Website localization basics and a Jooble case study

网站本地化基础和Jooble案例研究

2020-09-01 17:00 multilingual

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There are 195 countries in the world, and each country has its own unique version of language. Add to that the fact that there are more than 4.5 billion daily internet users and every user would prefer to read the content in their own language. In fact, 72% of users spend time on the websites in their own language and 72.4% are more likely to buy from a website that offers them information in their native language. So how do you reach the new potential markets and enhance your digital presence in order to please international customers? The answer is the website localization. The intricacies of going global If you’re new to this, you’re not alone. Many website owners confuse the terms localization and translation. While they might keep localization in mind, all they do is simply translate the website copy which predictably leads to poor results. In order to truly win the hearts of international clients and retain your brand reputation, you need to clearly understand what are localization and translation and how they differ. Translation is simply translating the copy from one language to another. You have “a red apple” in English and “une pomme rouge” in French. Simple as that. Localization is far more tricky. It is a process of adapting your product (i.e. a website) to a specific market or audience in accordance with the audience’s culture. Think of design elements as an example. If we compare the Canadian and Japanese Coca-Cola websites, we will see that the design differs drastically. While the Canadian website seems to have a clearer layout and displays the messages about the brand’s value and mission, the Japanese version of the site seems over packed with information and images. But is it wrong? Not at all! The trick is, Asian audience loves to learn as much information as possible about the product before buying it, so Coca-Cola clearly did some quality research before launching the Japanese website. Now, localization may seem quite a hassle. Not only do you have to translate all the content, but you also need to take care of metrics and dates, images, and even layout. So why would you decide to localize your website? Here are some of the biggest benefits. Increased credibility and brand reputation. Customers love when a brand takes care of their needs and goes extra mile in an attempt to deliver a superior user experience. Therefore, an international brand that caters to its customers and knows about the different cultural aspects is more likely to win people’s hearts. If a user goes to a website and sees that it’s available in multiple languages, including their native one, this immediately boosts trust towards this website and encourages the user to explore and browse it. On the opposite, if there is only one language present on the website, it might lead to a high bounce rate. After all, 60% of global customers “rarely or never” buy services or products from English-only websites. Increased market share and revenue. Website localization means the expansion of your digital presence and therefore, entrance to new markets. And if you enter the new markets prepared, this will inevitably result in increased revenue and bigger market share. A study by Shutterstock confirms that 71% of marketing decision-makers from the US, UK, and Europe increased their sales thanks to the localization. Competitive advantage. Finally, website localization can serve as a valuable competitive advantage. Think about it: while there may be dozens (if not hundreds) of companies similar to yours, hardly several of them will make an attempt and become truly international. Therefore, if you show that you really care about all your customers, this will become an unbeatable advantage. The challenges of localization While localization is indeed a great way to connect with the customers worldwide and significantly boost your reputation, it also has several pitfalls that not many entrepreneurs are aware of. These are the localization challenges that have to be considered in order to avoid major financial and resource losses. These challenges include: Great variety of languages and dialects High costs in terms of coding and translation spendings Various cultural issues to consider Great variety of processes involved in localization Though they may sound complex, it’s actually not so difficult to resolve them if you use the right tools. Website localization: A step-by-step checklist Now that we know what exactly localization is and how it benefits one’s business, we can look at the actual process of localizing your website: Market and competition analysis: at this stage, you will determine the most potential and profitable market to enter. Definition of the project scope: assess the project in order to set the deadlines and requirements for all parties involved in localization. Choice of a third-party services provider (localization company) or assembly of an in-house localization team and assignment of roles. Use of Hreflang tags and Unicode: this helps make the website compatible with multiple languages. Work on design: visual elements of the website should correspond to the particular cultures that you target. Translation of the website content: make sure to pay attention not only to the text but formats as well (such as dates, time, and other metrics). Renewed SEO strategy: different countries have different keywords that rank the highest so you will need to work on that aspect as well. For example, 20% of all Google searches are in local languages, so you want to consider that. Compliance with local rules and regulations: you need to double-check if your website and all its contents correspond to the rules and regulations of the countries that you target. Testing: before launching the website, it is obligatory to test it and see whether it works equally well in different languages. It is worth mentioning a few localization risks that testing can successfully identify. Probably the most common issue is the lack of space: while some languages require less space, others will demand significantly more. Compare “Hello” and “Bonjour” — these two words have an obvious difference in their length. Other issues include text direction, messages adaptation, notifications, and so on. Website localization is a complex process and every step takes time and resources. However, there are ways to make localization easier and faster. Use automation — a lot! Automation is a great time-saver in terms of localization, so don’t hesitate to use it. If you have a lot of text to translate, you’ll very likely use translation memory and glossaries. A translation memory is a tool that keeps track of the translated copy, stores it, and notifies the translator in case a text similar to the already-translated one is encountered. As for the glossary, it is a compilation of all specific terms that can be met in a text (for example, medical terms) alongside their context. With the help of a glossary, translators can always know what a specific term means and when it should be used. There are a variety of available computer-aided translation tools that store translation memories, help automate the translation process, and speed things up: SDL Trados, SDL Passolo, OmegaT, Sisulizer, Poedit, MemoQ, and more. Automation is also offered by CMS and translation platforms: for example, when a translation is approved, it can be automatically published in a CMS with a CLI — command line interface or API. Such little things end up saving a great amount of time. When preparing big chunks of text for translation, it’s easy to slip into the temptation of machine translation, but you should not rely on this without a solid professional strategy. The thing is, localization is quite complex and there are many examples of the cases when it went wrong. There are hundreds of examples of marketing translation fails even from the biggest brands like Coca-Cola or KFC. And if you need an example of a really clever localized website, ASOS is your choice. The brand has different and customized messages about shipping for every available location: “Shipping to Collection Points” for France and “One-day Shipping for 15€” for Italy. The company clearly did some research and found out which messages would elicit the most response from the customers. A quick case study: localization of Jooble portal Jooble is a job search portal that is now available in 60 countries, so it came as no surprise that the company needed to expand its reach and translate the website into different languages. The company required website translations into 16 languages, including Tagalog. To begin with, Alconost requested materials from Jooble that would help their translators properly understand the context. For this, Jooble provided many screenshots of the user journey. These were then uploaded into the cloud-based translation software Crowdin and were carefully considered during the translation process. In addition, the source texts were provided in the form of .docx files containing text with HTML code. The translations were carried out directly within the HTML code; all tags needed to be kept intact, as they’re essential to website formatting. In this way, the translations could be integrated into the customer’s system directly upon completion. The translators, aside from being native speaker professional translators, had extensive experience working with HTML texts. Once the translations were added to Jooble’s website, we conducted a full linguistic testing, where we were able to fix some “long strings” that did not quite fit into their allocated places. Ultimately, Jooble was able to create a simple user interface that would work for all regions. With the help of the screenshots provided, the translated website copy was made to be enticing to the users. Jooble also made sure to add popular searches to the home screen ー it automatically displays the types of job that would be most interesting for someone from that region, thus augmenting the click rate.
全世界有195个国家,每个国家都有自己独特的语言。此外,每天有超过45亿的互联网用户,而每个用户都更喜欢阅读母语内容。事实上,72%的用户使用的是母语网站,72.4%的用户更有可能从提供母语信息的网站上消费。 那么,你如何进入新的潜在市场,增强数字化影响力,以提升国际客户满意度呢?答案就是网站本地化。 走向全球的复杂性 你可能对此感到陌生,但并不是只有你这样。许多网站所有者都混淆了本地化和翻译这两个术语。尽管他们可能熟知本地化,但他们所做的只是简单地翻译网站副本,这样做很可能效果不佳。为了真正赢得国际客户的青睐,维护品牌声誉,你务必明晰本地化和翻译的概念,以及两者之间的不同之处。 翻译,即简单地把副本从一种语言翻译成另一种语言。英文中的“a red apple”,翻译成法文叫做“une pomme rouge”。翻译就是这么简单。 本地化要棘手得多。它是根据受众的文化,使产品(即网站)适应特定市场或受众的过程。以设计元素为例,如果我们比较一下加拿大和日本的可口可乐网站,就会发现它们的设计大不相同。加拿大的网站布局相对更清晰,显示了品牌价值和宗旨的相关信息,而日文版的网站充斥着更多的信息和图片。但这有什么问题吗?一点也没有!其中的行业诀窍在于,亚洲受众喜欢在购买之前尽可能多地了解产品信息。显然,可口可乐在启用日文网站之前做了一定的质量调查。 当今,本地化似乎相当繁琐。你不仅要翻译所有内容,还需要注意度量标准、日期、图像,甚至布局。那么,你为何还要决定将网站本地化?以下是一些最显著的好处。 增强信誉度和品牌美誉度。一个品牌如果能够考虑客户需求,并且竭力提供卓越的用户体验,一定会备受青睐。因此,迎合客户的需要并且了解不同文化背景的国际品牌更容易赢得人心。 用户访问某个网站时,如果发现该网站可以使用多种语言(包括其母语),会即刻产生信任感,也乐于去探索和浏览。相反,如果网站上只有一种语言,那么跳出率可能会很高。毕竟,全球60%的客户“很少或永远不会”从纯英文网站购买服务或产品。 增加市场份额和收益。网站本地化意味着你将扩大数字化影响力,从而进入新市场。而且如果你进入了新的现有市场,无疑会增加收益和市场份额。Shutterstock的一项研究证实,71%来自美国、英国和欧洲的营销决策者由于本地化提高了销售额。 竞争优势。最后,网站本地化可以作为一个宝贵的竞争优势。想想看:和贵公司实力相仿的公司可能有几十家(不说几百家),但没有几家公司会做出尝试并真正走向全球。因此,如果你表现出对所有客户的真正关怀,这将成为一个无可比拟的优势。 本地化的挑战 本地化确实是一个与全球客户建立联系并显著提高声誉的好方法,但它也存在一些隐患,很多企业家都没有意识到。为了避免重大的财务和资源损失,必须考虑这些本地化挑战。 这些挑战包括: 各种各样的语言和方言 编码和翻译的高额费用 需要考虑的各种文化问题 本地化涉及的繁琐流程 虽然这些挑战听起来很复杂,但如果使用正确的工具,解决起来其实并不困难。 网站本地化:步骤一览表 既然我们知道了本地化确切的概念,以及本地化是如何增加企业效益的,那么我们接下来看看网站本地化的实际过程: 分析市场和竞争力:在这个阶段,你要确定即将进入的市场,并确保它是最有潜力、盈利最高的。 定义项目范围:对项目进行评估,以便为本地化相关各方设定最后期限和要求。 选择第三方服务提供商(本地化公司)或组建内部本地化团队并分配角色。 使用国际标签(Hreflang)标记和统一字符标准(Unicode):这有助于网站兼容多种语言。 设计:网站的视觉元素应该符合特定的目标文化。 翻译网站内容:确保不仅要注意文本翻译,还要注意格式(如日期,时间和其他度量标准)。 更新搜索引擎优化(SEO)策略:不同的国家,其排名最高的关键词各不相同,所以你也需要在这方面做些工作。例如,20%的谷歌搜索都是用本地语言进行的,所以你要考虑好这个问题。 遵守当地的规章制度:你需要仔细检查网站及网站上的所有内容是否符合目标国家的规章制度。 测试:在启用网站之前,必须进行测试,确保其使用各种语言都能良好运行。 值得一提的是,通过测试可以成功识别几个本地化风险。最常见的问题可能是空间不足:有些语言需要的空间较少,而另一些语言则需要更多的空间。比较一下“Hello”和“Bonjour”——这两个词的长度明显不同。其他问题包括文本方向,消息改写,通知等。 网站本地化是一个复杂的过程,每一步都需要投入时间和资源。然而,有一些方法可以使本地化变得更容易、更快捷。 大量使用自动化! 就本地化而言,自动化可以节省大量时间,所以不要犹豫,去使用吧。如果你有大量文本要翻译,你很可能会使用翻译记忆和术语表。翻译记忆是一种工具,它可以追踪翻译的副本,存储下来,并在遇到与已翻译文本相似的文本时告知译者。至于术语表,它是在文本中可以遇到的所有特定术语(例如医学术语)及其上下文的汇编。在术语表的帮助下,译者总能知道某个特定术语的含义及用法。 现有的许多计算机辅助翻译工具都可以存储翻译记忆,实现翻译过程的自动化,提高翻译速度:SDL Trados,SDL Passolo,OmegaT,Sisulizer,Poedit,MemoQ等等。内容管理系统(CMS)和翻译平台也提供了自动化功能:例如,翻译核准后,可以通过命令行接口(CLI)或应用编程接口(API)在内容管理系统中自动发布。往往是这样的小事,最终能节省大量的时间。 如果准备翻译的文本过于庞大,就很容易抵制不住机器翻译的“诱惑”。但是,如果没有可靠的专业策略,就不宜依赖机器翻译。 问题在于,本地化是相当复杂的,出现问题的案例也很多。在营销方面,翻译失败的例子有成百上千,即使是最大的品牌(比如可口可乐或肯德基),也有过类似的经历。 如果你需要找一个设计精巧的本地化网站来参考,ASOS是个不错的选择。该品牌针对每个地区均有不同的定制化信息:法国为“发货至收集点”,意大利为“15欧元单日配送”。显然,该公司做了一定的调查,发现了最能引起客户反应的各种信息。 快速案例研究:Jooble门户的本地化 Jooble是一个求职门户网站,目前在60个国家都可以使用,因此公司需要扩大其覆盖面并将网站翻译成不同的语言也就不足为奇了。该公司要求将网站翻译成16种语言,包括他加禄语。 首先,Alconost要求Jooble提供一些材料,帮助其译者正确理解相关背景。为此,Jooble提供了大量的使用者旅程截图。这些截图随后被上传到基于云端的翻译软件Crowdin中,在翻译过程中会认真参考。 此外,源文本以.docx文件形式提供,其中包含带有HTML代码的文本。翻译直接在HTML代码内进行;所有标签均需保持原封不动,因为它们对网站格式至关重要。这样,翻译完成后就可以直接合并到客户的系统中。除了以英语为母语的专业译者外,其他译者都拥有处理HTML文本的丰富经验。 一旦有翻译添加到Jooble的网站上,我们就会进行一次全面的语言检测,通过检测我们能够修复一些不太适合其指定位置的“长字符串”。 最终,Jooble能够创建一个简单的用户界面,该界面适用于所有地区。借助提供的截图,翻译后的网站内容十分抓人眼球。Jooble还会将热门搜索添加到主界面上——它会自动显示某个地区最吸引人的工作类型,从而提高点击率。

以上中文文本为机器翻译,存在不同程度偏差和错误,请理解并参考英文原文阅读。

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