can specify in your website’s code the most appropriate language for regions where you have not translated the content. For example, if you do not have a website in French, you can select to redirect French users to the pages translated to English instead of Chinese.

The risk in using this approach is that you might show your website to a non-native speaker visiting the region. You can easily overcome this by having a drop down menu at the top with other languages visitors can choose from.

When it comes to translating your website, there is a lot to consider. From the images you use, to the way you display each language, your firm must decide what approach is right for your goals, and how you will get the maximum impact from your international marketing.

Image: PhotoSpin