I gave this presentation at Confab 2012, the Content Strategy conference in Minneapolis, US. It's an updated version of the one I gave in September 2011 at the Content Strategy Forum in London.

1. Weaving localization issues into a content strategy
Issues in Content Localization
Lise Janody
Confab 2012, Minneapolis, May 15, 2012

2. Localize
Why
Localize ?

3. ENGLISH IS THE WORLD’S MOST INFLUENTIAL LANGUAGE
Georges Weber, The World’s 10 Most Influential Languages

4. ….AND IT ISN’T ABOUT TO CHANGE ANY TIME SOON
89% of European
schoolchildren learn English as
a second language
Very high level of comfort with
English among more than 50%
of Europeans
350 million Chinese are
learning English
It is the de facto language of
work in many global companies
Eurobarometer 2011: User Language Preferences Online - Robert McCrum, Globish: How English became the world’s language, Anchor Canada 2011;
Image Fotolia

5. But…
Ability is not
Preference
Preference
9 of 10 Internet users would access
web in THEIR language – if given the
choice*
Eurobarometer 2011: User Language Preferences Online

6. Getting the gist is not
Details
Getting the details
44% of European internet users believe
they’re missing information when accessing
in non-native language*
Eurobarometer 2011: User Language Preferences Online

7. ACCEPTANCE IS NOT ADHERENCE
Eurobarometer 2011: User Language Preferences Online

8. Access is not
Transaction
Transaction
Only 18% of EU internet users polled
would purchase goods or services in a
foreign language. *
Eurobarometer 2011: User Language Preferences Online

9. WHY NOT JUST USE GOOGLE TRANSLATE?

10. Preference
User preference +
More sales +
Trust and persuasion =
Localization is good
BUT

11. Localization is
hard
hard
• Costly
• Time-consuming
• Quality an ongoing issue
• Budgets are fragmented
• Requires supporting tools
and processes
• Creates complexity

12. Q
How can we help reduce costs,
speed translation cycles, make
it less complex?
A
Make it part of the content
strategy cycle, and not a
parallel process

13. A FEW
DEFINITIONS

14. Localization is the process of adapting
internationalized software for a specific
region or language by adding locale-
specific components and translating text.
From Wikipedia

15. A SERIES OF LONG ACRONYMS: GILT
G11N
Globalization
L10N
Going into
L18N Localization T9N
other markets
Internationalization Adapting content Translation
to another context
Ensuring platforms Taking content in
and tools can one language and
handle technical making it
requirements of understandable in
globalization: fonts, another
date formats, time
formats, error
pages, etc.

16. Localization Translation
COUNTRY LANGUAGE
Country & Language
LOCALES

17. MODEL
Choice of approach affects your
Architectural Model

18. LOCALE FIRST

19. GLOBAL REACH, LOCAL TOUCH
Corporate site is in two languages: English and language of Headquarters

20. GLOBAL REACH, LOCAL TOUCH – REDUCED SCOPE CONTENT

21. GLOBAL REACH, LOCAL TOUCH

22. REDUCED SCOPE, FEWER LEVELS

23. MULTI-PURPOSE, DIFFERENT AUDIENCES

24. MULTI-PURPOSE, DIFFERENT AUDIENCES

25. MULTI-LANGUAGE VERSIONS

26. MULTI-LANGUAGE VERSIONS

27. LOCALIZED RESOURCES WITHIN ENGLISH SITE
International English default, with limited localized resources

28. SEO
Approach impacts
SEO
• Localized keyword research
• Duplicate content among
countries with same language
• New Google hreflang tags

29. SMS
Approach impacts
CMS
• Substitute components
• Add/remove
• Parent/child
• Content modeling

30. Approach impacts
Governance
Governance
• One rule for all locales?
• One rule for the whole site?
• Can you localize the landing page?
• Can you localize entire sections?
• Can you opt-in/opt-out?
• Specific pages?
• Specific page components?

31. And of course,
Content
Content

32. THE GOAL: MAKING YOUR LOCALIZED CONTENT EFFECTIVE
PRINCIPLES OF
EFFECTIVE CONTENT*…. ….APPLIED TO LOCALIZATION
APPROPRIATE Does it apply to the local context?
USEFUL Is your purpose the same in all your markets?
USER-CENTERED Can your users understand?
CLEAR Is translation quality high? Is it localized?
CONSISTENT Are you reinforcing brand while keeping costs
down?
CONCISE Less is more – and less costs less
SUPPORTED Do you have the processes, tools, people, and
budgets required?
*From Elements of Content Strategy, Erin Kissane, A Book Apart, 2011

33. YOU
WHAT’S BEST
FOR ?

34. SETTING TARGETS,
EXAMINING WHAT YOU HAVE…

35. SETTING THE TARGET
Creating baselines
• Market size and • Ability to speak
potential English
• Legal & contractual • Language preference
obligations • Audience A, B, C, D
• Brand recognition • Formal/informal
• Competition • Other elements
impacting Look and
Market Cultural feel
forces forces
• Market presence
• Type
Internal Site
• Inform
• Number of Forces objectives • Educate
People
• Interact
• Consistency of
• Convert
offering
• Transact
• Culture and
Heritage • Recruit

36. BASELINE TARGETS
DEFINING WHERE YOU WANT TO GO
• Number of languages
• IA Model (or models)
• Number of tiers

37. REVIEWING YOUR LOCAL SITES
IF YOU’RE NOT STARTING FROM SCRATCH
From what bucket
WHAT’S ON THE WEBSITE IN % of bucket that’s translated
LOCAL LANGUAGES? % of bucket that’s localized
How it’s maintained
Owner
Enlist local help to locate
BUT ALSO WHAT’S OUT
Mini-sites, YouTube,
THERE?
SlideShare, Twitter,
Facebook

38. QUALIFY YOUR SOURCE CONTENT
• Volume of web pages
• Volume of associated content assets
• How often content changes
• Relevance to local audiences
• Budget and ownership
• Potential for localization

39. EXAMINE YOUR ECOSYSTEM
• Number of players
• Centralized or decentralized language
management?
• In-house or outsourced?
• Centralized or decentralized web management?
• Who owns the budget for what? Is there one?

40. LOOK AT YOUR TOOLSET
• Translation Memory
• Terminology Management
• Translation Management
• Machine Translation

41. LOOK AT TIME AND METRICS
• Latency
Time from source to published, translated
version
• Metrics
If there are sites, are they being visited?
• Costs
Can you develop benchmarks?

42. FIND THE GAPS, REFINE THE PLAN
Identify gaps – in content, tools, and
resources
Pretty good ballpark figure of costs
- Costs per language and per word
(translation)
- Costs for transcreation and original
content development

43. Make decisions about
Content
localizing content
• What you’ll do with it
• With what quality
• With what workflow
• For which formats
• For which devices

44. WHAT EXACTLY DO YOU LOCALIZE?
As is Keep in full, translate as is
Chunk Add, subtract
Change Shorten, replace, select, rethink
Leave it Link to English or provide no links

45. WHAT LEVEL OF TRANSLATION QUALITY?
• Transcreation
• Marketing messages, conceptual, value props
• Tool-supported translation
• Translation memory, terminology management,
post-edited machine translation
• Structured content
• Machine translation
• Large volumes of straightforward content
• Real-time communications: forums, chat
• Also, for listening…

46. SUPPORTING DIFFERENT FORMATS
• Text…but also
• Video
• Chat
• Webinars
• Micro-copy
- Banner headlines
- Calls to action
- Asset descriptions and titles

47. SUPPORTING MOBILE DEVICES
• Truncated words
• Separate processes
• The dominance of mobile in many markets

48. SAMPLE RULES FOR SITE SECTION
SOLUTIONS Section Pages Translate Quality? Who Localize? Who Comments
Tier 1 Must Must In full TC for level Central, with Add info Local
1; TM for local about in-
rest validation; country
Local for TC delivery
capability;
Tier 2 Must Opt-in Level 1 TC for level Central, with Add info Local
only 1; TM for local about in-
rest validation; country
Local for TC delivery
capability
Tier 3 Must Replace Yes TM Central, local No Use
with validation default
Summary www

49. Put content decisions
Action
into action
• Add qualifiers to your
inventory
• Include requirements in
your page specs
• Make your content
global-ready

50. ADD COLUMNS TO YOUR INVENTORY
Page Opt-In Translate Localize Status Comments
www.alpha.com/ Yes Exists Add In progress
solution/Solution
1/index.html
www.alpha.com/ yes Exists Exists Done
solution/Solution
1/index.html
www.alpha.com/ Yes To do Add TM done,
solution/Solution
1/index.html need to add

51. WEAVE LOCALIZATION INTO PAGE SPECS
• Do you translate? Yes/No
• Do you chunk, change or leave?
• What’s global, what’s local?
• What’s distinct about the local?
• What changes and how?
• Source content for local differences
• Who validates local content?
• Who pays?

52. MAKE IT GLOBAL-READY
• Remove idioms
• Keywords
• Terminology requirements
• Voice and tone

53. A FEW TIPS

54. DON’T…
• Confuse local and locally-produced
• Have several translation memories
• Use just one standard process for all your
content
• Treat localization as an afterthought

55. DO….
• Use tools to support and lower costs
• Have a feedback loop with your LSP
• Keep the glossary updated
• Try to limit number of players involved
• Find alternatives to latency issues
• Track metrics
• Keep tabs on costs
• Put someone in charge

56. Thanks
Merci
Thanks
• Lise Janody
• www.dot-connection.com
• @lisejanody