Translate to Multiple Languages: 3 Simple Web Translation Options

Do you have an ecommerce website, a blog, or simply a website that you want to expose to a wider audience? Do you want to increase sales for your landing pages? Or do you simply want to improve traffic to achieve your goals – visibility, conversions, sales, or reach?

Translate to multiple languages and make your website more visible, valuable and user friendly. Keep reading in the following for the reasons to translate to multiple languages and what options you have. For the meantime, let’s check out some stats on why you must translate to multiple languages.

eCommerce Websites Statistics: Why Translate to Multiple Languages

●   65 percent of online consumers want to read and see content in their native language

●   76 percent of online consumers prefer buying products if the information presented to them is in their native language

●   60 percent of customers shop from websites in which content is written in their language

Translate To Multiple Languages: How to Choose a Translation Method

You can get your website translated in multiple languages by using any of the following methods, such as manual translation, especially if the content is sensitive.

To help you choose, consider if you want your content to be translated by humans. That can make a huge difference in website translation because they can translate to multiple languages with accuracy, like in medical or legal translation.

While it can be costly for some small businesses that need only product descriptions, hiring the services of professional translators are absolutely valuable. They can translate your content with accuracy and perform editing to ensure precision of the meaning of the text.

On the other hand, there are also automatic translation tools, which over time have evolved and developed into more useful solutions for businesses that want to use a more affordable translation solution.

However, automatic translations are different from manual translation in terms of accuracy. 

Automatic translators might not be able to convey a 100% accurate meaning of the content, especially when it comes to word usage and specific idioms native to the target language. 

But if your website content, such as general articles, can be easily understood, using automatic translation may be enough. They can be translated using an automatic translation solution; there are also tools that allow you to translate the website content yourself with just a click of a button.

You might also like: Why Automatic Translation is (Mostly) a Bad Idea

Translate To Multiple Languages: Manual Translation

One of the most common methods to choose from is manual translation, which also offers you with several options. You can hire a freelancer, who you can pay per hour or per project, or a translation agency, which has a pool of professional translators to help translate content at a low rate.

You can hire a translator to translate to multiple languages. If you’d choose the right service provider, you’ll come up with accurate and well-written translated website content. 

You will also find a freelance translator that can help to translate in multiple languages. They might be what you’re looking for if your content is not technical or complex. They are in freelancing websites, such as UpWork or Fiverr.

They’ll manually translate your pages and word-for-word to ensure that they keep their context and meaning. 

While it can be expensive to hire a professional translator, it can be rewarding, especially if your content is sensitive.

On the other hand, you can hire a translation agency that specializes in website translation. They have a group of professional translators that can precisely translate content. You will find a wide range of translation companies that can offer you a quick turnaround, too.

Translate To Multiple Languages: Automatic Machine Translation

If your content is easy to understand and can be translated literally, there are also automatic translation tools that you can use. This may be suitable for you if a slight error will not affect your content.

If you’re a WordPress user, you can use a multilingual plugin that will allow you to translate the whole website, including the theme and menu.

Nevertheless, there are different WordPress plugins to choose from and use for automatic website translation, either bilingual or multilingual websites.

The downside for this – You might not come up with accurate translation. And as it translates literally, there are words or expressions, which may have bad meanings in other countries that can be included into your content.  

This might hurt your reputation and affect your image negatively. So if you have the budget, you might want to opt for human-generated translations.

Translate to Multiple Languages: Plugins

There are also website plugins that you can easily use to translate your content from one language to the other.  Each of them possesses unique features, which can help you decide the right one for you based on your needs. The following are some of the most used and powerful plugins to translate to multiple languages.

Google Translate

This plugin to translate to multiple languages is one of the most used and powerful plugins for translating web content into different languages.

Google Translate and its WP plugin “Translate WordPress with GTranslate” feature the world-renowned Google Translate engine, which can quickly create translations to all the supported languages.

It also has a language switcher that lets you translate a web page automatically based on the browser language of the user. Aside from its free version is its paid version that has added features, including SEO-friendly URL recommendations, and it lets you access search engine indexing.

TranslatePress

This plugin allows you to translate the whole website from the front-end directly. It features a unique and intuitive interface, allowing you to translate content, while seeing all the changes made in real-time.

It can work well for many themes, plugins, and page builders.  There are also integrated automatic translation solutions to use within the plugin, such as DeepL and Google Translate, and then change or modify something that isn’t right.

Polylang

This features a simple and easy to use interface, allowing you to add translations for your media, pages, custom post types, and posts, to name some, quickly. It uses an internal translation tool and sub-domains, subdirectories, and separate domains to help with managing translations.

WPML

This is another great plugin to translate to multiple languages, offering a whole host of features to translate the entire website. It allows you to install different languages in just one installation, eliminating the need for sub-domains and features an excellent interface, allowing users with not much technical experience to set up a multiple language website.

It also offers an option to connect your website to a translation service that might be what you need for higher quality outputs. This plugin lets you choose which content to translate and post on the website, too.

Weglot

This is another popular plugin used by WordPress users to translate their website. You can either use the web version or the plugin if you want to manage translations and access your dashboard.

It has different useful features, including a language switcher button and SEO-friendly features. It is available in both a free and a paid version. 

Multilingual Press

It is a unique plugin that uses a different approach to creating websites in different languages and uses an integrated WordPress multisite network that creates websites for each language. With this, your website can load only one language at one time.

It can be for you if you have a website with heavy content because websites for every language can be its separate directory, sub-domain, or a custom domain name. This plugin can support multiple translations for pages, posts, taxonomies, and custom post types, to name some.

Benefits to translate to multiple languages

Now, you may be asking “why translate to multiple languages?” In the following, let’s discuss a few major advantages of translating your website to multiple languages.

International exposure

If your website is only in English, you’ll be missing a lot of people who do not speak the language. 

Most people are outside America and other English speaking countries. For example, Chinese users are about 20% percent of internet users. So, you can imagine millions of people you will be missing if your website is not translated to multiple languages.

Whether blog posts, informational articles, product descriptions, and other website content, you must consider multiple language translation.

New and global markets

You might doubt at first but you might be surprised that some markets other than where you are selling your products will find your offers popular. 

By entering and launching your offers to new markets, you’ll adapt your products to a new audience. To translate to multiple languages, your business will be exposed to new and global markets, which may potentially mean more visibility and eventually sales.

Translate to multiple languages and expand your market! It’s one of the best ways to increase the global presence of your company because it allows you to reach more people; thus, you’re increasing the size of your potential online audience.

International and global branding

Make your products and your brand international through multiple language translation for your website, giving you access to the global market and opening more doors of opportunities for you.

Don’t limit your website to only English or one language. Otherwise, you’ll also limit your brand’s exposure. Instead, attract and reach out to more people around the world.

Translate to multiple languages! It will help improve brand awareness, which will eventually elevate your status. Doing so, you’ll also improve your reputation, as more consumers regard global brands more trustworthy than those only known locally.

Cost-effective

Do you want to reach a wider audience by launching to new markets but think it’s expensive? It doesn’t need to be expensive at all. The truth is, a website translated to multiple languages is cost-effective especially in terms of engaging new potential customers that do not speak in your native language.

Translating your website, you’ll have better results for your global marketing campaign because you’ll stay more competitive as your content will be accessible in the language of your target market.

Search engine optimization boost

Translate to multiple languages for a higher potential to rank higher on search engines. It is because a wider audience can reach you. As a result, your website will increase its traffic due to increased visibility.  And much more if you offer valuable content, the more chances you’ll boost website traffic.

Translate to multiple languages and increase your exposure and traffic in online searches! 

As your site is available in multiple languages, you’ll have better rankings, not to mention users use their local or native language when searching. You don’t have to translate your site to all 123 languages, but in major languages, though.

Low Competition

Since a lot of website owners only have their site in English, you’ll find and meet less competition to translate to multiple languages. Who knows? You might be the first one to have website content in a certain language.

Accessibility

Translate to multiple languages to make your website accessible and available to everyone. 

Right now, English is no longer the universal language, accounting for only 29.5 percent of web users who are natives of the English language. On the other hand, those from non-English speaking countries total to 3.4 billion, as of March 2020.

Conversions and sales

If you translate to multiple languages, you’ll improve user experience and build a connection with them better than your competitors who have not considered multiple language translation.

Direct communications, promotions, ads, follow ups, and website content will be in their language, and that’s something they’ll appreciate. Thus, you’ll have more chances of improving your conversions and sales.

Multiple language translation for your website can help increase your revenues because you help users find and grasp information easily and quickly.

With that, they’re likely to convert from users to customers, who may also be your brand ambassadors if they find your offers really valuable. And as you have a multilingual website, you’ll also have a broader reach on the web.

Increasing sales, nonetheless, is one of the best ways to achieve financial productivity. It becomes possible if your product descriptions, for instance, are available in the native language of your customers, who are more likely to buy from you if they understand your content.

Final Thoughts

If you want to translate to multiple languages, choose from one of the methods we’ve shared above. Each of them has their pros and cons, so you should study your options well before making that decision.

So again, there are manual translation solutions, automatic translation tools, and plugins that you can rely on for full website translation. Depending on your budget, requirements, and specific situation, choose the one that can meet your needs.

But if you require a higher quality output, you might want to use a professional translation service.  We have years of combined experience in helping websites localized their content and website with our translation expertise.  Contact us to learn more today!