Multilingual Websites - How Useful Are They?

Almost the whole world is now aware of the power of the Internet, its uses and its effects on our lifestyles and businesses and the fact that nearly every business in existence has a website of one sort or another. Whether it's an ecommerce site or a brochure and information site, each and every one of them can be visited by anyone from anywhere in the world, and for some businesses here lies the problem.

Language Barriers

Whilst the Internet has broken down a lot of communication and trading barriers and created bridges and links between nearly every country on the globe, there is still one problem that frustrates a large percentage of users – language!

We have all at one time or another visited a website written in a foreign language and quickly left it because we can't understand what's on it; it's extremely frustrating but more so when you can actually see what it is you're looking for but can't read about it. For a private individual's website it doesn't really matter too much, but for companies it could mean lost sales and a missed opportunity for future business dealings.

Business Opportunities

There are many companies trading on an international basis who are failing to make the best possible use of their websites because of this possibly costly oversight. For example; an English company trading with or looking to trade with German, Italian and Spanish companies should ideally have a version of their website in each of those languages; it would also convey a sense of courtesy and professionalism to current clients and possible future customers from those countries. Some truly global organisations already do this and have anything from three to eight or even more other-language versions of their website available for viewing.

Multilingual Speakers

For businesses planning to have additional languages on their website there is another point to consider. Whilst foreign customers will be able to order goods or services through the website, it is almost a certainty that at some point one of these customers will want to talk to a real person, perhaps to obtain further information or advice, or just looking for general support; employing a multilingual speaker or two may not only prove to be a good investment, it could also avoid any potentially embarrassing language-related incidents between clients and the company.

The Future

The advantages of multilingual websites may well become even more evident in future years as more and more countries adopt the Internet as their primary trading tool. Obviously it wouldn't be very practical to have a website that could be viewed in every single language of the world; however, this may be become a standard website feature as the Internet continues to evolve.

In the meantime, for any company who wants or is considering having extra languages on their site, a word with your web designer would be a good idea. Adapting an existing website to accommodate extra languages will obviously involve some costs such as translation fees and your web designer's time, but these would be far outweighed by the extra business a multilingual website could generate from other countries currently out of reach because of language differences.

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