Speaker 1: Hey everyone, hope you're all well. Welcome back to our channel and in today's video I am going to show you how to create a multilingual website on a budget. Multilingual websites are a stepping stone into a global audience to attract a global audience. There's a lot to unpack in this video so we'll cover what they are, why you should build one, how to build effective ones and challenges and costs and specifically how to actually use some of the apps and plugins that are out there to create your own multilingual website on a budget as well. We'll also take a look at some of the examples in real life examples of successful multilingual websites so without further ado let's get started. So why build a multilingual website? A multilingual website is a website that offers its content in more than one languages. In other words it'll provide information, text and other elements such as images and videos in multiple languages and the reason for this is because it caters to a diverse audience. Users visiting the site can typically choose a preferred language from the language selector arm menu. Some other key features of a multilingual website include language selection so users can select their preferred language from a list of available languages. This choice often persists across pages or sessions ensuring a consistent browsing experience in the chosen language and localized content so content isn't simply translated word for word but it's often adapted to be culturally relevant and sensitive to the target audience. This may involve adjusting language imagery and content to align with local customs and preferences. The website's architecture typically employ SEO practices to ensure that the content in each language ranks well in search engines. This may involve using href tags to indicate language and regional targeting and content is managed in a way that allows for easy translation updates in multiple languages. This often involves using a content management system that supports multilingual capabilities. The user interface elements such as navigation menus and buttons are also translated to provide a seamless experience in the chosen language. Multilingual websites are essential for businesses and organizations that want to reach a global audience or serve a diverse community with different language preferences. They ensure that information is accessible and understandable to a wide range of users contributing to improved user engagement, trust, and international expansion opportunities. So let's talk the first step which is planning your multilingual website. Planning is a really crucial step in any web development project and when it comes to creating a multilingual website it becomes even more important. Here are several reasons why planning your multilingual website project is of utmost importance. First it'll help clear your objectives. Planning helps you define your clear objectives for your multilingual website. You can identify the specific languages you want to support, the target audience, and what you aim to achieve with the site. The clarity ensures that your project stays on track. It helps with budget management, content strategy as well, meaning that you can develop a comprehensive content strategy during the planning phase. This involves deciding which content will be translated, what will be kept in the original language, and how to maintain consistency in messaging across languages. Planning also helps you address technical aspects such as choosing the right CMS with multilingual capabilities, setting up language-specific URLs, and implementing SEO best practices for internationalization. Localization goes beyond translation. Planning allows you to consider cultural nuances, regional preferences, and context-specific adjustments to ensure that your content resonates with the target audience. You can plan the user experience carefully, ensuring that language selection is intuitive and that users can easily navigate between the different language versions of your website. This will contribute to an overall positive experience. Planning is essential for developing a solid SEO strategy. You can research keywords in different languages, set up hreflang tags correctly, and plan how to build a backlinks and local authority. During the planning phase, you can establish a quality assurance process for translations, content updates, and technical implementations. This helps prevent errors and inconsistencies down the road. In summary, planning your multilingual website project is crucial for setting clear goals and managing resources effectively, ensuring a positive user experience, and addressing technical and cultural considerations. It lays the foundation for a successful and effective multilingual web presence. So now let's talk about the content management system and selecting the right one. Selecting the right CMS is a critical decision when building a multilingual website. Here are some things that you need to consider and popular options to make you make an informed choice. You want to consider a CMS that gives multilingual support. So it has to have, it should allow you to create and manage content in multiple languages really easily. You should be able to check how the CMS handles language and character sets. It should support the language encoding required for the languages you plan to use. Look for CMS features that support content localization, including date and time formats, currency, and regional variations. Consider whether the CMS offers a built-in translation workflow or integration with the translation management tools to streamline the translation process. Evaluate the CMS' SEO capabilities, like the ability to add href language tags and manage metadata separately for each language. You want to assess the CMS' user community and the availability of support, documentation, plugins, extensions, especially for multilingual features. Ensure that the CMS can handle the performance demands of serving content in multiple languages without slowing down your website. Evaluate the CMS' security features, how it handles security updates, especially if you're dealing with sensitive content or user data. And overall, consider the total cost of ownership, including licensing fees, hosting costs, and any additional expenses that might relate to website support. So WordPress is a really popular option for CMS. It's actually one of the most popular CMS choices, offering extensive multi-language support through plugins like WPML and Polylang as well. WordPress have a bunch of plugins that's really good for WordPress translation websites. They have some free ones like Translate Multilingual Sites and Translate, but they also have Locotranslate, DeepL, and they also have Polylang as well. All of these are really popular choices for creating multilingual websites. Polylang is actually a free multilingual plugin that simplifies the process of translating content. It's very user-friendly, allows you to add multiple languages to your site as well, and Polylang supports custom post types, widgets, and a lot more. WordPress is also known for its SEO friendliness, and when combining with multilingual plugins, you can easily optimize your site for different languages, and this includes adding tags, which can help search engines understand the language and regional targeting as well. In terms of language searcher, the Polylang plugin and also the WPML plugin also offer language searcher options that allows users to select their preferred language, and WordPress has a large and active community of users as well in order to help with any tutorials, forms, and resources as well, and troubleshoot multilingual website issues. When using WordPress for multilingual websites, it's important to carefully plan your content strategy, organize your translations, and choose the right plugins and themes to meet your specific needs. With the right approach and tools, WordPress can be a powerful platform for creating a multilingual website that reach a global global audience. Another really popular option is Wix. Wix is a popular website builder known for its ease of use and user-friendly experience. While it may not offer the same level of multilingual support and flexibility like a dedicated CMS like WordPress, it can still be a viable option for creating a basic multilingual website, especially for individuals and small businesses who prefer a simplified website building experience. Wix offers the Weglot Translate app, and this allows you to add multiple languages to your website. This app provides a straightforward way to create language versions of your website. Wix also has built-in SEO tools to help optimize your website for search engines, and this includes the ability to set unique metadata for each language version as well, and you can add a language switcher to your website to help users navigate between the different language options that you have. Wix also provides some of the best customer support to assist users in setting up and managing their websites, including multilingual features. And while Wix can be a convenient option for basic multilingual websites, it's really important to consider your specific needs and the complexity of your project. If you require more advanced multilingual features, extensive content management capabilities, or complex integration, WordPress may offer more flexibility and customization, but for a straightforward and user-friendly multilingual website, Wix is the more suitable choice. So let's talk a little bit more about the differences between translation and localization. They are related, but distinct processes when it comes to adapting different content for different languages and cultures. So when it comes to translation, you are focusing on things like language conversion. So it's primarily concerned with converting text or content from one language into another while preserving the meaning and context. It kind of aims to convey the same information in a different language. The focus of translation is on accuracy in terms of language and grammar. Translators survive or strive to ensure that the words or sentences are grammatically correct and semantically accurate. Translation may not be necessary, as in like they may not necessarily address cultural nuances or differences. It assumes that the content once translated will be understood and accepted in the target culture. In translation, maintaining consistency in terminology and phrasing across different parts is important to ensure clarity and coherence. For example, translating a user manual from English to Spanish, translating a book from one language to another, or offering subtitles for a foreign language film. Localization, however, goes beyond language conversion. It involves adapting content to the cultural, social, and visual norms of the target audience. This can include changes in tone, imagery, symbols, and even content itself. Localizers consider context-specific factors like idiomatic expressions, humor, or references that may not be relevant or understandable in the target culture. They modify content to resonate with the local audience. Localization takes into account regional variations in languages. For example, Spanish and Spain may differ from Spanish and Mexico, and these differences are considered during the process. Localization can involve changes to visual elements like graphics, colours, and design to aim with cultural sensibilities and avoid offence. Some examples include adapting a website for a Japanese audience, localizing marketing materials for a Middle Eastern or Caucasian audience, or changing the language of a language. Some examples include adapting a website for a Japanese audience, localizing marketing materials for a Middle Eastern or Caucasian audience, or changing the language of a Japanese audience. adapting a website for a Japanese audience, localizing marketing materials for a Middle Eastern market, or changing product packaging to appeal to European countries. In summary, translation is primarily concerned with linguistic accuracy and converting text from one language to another, while localization encompasses a broader spectrum of cultural and regional adaption. Relocalization ensures that content not only speaks the language but also resonates with the local culture and context, making it more relatable and effective in the target market. Building a multilingual website involves several best practices to ensure that your website is effective, user-friendly, and accessible to a global audience. Here are some best practices for building a multilingual website. First one, as mentioned before, plan ahead. Start with a clear strategy, define your target audience for each language, and set specific goals for your site. You want to select a CMS that supports multilingual features and makes it easy to manage content. You want to develop a content hierarchy and structure that accommodates multiple languages. You want to implement a language selector or menu on your system that allows users to choose a preferred language. And you want to use language-specific codes and URLs, for example, slash EN for English, slash ES for Spanish, etc. And this will help improve SEO and make navigation a little bit more intuitive for users. You want to invest in professional translation services or tools to ensure accurate and cultural appropriations translation. And you want to go beyond translation, you want to adapt content to the cultural and regional preferences. Implement SEO best practices for each language and include localized keywords, meta-tags, and attributes to indicate language and regional targeting. Localize the user interface, including navigation buttons, menus, links, and labels to match the language and culture of your audience. Conduct user testing with individuals from different language backgrounds to gather feedback and improve the user experience. By following these best practices, you can create a multilingual website that effectively reaches and engages a diverse global audience while providing a seamless and culturally relevant user experience. So now let's take a look at some real-world examples of multilingual websites. First one we're going to talk about is Airbnb. So Airbnb's multilingual feature is a complex and impressive effort to break down language barriers and connect hosts and guests across the globe. So you can see on their website, they've got all their postings up here. If you click on the little globe icon, you can set the translation and you can also set things like currency as well. So if you go into language and region and look at translation, it's automatically set to translate descriptions and reviews to English. We can always uncheck that. So now the site will reload and it will reload with their postings in its original language. So now it's set to UK, so it's still showing in English, but we have the translation set to automatic and the suggested language region is set as English United States. But again, if we click into it, we're able to change that or we can choose a language and region. So for example, if you want to see listings in Spanish, not only do we have a generic sort of Spanish language option, we do have it with a specific region. So for example, Spanish, Costa Rica, Guatemala, things like that. Same with most other languages as well, but we can pick specifically between the actual region and the language as well. So for example, if you click on Spanish Argentina, you can see that it's now been translated quite easily using the translation feature. So hosts can translate their listings into multiple languages and that'll help boost visibility for international travelers. Airbnb also automatically translate key elements like titles, amenities, and reviews for guests who prefer, whose preferred language isn't used by the host. And you can also search for listings and filters results based on the language spoken by the host or translated into the preferred language. And yeah, they also offer customer support in over 60 languages as well. So ensure that smooth communication for all users. So there's a lot of investing on their part in machine translation technology and encouraging host translation as well. Overall, Airbnb's multilingual feature is a really powerful tool and it breaks down the language barrier and fosters this kind of global connection as well. While some challenges remain, Airbnb's ongoing efforts to improve this feature are commendable and will further enhance the platform's inclusivity and reach as well. So it's definitely a good one to look out for. And if you're in a similar type business, then definitely being multilingual and be able to have the content on your website easily translatable by your guests and by your potential customers is definitely really helpful for them as well. Next up we have Etsy. So Etsy has a multilingual playground similar to Airbnb. So if you click on the little globe icon, you can update your settings to set where you live, what language you speak and the currency you use. So for example, right now it's set to English UK. So their multilingual feature aims to bridge the gap between the users, the sellers that are on the Etsy app and customers across the globe. Etsy requires a little bit more nuanced approach to cater to both sellers and buyers with diverse language needs. So with the language, for example, if we select a different language, sellers can manually translate their shop name, banner, policies and things like that. And then they can also reach relevant international audiences by adding tags in their preferred language as well. What Etsy themselves do is offer machine translations for titles, descriptions and tags to provide a basic understanding for non-English speakers as well. They also do machine translated reviews, so reviews written by sellers in other languages are automatically translated for easier understanding as well. Etsy offers guides and tutorials and translation tools to encourage sellers to translate their content and it continuously improves its machine translation algorithms for better accuracy and natural flow. Overall, Etsy's multilingual feature does empower both sellers and buyers to break down language barriers and engage in global marketplaces. While there are some challenges, Etsy's ongoing efforts to improve this feature will further open doors for unique creations to reach appreciative audiences around the world as well. So if you're a seller and you're wanting to expand your target audience beyond the country you're based in, then again, looking into a multilingual option, whether that's through the plugin or through a Wix app, might be worthwhile as well. And lastly, we have Wikipedia and Wikipedia's multilingual feature is truly impressive. It aims to make knowledge accessible to everyone on earth, regardless of their native language. It's a very complex ecosystem fueled by a dedicated of community volunteer translators and an innovative technological solutions. So if you go into Wikipedia's website, you have the option to read Wikipedia in your own language and they have over 300 languages. So there's content available in over 300 languages with variations like Mexican, Spanish and Canadian French catering to regional nuances as well. And each Wikipedia page features a languages section linking to equivalent pages in other languages and it uses machine translation tools to offer a basic understanding of content in languages you don't understand. The heart of the system is basically just of content in languages that you don't understand. And it lies in the vast community of over 280,000 active editors who translate and maintain content in their native languages. And the translated content undergoes a review by other editors to ensure accuracy and adherence to Wikipedia's quality standards as well. So Wikipedia's approach to translation is a little bit different. It fosters a welcoming community and supportive community for translators across languages and culturals. And that's really crucial for attracting and retaining volunteers. And Wikipedia also provides various tools and resources like translation memories, style guides to assist volunteers in their work. And Wikipedia continuously explores and implements new technologies like improved machine translation and content localization models as well. Overall, I think Wikipedia's multilingual feature stands as a testament to the power of collaboration and of knowledge as well. It bridges the language gap and empowers people with access to knowledge worldwide. And while there are challenges, Wikipedia's ongoing efforts to improve its multilingual capabilities solidify its commitment to making knowledge available to all. And that's it. I hope you enjoyed this video on multilingual websites. If you did, like and share with anyone who you think might find this beneficial. And let us know in the comments your experience and if you have any experience with multilingual websites and any questions, leave them in the comments section below as well. Thanks and I'll see you in the next one.