Website Localization

Localization is the process of adapting content for a specific marketplace. Localization is but one step in the translation process when the target audience is foreign to your home market. In effect, translation and localization are co-dependent.

The quickest and most obvious way to go after foreign business is by way of your website. A multilingual website signals that you mean business. It also delivers a clear message to the people in the target market that you are sensitive to their language needs.

Of course, in order to be effective, the message has to be crafted with local language requirements in mind.

In addition to appropriate language, the website localization process should also take into account the search engine optimization idiosyncrasies of the local marketplace. After all, it's one thing to have a multilingual website; it's a whole different story to have it rank in search engines such that it will readily be found.

In other words, there's little point in having a website translated into Spanish, if it's invisible to people who search the web using Spanish terminology that your website has not been optimized for.

And that's the rub. It's daunting enough to make an English language website search engine friendly, it becomes an even greater challenge for multilingual websites. Considerations like special characters and displaying them properly, translators unfamiliar with the search terminology of the local culture, regional search filters, etc. are but some examples.

See also:  

Going Global -- Click on the For More Information... link within this listing to view

TRANSLATION TIPS -- Writing Material for Websites -- Click on the Other Recommended Link... within this listing to view