Web Site
Localization
- By John Watkins
- Chief Operating Officer,
Lingo Systems
The use of Web sites
continues to grow in leaps and
bounds. In business, these
sites typically address
marketing, sales, and
information management for
shared data across corporate
Intranets. Companies today
realize that the Internet
provides a window through
which customers around the
world can view products and
services. For example, China's
Internet surfers have
increased to 22.5 million in
2001, skyrocketing from 8.9
million at the end of 1999. In
fact, the entire Internet is
expected to grow to a
half-billion users by 2002,
according to Forrester
Research. Western Europe will
account for 40 percent of
Internet users in 2001.
Until recently, most Web
pages were presented in
English. As use of the
Internet increases
internationally, though, more
and more companies are
considering localization of
their Web sites.
 There
are important issues to
consider before embarking on a
project for Web site
localization. Web sites, by
their very nature, encourage
the site hosts to update and/
or modify the information
frequently- visitors to the
Web site expect to see
up-to-date information! It is
this expectation, though, that
makes localization of Web
sites a bit more problematic.
A change to one Web page on
the site requires changes to
the same page in all languages
supported. Clearly, Web site
maintenance becomes more
complicated with each language
supported.
Before localizing a
company-wide Intranet (with
international offices) Web
site, you should consider:
- How many foreign staff
members use our Intranet?
- Do they require text in
their native language?
- Could certain key pages
be localized while leaving
the bulk of the site in
English?
Similarly, the decision to
localize your marketing and
sales pages should be
carefully evaluated. While
localizing the Web site makes
your product more visible in a
foreign market, you should be
sure that your foreign
audience is large enough to
support the costs for
localization and ongoing
maintenance of the pages. As
with Intranet considerations,
it may be possible to localize
a subset of your pages to keep
cost down while showing
good-faith effort for your
international market.
Cost concerns aside, it is
clear that some level of Web
site localization is desirable
for many businesses. The
following subsections address
the localization process for
Web sites.
- The following are some
examples of the benefits
and issues related to
localization:
-
- Used with permission.
- John Watkins
- Lingo Systems
- http://www.lingosystems.com
|
Localization
Information Sources
|
| http://www.idg.net/ |
IDG's
search site -
numerous articles on
globalization and
localization. |
| http://www-106.ibm.com/ |
IBM's
"Building
Worldwide Web
Sites" -
excellent overview
of localization
issues and concerns. |
| http://www.lisa.org/ |
Founded
in 1990 as a
non-profit
association, LISA is
the premier
organization for the
(GIL) Globalization,
Internationalization,
and Localization
business
communities.
Offers detailed
35-page localization
primer at following
address: http://www.lisa.org/ |
| http://www.lisa.org/ |
LISA
Cost Matrix for site
localization. |
| http://babelfish.altavista.com/ |
Altavista
Bablefish -
translation to eight
languages - Spanish,
German, French,
Chinese, Japanese,
Portugese, Italian
and Korean |
| http://www.lisa.org/ |
Building
Cultural Diversity
into the Development
of Multilingual
Applications. |
| http://www.w3.org/ |
World
Wide Web Consortium
(W3C) guide to
internationalization. |
| http://www.bowneglobal.com/ |
Bowne
Global Solutions
provides
localization, market
entry and
translation /
interpretation
services. |
| http://www.japantranslate.com/ |
WorkMedia
provides
localization, market
entry and
translation /
interpretation
services. |
|
Localization
Blunders
|
| Chevy
Nova |
Doesn't
go (Spanish) |
| Intel
Pentium IV Chip |
"Chip
of Death"
(Korean) |
| Kentucky
Fried Chicken
"finger-lickin
good" |
"Eat
your fingers off"
(Chinese) and "So
good you'll eat your
fingers" (Iran) |
| Perdue
(Tyson) "It takes
a tough man to make a
tender chicken" |
"It
takes a hard man to
make a chicken
aroused" (Mexico) |
| Puffs |
"Whorehouse"
(German) |
Date Updated: March 27, 2007
|
