It involves translating all marketing content into one or more languages and the process typically goes far beyond simple linguistic translations. 

In this article, we will dive deeper into what marketing translations involve, the many benefits and challenges of the translation process, and the steps you need to take to implement marketing translations in your business. 

Let’s get started. 

What is Marketing Translation?

Simply put, marketing translation refers to the translation of all marketing content into one or more languages. 

The areas of marketing that warrant translation include business websites, social media posts, product descriptions, email campaigns, press releases, brochures, offline advertisements, and other promotional materials. 

The goal of implementing marketing translation is to effectively convey the intended marketing message to diverse audiences across various markets and drive your business to success. 

It’s important to understand that marketing translation is not as simple as translating content into different languages. 

It requires an expert understanding of cultural nuances, linguistic subtleties, and market dynamics to ensure that the business avoids misinterpretation and cultural insensitivity which could ruin its brand image and squash any dream of expansion and global success. 

As you can imagine, implementing marketing translation is a long and complicated process. 

In this article, we will show you how to successfully implement marketing translation but first let’s take a quick dive into the many benefits and challenges of implementing marketing translation. 

Benefits of Marketing Translations 

The common benefits of implementing marketing translation for your business are:

Better Reach: Translating all your marketing content allows your business to communicate with potential customers in their native languages. Such multilingual marketing efforts are likely to build trust and increase engagement levels with your product and services. 

Increased Brand Awareness: More people engaging with your business heightens your brand awareness. This heightened awareness attracts new customers but also reinforces loyalty among existing ones. It allows businesses to differentiate themselves in competitive markets, and solidify their reputation as a trusted and inclusive brand.

Increased Revenue: Better reach and heightened brand awareness could easily translate to better revenue collection. The more people encounter your marketing content tailored to resonate with different cultural backgrounds, the more they feel understood and valued and are inclined to purchase your product or service.

Industry Leader: By leveraging marketing translation businesses can create a strong brand presence, foster customer loyalty, and differentiate themselves in competitive markets. As a result of such consistent effort, businesses can establish themselves as the go-to authority in their respective fields, driving long-term success and sustainability.

Business Longevity: By catering to different markets businesses can reduce dependency on a single market, and ensure that businesses remain afloat and thriving during economic downturns or shifts in consumer preferences. Marketing translation makes the business resilient and ensures longevity in an ever-changing economic landscape.

Challenges of Marketing Translations 

Next, let’s take a look at the challenges you are likely to face when implementing marketing translations:

Cultural Nuances: Messages that resonate well in one language may not have the same impact when directly translated into another language. Understanding cultural subtleties, idiomatic expressions, beliefs, and values is crucial but also a lot of work. Moreover, failure to address cultural nuances can lead to misinterpretations, potentially damaging brand reputation, hindering the effectiveness of marketing campaigns, and even preventing future success. 

Language Complexity: Some languages have unique grammatical structures, tones, or writing systems that may not directly translate into other languages. Finding the right balance between linguistic accuracy and readability requires skilled linguists and cultural experts which can be a time-consuming and expensive affair. 

Brand Consistency: Maintaining brand voice, tone, and messaging consistency across different languages while ensuring that the essence of the brand is not lost in translation can be difficult. Any discrepancies in translation can lead to fragmented brand perception across diverse markets.

Legal & Regulatory Compliance: Different consumer markets have different laws and guidelines on marketing, advertisements, collection, and use of personal information among other things. Translating marketing content while adhering to these regulations requires meticulous attention to detail and a deep understanding of local legal frameworks. Failure to comply with legal requirements can result in fines, reputational damage, or even legal consequences for businesses. 

Time & Resources: Coordinating multiple projects across different languages, ensuring quality translations, and meeting tight deadlines require hiring skilled professionals, access to resources, and efficient project management, and collaboration techniques. Catering to all these requires time, effort, and funds. 

Now that you have some idea of the benefits and challenges of marketing translations, let’s dive into the steps of implementing it for your business.

How to Implement Marketing Translations For Your Business

To implement marketing translations for your business, you need to carry out the following steps:

1. Assess Market Needs

One of the first things you’d need to do is determine the regions or countries where your products or services can be sold. This can be done by 

• Looking at competitors who are already successful in those regions
• Reading market surveys and predictions in your industry to understand market trends and potential opportunities
• Assessing your business data to discover markets where the demand for your product or service is steadily increasing

You can review sales data, customer demographics, website traffic, and other relevant metrics to pinpoint regions or countries showing growth potential. 

Also consider factors such as customer feedback, and purchase patterns, and make inquiries from specific regions to determine where localization and marketing translations can have the most impact.

2. Assess Your Existing Business Resources 

Before embarking on marketing translations, you need to evaluate your existing resources to figure out how to allocate them and whether you need additional resources. 

Evaluate the language skills and expertise within your team. Determine if you need to hire in-house translators and have the resources to train them. 

For some businesses, it might be better to hire agencies, freelancers, or translation tools to carry out the translation process.

Consider the costs related to hiring translators, purchasing translation tools, or outsourcing to agencies. Factor in expenses for proofreading, editing, and quality assurance to maintain translation accuracy.

Also consider the time required for translation projects, including content review, revisions, and approval processes.

3. Decide What to Translate

Here’s a quick rundown of the key areas that need translations during marketing translation campaigns: 

• Website content (including slogan, taglines, posts, pages, popups, widgets, SEO, and metadata elements) 
• Advertising materials 
• eCommerce elements 
• Brochures and marketing collaterals 
• Email campaigns 
• Social media content 
• Press releases 
• Video scripts, subtitles, voiceovers, etc

IMPORTANT: You don’t need to focus on all these areas simultaneously. Prioritize based on audience engagement potential, brand consistency needs, and translation feasibility within budget and timelines. 

4. Choose Translation Tools, Professional Translators, or Both

When it comes to implementing translations, there are two ways to do it: you can use a translation tool or hire a professional to manually translate your marketing content. 

Both methods have benefits and drawbacks. 

Translation tools offer automation features for quick turnaround, they are cost-effective, and excellent devices for scaling translation efforts across multiple languages and content types. But they lack accuracy and cultural nuances, consistency in terminology and tone. 

Professional translators ensure accuracy, culturally sensitive translations, 

expertise in specific dialects and industries while striving to maintain brand voice, consistency, and compliance with local rules and regulations. 

Their main drawbacks are that professional translators work at a slower pace than tools, they are expensive, and depending on the expertise level of the translator, translations may require human input and oversight to ensure nuanced, culturally appropriate translations that accurately convey the intended message and tone.

We would recommend taking a hybrid approach by using translation tools for initial drafts or routine tasks and professional translators for high-stakes projects or content requiring human expertise and cultural sensitivity.

For instance, you can use a translation tool like TranslatePress to translate a business website and then get professional translators to review and modify the translations using the tool’s front-end editor. 

TranslatePress Multilingual

TranslatePress is the easiest way to translate your WordPress site. It's fast, won't slow down your website, works with ANY theme or plugin and it's SEO friendly.

Get the plugin

Or download FREE version

Take a glance at TranslatePress’s automatic translator. 

And also take a look at the tool’s frontend editor used for manual editing:

To learn more about translation tools for different types of content, take a look at the following guide: best website translation tools and best AI translation tools. 

As for hiring professional translators, the following guides will be helpful: ultimate guide on translation outsourcing, best translation agencies, and best marketplaces to hire freelance translators. 

5. Implementing Marketing Translations 

Having identified target markets, assessed available resources, defined key focus areas for translation, and made crucial decisions on resourcing and translation methods, the next step is to craft a detailed execution plan for the translation process.

Here are a few pointers on what to include in the execution plan:

• Establish measurable goals for the marketing translation initiative, such as increased website traffic, higher engagement rates, improved conversion metrics, etc 
• Map out a timeline with specific milestones for each stage of the translation process
• Allocate resources efficiently by setting a budget that accounts for potential costs
• Clearly define tasks for team members or external partners involved in the translation process 
• Establish a review process to ensure accuracy, consistency, and cultural relevance in translated content
• Also, monitor performance and refine strategies based on performance data (more on this in the next section)

6. Monitor Performance

Continuous monitoring of performance metrics is essential as it allows you to gauge the effectiveness of marketing translations.

Some of the tools that you can use for monitoring performance are as follows:

• Google Search Console and Google Analytics provide valuable insights into website traffic, ranking queries, user behavior, and conversion rates for each translated version of the site
• Hotjar offers heatmaps, session recordings, and user feedback to understand how visitors interact with translated pages
• SEMrush and Ahref enable tracking of keyword performance, SEO rankings, and traffic trends for translated content
• Crowdin is a localization management platform that streamlines the translation process, facilitates collaboration among teams, and offers analytics to monitor progress 
• Brandwatch offers social media monitoring and analysis tools to track brand mentions, engagement levels, and audience sentiment across different languages
• SurveyMonkey enables the creation of multilingual surveys to gather feedback from customers across the globe 

You can use the data from these tools to gain actionable insights, optimize your translation efforts, and refine future strategies for optimal results.

7. Iterate & Improve

Iteration allows businesses to adapt to changing market dynamics, and customer preferences. So it’s important to iterate your marketing translation strategies based on data insight from tools used to monitor the performance of your translated content. 

We encourage you to identify the most impactful tactics that helped drive significant growth in your business and double down on them in the future. 

Moving forward, it’s essential to not only replicate successful tactics but also experiment with new approaches, like testing different messaging strategies, conducting A/B testing on website designs, exploring emerging digital marketing channels, etc to adapt to evolving consumer behaviors. 

Conclusion

Marketing translation is the process of translating all your marketing content (like social media posts, websites, email campaigns, advertising content, etc) into one or more languages.

Implementing marketing translations can help grow your website rapidly and by many folds. 

To implement marketing translations for your business, you need to carry out the following steps:

• Access market needs 
• Access your existing business resources
• Decide which materials to translate 
• Choose between translation tools, and professional translators, or both 
• Start implementing the translation process
• Monitor performance 
• Iterate and improve your strategy 

That’s it for this one folks. If you have any questions about marketing translation, let us know in the comment section below. 

The post Marketing Translation: How to Implement (Step-by-Step Guide) appeared first on TranslatePress.

Whether you want to convert casual visitors to loyal customers or expand your business to newer territories, adding multilingual social media content (along with other localization strategies) is an excellent way to ensure rapid growth for your business. 

This article covers some of the tried and tested methods for building a multilingual social media presence. But first, we are going to look at how exactly a multilingual social media presence benefits businesses. 

Let’s dive right in. 

Benefits of Building a Multilingual Social Media Presence 

Building a multilingual social media presence helps accelerate business growth. Here’s how: 

Better Reach: By communicating in multiple languages, you can reach a broader audience that speaks different languages. It opens doors to new opportunities for growth and global expansion.

Improved Following: Tailoring your content to different cultures shows respect for diversity and establishes your brand as inclusive, and modern. The audience is likely to recognize the effort you put into catering to their language preferences and will eventually start trusting your brand, leading to more engagement and following on social media.

Increased Conversions: By reaching a broader demographic through multilingual content, businesses can improve user satisfaction leading to increased purchase decisions and better conversion rates.

Competitive Advantage: Having multilingual social network accounts can give you an edge over competitors who only operate in one language. It allows you to attract a more diverse customer base, boosting your revenue collection and business growth.

Business Longevity: Multilingual content not only expands market reach and conversion rates but also fortifies the business against risks such as local market fluctuations and economic downturns contributing to long-term success and longevity.

Broadly speaking, these are some of the benefits of having a multilingual presence in social media for a business. 

How to Build a Multilingual Social Media Presence 

To build a multilingual social media presence, you need to carry out the following steps: 

1. Define Target Audience 

Setting a target audience is essential for creating focused and effective strategies that resonate with the right people, drive the right engagement, and ultimately lead to success.

Here are the steps you need to take to define the target audience:

Identify Demand: To choose a target audience, you need first to conduct thorough market research and identify regions where your products or services are in demand. 

Audience Characteristics: You will also need to determine characteristics such as age, gender, income level, and interests of potential audience to ensure that your social media content is tailored to meet their specific needs and preferences.

Language proficiency: Proceed by determining the language proficiency levels of your target audience. For instance, in some urban areas, people speak a mixture of English and their native language which means you need to create content that reflects this particular preference. 

Competitor Study: It’s also important to study your competitors’ multilingual social network strategies to gain insights into what is working well, areas for improvement, and potential opportunities to differentiate your approach.

2. Set Goals 

It’s important to set goals because building a multilingual social media presence requires a lot of time and effort.

Setting goals allows you to be constantly aware of what you are working towards to track your progress to avoid frustration and to know that you are headed in the right direction.

You can start by defining what you aim to achieve with your multilingual social media presence.

Do you want to increase brand awareness or drive website traffic? Do you want to generate leads, or boost sales? 

All these may seem like good goals to chase but it’s important to identify one or two main goals. 

To make that choice you need to look into your overall business objectives. For instance, a startup may want to increase global user acquisition and engagement while a mid-sized chain company may seek to boost brand loyalty and revenue collection. 

After defining your goal, you need to identify reasonable quantifiable targets such as increasing the follower count by 20% among Spanish-speaking users within six months or improving click-through rates by 15% among German language users by the end of the quarter.

It can be tricky to identify reasonable quantifiable targets because you need to consider various factors to ensure that your targets are both challenging and achievable. You need to: 

• Analyze your current performance 
• Look at historical data to understand typical growth rates 
• Conduct a competitive analysis to benchmark your performance 
• Consider the resources available to support your efforts
• Analyze the market to understand the viability of your success

3. Choose the Right Platforms 

There are multiple social media platforms. Typically businesses don’t focus on every platform because not all platforms suit all business types and/or you may not have the resources to build your social media presence on all platforms. 

When determining which social media platforms are suitable for a business, it’s essential to consider factors such as the target audience, business goals, type of content, and resources available.

Target Audience: Different social media platforms attract different user demographics. For example, a fashion brand targeting young, fashion-conscious individuals might find platforms like Instagram and Pinterest more suitable for their business.

Business Goals: A B2B software company focusing on establishing itself as an industry leader might prioritize platforms like LinkedIn for showcasing expertise and establishing professional credibility.

Type of Content: Evaluate the type of content your business would want to share on social media. For example, a food blog would want to share high-quality food images and recipe videos. In that case, platforms like Pinterest and YouTube where visual content performs well are more suitable.

Resources Available: A small local business with limited resources may opt for platforms like Facebook and Twitter which are easier to manage than platforms requiring more visual content production like YouTube. 

We recommend choosing multiple platforms (minimum two) to ensure that your business can mitigate risks associated with relying solely on one platform.

4. Use Translation Tools & Hire Translators 

After choosing the right social media platforms, you need to decide whether you want to rely on translation tools or hire professional translators to create multilingual social network posts.  

Translation tools are often more budget-friendly compared to hiring professional translators. Tools offer quick translations and automate processes to produce large volumes of content but they are more suitable for texts with relatively low complexities. They may not always capture the context, or cultural sensitivities required for effective communication.

Professional translators ensure that they maintain the original meaning, tone, and nuances of the culture to avoid potential misunderstandings and promote positive brand image and credibility. However professional translators are expensive and their manual translations are a time-intensive process.

You can choose to use translation tools or hire professional translators but you can also take a hybrid approach. For instance, you use tools to mass-produce social media posts but run them by a translator to ensure accurate translations.

5. Localize Visual Content

When building a multilingual social media presence, it’s important to ensure that your visuals resonate with diverse audiences across different languages and cultures. 

Here are a few things to consider when creating visual content for your multilingual social media accounts: 

• Use neutral and universally understood languages, such as images, icons, and symbols that convey messages without relying on text
• When localizing images, consider localizing elements such as background, clothing styles, etc to better reflect local people and customs
• Understand cultural nuances and preferences to avoid using visuals and text overlays or captions that may be inappropriate, offensive, or misunderstood
• Be mindful of color symbolism as certain colors may have different meanings or connotations in a different region
• Incorporate holidays, festivals, and cultural events specific to your target regions to connect with audiences 
• Stay updated on local trends, memes, and popular references in each target market to create visual content that feels current and relatable

We recommend conducting localization testing to gather feedback from native speakers and ensure that your visual content is culturally appropriate and effectively conveys your message in each language.

6. Use Hashtags 

Using hashtags on social media platforms is necessary because it helps increase content visibility by making them discoverable to users searching or following those tags.

By creating branded hashtags you can boost brand recognition and encourage user-generated content related to your brand or campaigns.

Also, leveraging trending or popular hashtags can keep your content current and aligned with ongoing conversations, events, or viral trends, increasing the likelihood of engagement and visibility.

You can use hashtags to track and measure the performance of your social media campaigns and gain insights into what resonates with their audience.

7. Collaborate With Local Influencers

Local influencers have a dedicated following that trusts their recommendations. Partnering with them can help expand your reach, establish credibility, and build trust among multilingual communities. 

To start the collaboration process, look for influencers who align with your brand values and target demographics.

Then reach out to influencers with personalized messages outlining the benefits of collaboration and be sure to work with them closely to develop content that resonates with their audience.

8. Be Mindful About Posting Times

Figuring out the ideal posting times for different language groups is important because posting at the right times can significantly impact the reach and engagement of your content.

To know the ideal time for posting on social media for different language groups you need to research the peak activity hours for each language group you are targeting. 

Also, you need to be aware of local customs, events, and holidays as they impact social media usage patterns.

There are tons of research on ideal posting times online. You could follow those and also experiment on your own to identify when your audience is most active and responsive.

Once the peak hours are down, develop a posting schedule that aligns with those hours while maintaining a regular cadence. This helps in establishing expectations among your followers and keeps them engaged consistently.

9. Monitor Results & Optimize Strategy 

Monitoring is an important step in building a multilingual social media presence.

It tracks the performance of your content, helps understand audience preferences, and makes informed decisions on how to optimize your social media strategy. 

Optimization of strategy is required to ensure that your multilingual social network efforts align with your business objectives.

You can make use of analytics tools provided by social media platforms like Facebook Insights, Twitter Analytics, or third-party tools like Google Analytics to gather valuable data on content performance and audience behavior.

It’s important to note that while continuous monitoring and optimization are crucial, you must allow sufficient time for strategies to mature and yield results. 

So try and strike a balance between proactive refinement and strategic patience.

10. Localize Your Website 

When building a multilingual social media presence on the internet, consider localizing your business website. 

Business websites are an important part of your online presence. 

When your social media followers seek information about your business they are likely to encounter your business website (assuming that you have one). 

It would be wise to localize your business website to the language groups you are targeting. 

Just as we advised you to take a hybrid approach of using both translation tools and professional translators to translate social media content, here too we offer the same advice. 

We recommend using our powerful and popular TranslatePress plugin to automate translations and manually improve translated texts using the plugin’s frontend editor. 

TranslatePress Multilingual

TranslatePress is the easiest way to translate your WordPress site. It's fast, won't slow down your website, works with ANY theme or plugin and it's SEO friendly.

Get the plugin

Or download FREE version

You can carry out the manual translations yourself or hire certified translation agencies or freelance translators to do it for you.

Conclusion

Building a social media presence can help enhance brand visibility, reach a diverse audience, increase revenue, and establish longevity for your business. 

To build a successful social media presence, you need to carry out the following steps:

1. Define target audience 
2. Set goals 
3. Choose the right platforms 
4. Use translation tools & hire professional translators 
5. Localize visual content 
6. Use hashtags 
7. Collaborate with local influences 
8. Be mindful of posting times
9. Monitor results and optimize strategy 
10. Localize your website

It takes a lot of time and effort to build a significant social media presence but given a consistent effort, businesses can reap substantial rewards in the future. 

If you have any questions about multilingual social media presence, let us know in the comment section below. 

The post Multilingual Social Media: Strategies That Actually Work (10 Steps) appeared first on TranslatePress.

Paragraph translators are automated tools that help translate written passages from one language to another while maintaining the content’s original meaning, style, and tone.

Translation tools are fast, convenient, and (sometimes) cost-effective but may lack accuracy in preserving nuances, context, and cultural subtleties, leading to potential errors or misinterpretations in the translated text.

In this article, we have listed the best translation tools out there and we have shown you how to use one of the tools to translate paragraphs on your WordPress website. 

But before we dive into those let’s take a look into the benefits and challenges of paragraph translation.  

Benefits of Paragraph Translations

Let’s take a look at the common advantages of translating website paragraphs: 

More traffic: Translating businesses to different languages can boost visibility on the SERP of different countries, making the website discoverable to users searching in various languages. By offering information in the native languages of different target markets, websites can attract and engage with a broader audience and expand their business to new territories.

More revenue: Accessing new markets will not only boost your traffic but also lead to more sales opportunities and revenue generation. Proper translation of your website content is likely to boost trust, convert casual visitors to loyal customers, and maximize revenue collection.

Potential to become an industry leader: Translating paragraphs gives websites a competitive edge by enabling them to reach an international market where your competitors may not have a presence. Also, by attracting a diverse customer base, you are likely to outperform competitors in terms of trust, brand recognition, and revenue collection. These will help establish your website as an industry leader. 

Ensure business longevity: By becoming an internationally recognized brand, you will establish a strong global presence which will protect your business against local market fluctuations. It will make the business resilient and will ensure that your business continues to thrive in the future where your competitors may get wiped out. 

These are some of the broad advantages of implementing paragraph translations on a website. Next, we will look into some of the major challenges of translating paragraphs accurately on a site.

Challenges of Translating Paragraphs Accurately 

Translating paragraphs accurately can be challenging due to several factors. For instance:

• To convey the intended meaning of a text accurately, you need to understand the context of the language which requires the translator to have extensive knowledge of idioms, cultural references, and nuances
• Translating technical terminology requires expertise in the subject matter to ensure precision and clarity in the target language
• Ambiguous words and phrases can pose challenges in determining the correct translation
• On top of all these, maintaining the original tone, style, and voice of the author, requires a lot of time and effort. Translations done on tight deadlines can compromise the quality and accuracy of the translation
• Lastly, ensuring consistency, accuracy, and quality across translated paragraphs is known to be difficult, especially in large translation projects involving multiple translators

By now, you know the benefits and challenges of paragraph translations. In the next section, we offer some pointers for translating accurately. 

Practical Tips for Translating Paragraphs Accurately 

Here are some practical tips to help achieve precise and effective paragraph translations:

• Familiarize yourself thoroughly with the subject matter, audience, and purpose of the text, or hire good translators with extensive knowledge of the language 
• Be mindful of cultural differences and adapt the translation to resonate with the target audience
• Refer to reputable dictionaries, glossaries, and style guides to ensure consistency and accuracy in your translations
• Leverage translation tools to speed up the process, but always double-check the output for accuracy
• Seek feedback from native speakers or professional linguists

Now, let’s take a look at the best paragraph translating tools. 

Best Paragraph Translating Tools

There are several translation services out there but the 4 most popular ones are Google Cloud Translation, DeepL Translator, Microsoft Translator, and Amazon Translate. 

We have already covered these services in a separate guide so we won’t dive into a lot of details in this article. We recommend taking a look at the guide: Best Machine Translation Services, to learn more about the tools. 

It’s worth noting that for WordPress websites, Google Translate and DeepL Translator are your best options. They can be easily integrated into a WordPress website using a third-party tool like TranslatePress. 

In the next section, we will show you how to implement paragraph translations using Google Translate and TranslatePress.

How to Translate Paragraphs Accurately (Step-by-Step Guide)

To translate paragraphs accurately, you need to implement the following steps: 

1. Install & Activate TranslatePress Plugin

TranslatePress offers a free and a premium version of the plugin. The premium version allows users to translate in multiple languages whereas with the free plugin, you can translate to only a single language.

The premium plugin also allows the translation of SEO metadata. On top of that, it offers the ability to add DeepL as a translation engine, the ability to add users in the new translator user account roles, and much more. Learn more: TranslatePress Free vs Pro.

We will show you how to translate paragraphs on your website using the free plugin. 

If you decide to purchase the premium plugin, don’t worry, you can still follow the steps below to translate paragraphs on your website.

Without further ado, download, install, and activate the free TranslatePress plugin on your WordPress website. 

Those of you who prefer to use the premium plugin, need to first purchase the plugin, install it on their site, and then activate the license key. 

To install the plugin (free or premium), open your WordPress dashboard, go to  Plugins → Add New, and proceed to upload and activate the plugin.

2. Choose Automatic or Manual Translation

TranslatePress offers automatic as well as manual translations. 

To implement TranslatePress automatic translation, you need to enable the translation engines and let the machine do the work for you.

But if you wish to implement manual translation, then use TranslatePress’ Translation Editor tool to change the text of your website manually. 

Some of you prefer the automated method while others prefer the manual method. 

Below, we cover the automated (in step 3) and manual (in step 4) methods. 

You can jump straight to the preferred method, but before you do that, we recommend learning about the pros and cons of machine and human translations. 

Since both the automated and manual translations have many drawbacks, we recommend implementing a hybrid approach to reap the benefits of both methods. 

The hybrid method involves automating the translations and making manual modifications to the text using the Translation Editor tool on pages where the automatic translations need improvement. 

3. Enable Automatic Translation

To enable TranslatePress’ automatic translation, you need to carry out the following steps:

i. Select a Second Language 

The second language is the language into which your paragraphs will be translated. 

To select the second language, open your WordPress dashboard, and go to Settings → TranslatePress. 

On the TranslatePress dashboard, head over to the General tab, and from the All Languages section select the language of your choice. 

Hit the Add button adjacent to the language and scroll down to select the Save Changes button to complete selecting your second language. 

SIDE NOTE: In case you can’t find the second language of your choice, then you have the option to add your preferred second language by going to Settings → TranslatePress → Advanced → Custom Language. 

ii. Enable TranslatePress Automatic Translation 

Go to the Automatic Translation tab on the TranslatePress dashboard, and from the dropdown menu beside the Enable Automatic Translation option, select Yes. 

Hit the Save Changes button. 

iii. Add a Translation Engine 

Translation engines are services that help automate translations of your websites into multiple languages. 

Since translation engines (like Google Translate and DeepL) don’t directly integrate with WordPress websites, you need to rely on TranslatePress for integration. 

TranslatePress offers access to two of the world’s best translation engines: Google Translate and DeepL. 

To use the DeepL translation engine, you need the premium TranslatePress plugin. We will proceed with Google Translate for this tutorial because we are using the free TranslatePress plugin. 

If you aren’t sure which translation engine to choose, then read this article: DeepL vs Google Translate. 

To use Google Translate you need to generate an API key from your Google Cloud account. The key generation is slightly lengthy and we already have a dedicated guide on the same. 

NOTE: Google Cloud accounts are free but there is a usage limit on Google Translate. You can translate 500,000 characters per month without paying a dime. If you try translating more characters, you will be charged. 

DeepL users can follow this guide to generate an API key. Like Google, DeepL also offers limited free monthly usage: 500,000 characters. Beyond that, you will need to upgrade to one of their pricing plans. 

Once you have the API key, open the Automatic Translation tab, select the Translation Engine of your choice, insert the API key, scroll down, and hit the Save Changes button. 

iv. Review TranslatePress Settings 

The TranslatePress dashboard contains three tabs: General, Automatic Translations, and Advanced. 

The Advanced tab contains options to help you troubleshoot errors, debug issues, and add custom languages, among other things. 

The General and Automatic Translation tabs contain the second language and translation engines. You already accessed these two in the previous steps when you had to select the second language and enable automatic translation engines. 

But the tabs contain more options that you didn’t have a chance to look into. So we recommend that you open those tabs again and review the options available there. 

You may want to modify some of the options. Take, for instance, the Language Switcher that started appearing on the front of your website after selecting the second language. 

In the General tab, there are options to modify how the Language Switcher is displayed on your website. 

The bottom line is, that you should review all three tabs (General, Automatic Translations, and Advanced) and make modifications as and when necessary. 

4. Modify Translated Paragraphs Manually

Whether you want to make manual modifications to automatically translated text or simply implement manual translations on your website, TranslatePress’ Translation Editor will help you do just that.

We will show you how to use the Translation Editor.

Open a page of your WordPress website and from the admin bar located on top of the page, select the Translate Page option. 

Immediately, the Translation Editor should slide in through from the left side of your screen. 

You will be translating one paragraph at a time. To start the translation, hover your cursor over a paragraph on the page and you should be able to see a blue pen right next to the paragraph. Click on the blue pen, and the entire paragraph automatically appears in the editor. 

If you had enabled the automatic translation engine, then the translated text should also appear in the editor right below the original text. All you have to do is replace the erroneous automatically translated text with the correct version of the translated text. 

If you didn’t enable the engine then you won’t find any translated text on the editor. Instead, there will be a blank bar. Be sure to insert your translated text in that bar. 

After replacing or inserting translated text, be sure to hit the Save button located at the top of the editor to save your translations. 

Then proceed to translate all the paragraphs on the page in this manner. 

NOTE: Are you having trouble translating large blocks of paragraphs? Follow this guide.

That’s it. You now know how to implement paragraph translation. 

Tackle Paragraph Translations Today!

Translating paragraphs offers benefits like the opportunity to draw more traffic, collect more revenue, become an industry leader, and ensure the longevity of your business. 

That said, accurate translation is not easy and should be carried out by expert translators or powerful translation services like Google Translate or DeepL Translator. 

Regardless of whether you want to implement manual translations through expert translators or use automated translation services like Google Translate or DeepL Translator, you need a third-party tool like TranslatePress to translate your website paragraphs. 

TranslatePress Multilingual

TranslatePress is the easiest way to translate your WordPress site. It's fast, won't slow down your website, works with ANY theme or plugin and it's SEO friendly.

Get the plugin

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If you have any questions about paragraph translations, let us know in the comment section below. 

The post Paragraph Translations: Benefits, Challenges & Step-by-Step Guide appeared first on TranslatePress.

English is the most spoken language in the world. It’s popular amongst both native and non-native speakers. Translating your Japanese websites to English will make them accessible to billions of English speakers. It will draw more traffic and generate more leads and sales revenue. 

There are two ways to translate Japanese websites into English. You can do it manually or automate the process. 

In this article, we will show you a hybrid method where you can implement automatic translations but also have the option to manually modify automatic translations if need be. 

To implement the hybrid method, you will use a powerful translation plugin called TranslatePress. 

We will show you how exactly to use the plugin on your website. But first, let’s take a quick look at the benefits and challenges of translating Japanese websites into English. 

Let’s get started. 

Benefits of Translating Japanese Websites to English

There are several benefits of translating Japanese websites into English. Here’s a quick rundown of the 3 main benefits:

Global Market Reach: With 1.400+ billion speakers, English is the most spoken language in the world. Compare that with 120+ million Japanese speakers and you can see how translating your website to English could expand your site’s reach, increase exposure, and further your brand recognition.

Better Sales & Revenue: Needless to say, more visitors could potentially increase business opportunities. As English-speaking visitors start to understand and engage with your products or services, it could lead to improved conversions, higher sales, and increased revenue generation. 

Competitive Advantage: English speakers are likely to choose your website over competitors that only provide content in Japanese, therefore translating a Japanese website to English can give you a competitive edge. This could position your brand as a leader in your industry, both domestically and internationally.

Challenges of Translating Japanese Websites to English

Japanese is one of the most difficult languages to translate due to its linguistic and cultural peculiarities. So before you take the plunge, it’s important to know what challenges you are likely to face when translating Japanese websites to English. 

Common challenges of Japanese-to-English translations are:

• Both Japanese and English have distinct grammatical structures, vocabulary, and writing systems. Translating complex sentences can be extremely difficult. 
• Japanese culture is unique with deep historical roots that guide societal values and customs. Without a good understanding of Japanese history, cultural nuances can be easily lost and translation fails might happen. Failing to understand and convey cultural context can lead to misunderstandings or misinterpretations.
• The level of politeness, honorifics, and non-verbal communication methods differ from language to language. Careful interpretation of these things requires an understanding of the Japanese context. 
• Some Japanese technical or industry-specific terminologies may not have a direct translation. In such cases, translators need to rely on appropriate equivalents which can be challenging to find. 
• Japanese writing often requires fewer characters compared to English for expressing the same ideas. Translating content while adhering to character limitations imposed by website layouts or design can be difficult.

With these common challenges in mind, let’s proceed to translate your Japanese website. 

How to Translate Japanese Websites to English

To translate Japanese websites to English, you need to use a plugin called TranslatePress. 

It’s incredibly powerful and the most popular translation plugin there. It supports 130+ languages including Japanese and offers comprehensive translation which includes dynamic strings (gettext) added by WordPress, plugins and themes, SEO metadata elements, and images on the page. 

Here’s a complete list of all the features offered by the plugin. 

IMPORTANT: As we mentioned earlier in the article, there are two ways to translate a website. You can automate the process or implement manual translation. 

In this article, we are taking a hybrid approach. We will show you how to automate translation and then manually modify translated text if you feel the need to. 

But if you prefer the automated method, then feel free to skip step 3 which covers manual translations. Alternatively, if you prefer the manual method, then skip step 2 which covers automatic translations. 

Now, let’s dive into the tutorial. 

Step 1: Install & Activate the TranslatePress Plugin

There are two versions of the TranslatePress plugin. One is free and the other one is a premium plugin. 

The free TranslatePress plugin is extremely powerful and it’s enough to translate your Japanese websites to English. 

But you might need the premium plugin if you wish to translate your site into more than one language. The premium plugin is also required to translate SEO metadata which will help rank your website in English search engines. Take a look at this comparison to figure out which plugin is better suited for your needs: TranslatePress Free vs Pro.

If you wish to proceed with the premium plugin, then you need to first purchase the plugin, install it on your website, and activate your license key. 

If you wish to proceed with the free plugin, then download the free TranslatePress plugin on your local computer, open your WordPress dashboard, go to  Plugins → Add New, and proceed to upload and activate the plugin.

Alternatively, instead of downloading the plugin, simply go to Plugins → Add New and insert “TranslatePress” into the search box. Then proceed to install and activate the plugin on your WordPress website.

The rest of the steps can be followed as is, regardless of whether you are using the free or the premium TranslatePress plugin. 

Step 2: Enable Automatic Translation 

To enable TranslatePress’ Automatic Translation, you need to carry out the following steps:

i. Select a Second Language

On your WordPress dashboard go to Settings → TranslatePress. 

On the TranslatePress Settings page, go to the General tab and scroll down to the All Languages option. 

From the dropdown menu located beside the All Languages option, select English and then hit the Add button. 

Next, be sure to scroll down to the end of the page and hit the Save Changes button before proceeding with the next step. 

ii. Enable TranslatePress Automatic Translation 

To enable automatic translation, go to the Automatic Translation tab on the TranslatePress Settings page. 

You should see an Enable Automatic Translation option with a dropdown menu. Select Yes from the dropdown menu and hit the Save Changes button to complete enabling automatic translation. 

iii. Add a Translation Engine 

As soon as you enable the automatic translation, numerous other options will immediately fill up the Automatic Translation tab. 

One of the options that you need to focus on right now is the Translation Engine. 

Translation engines are services that use artificial intelligence to automatically translate your Japanese website into English. 

You are integrating these engines directly into your WordPress website so you need to rely on a translation plugin called TranslatePress to help with the integration. 

TrsnaltePress can help integrate two translation engines: Google Translate and DeepL. 

We have a separate article covering the difference between the two engines: DeepL vs Google Translate. 

For this tutorial, we are going to proceed with Google Translate because it’s free. To use the DeepL engine, you will need the premium TranslatePress plugin. 

Quick Side Note: It’s important to know that access to Google Translate is not unlimited. You can translate up to 500,000 characters for free per month. If you continue using the engine beyond that, you will be charged. Check out Google Translate pricing. 

Select Google Translate and proceed to generate an API key on your Google Cloud account. The API key generation process will take a while. We have covered the process in a separate help doc. 

If you are using DeepL instead of Google Translate, use this help doc to generate a DeepL API key.

Once you have the key, go back to Settings → TranslatePress → Automatic Translation tab and insert the API key. Then scroll down and hit the Save Changes button before exiting the page. 

iv. Review TranslatePress Settings 

You would have noticed that there are several tabs on the TranslatePress Settings page. Go over to the General, Automatic Translation, and Advanced tabs. 

Each of these tabs is full of various setting options. We strongly recommend that you review and modify these options if need be. 

Take, for instance, in the General tab, there is a Language Switcher section. 

The language switcher is a button that appears on the front end of your website after enabling the Automatic Translation system. 

You can change the color, location, and other design aspects of the switcher from the Language Switcher section in the General tab. 

Step 3: Modify Translation Text Manually 

Japanese is one of the hardest languages to translate. So it’ll be a good idea to hire agencies or freelance translators or check the automatic machine translations yourself. Any discrepancies in the translation can be taken care of using the TranslatePress Editor. 

Whether you skipped the automatic translation altogether or want to manually modify some of the automatic machine translations, TranslatePress will help implement manual translations using its frontend editor. Here’s how:

Open one of your website pages or the page whose automatic translation, you want to modify and select the Translate Page option from the admin bar. 

The editor will slide out from the left of the screen. 

To start manual translations, hover your cursor over a text on your page and a blue pen should appear right next to the text. Hit that pen and the text will be automatically selected and displayed on the editor. 

Go ahead and add the English text in the To English section. 

If you had used TranslatePress’ automatic translation, then the To English section should already have an English translation. Remove that text and add a proper translation. 

When you are done, hit the Save button located on top of the editor to save your translation. 

Proceed to implement manual translations on other texts on the page in this same way. Just remember to save your modifications before exiting the page or else you will lose your translations. 

That’s it, folks. With that, we have come to the end of this tutorial on translating Japanese websites to English.

Conclusion

Translating Japanese websites to English is a great way to draw more visitors, improve sales and revenue, and establish your brand as a globally recognized leader. 

Japanese-to-English translation can be very difficult because of distinct Japanese grammatical structures, vocabulary, and writing systems, cultural nuances, among other things. 

Since manual translation is tedious, we recommend using an automatic translation service and then implementing manual modification if required. 

WordPress does not offer an out-of-box feature to translate websites, you need to rely on 3rd party plugin like TranslatePress to translate your website from Japanese to English. 

TranslatePress offers a perfect hybrid approach to translations. It has both automatic and manual translation systems in place. 

TranslatePress Multilingual

TranslatePress is the easiest way to translate your WordPress site. It's fast, won't slow down your website, works with ANY theme or plugin and it's SEO friendly.

Get the plugin

Or download FREE version

To learn how to use the plugin to its fullest potential, use these guides.

If you have any questions about how to translate Japanese websites to English, leave us a comment below. 

The post How to Translate Japanese Websites to English (Step-by-Step Guide) appeared first on TranslatePress.

Implementing cross-border eCommerce is a great way to expand your business, draw more traffic to your online store, and generate more revenue collection. 

In this article, we will dive deep into the many advantages and disadvantages of cross-border eCommerce and how to successfully implement one on your online store. 

Let’s get started. 

What is Cross-Border eCommerce?

The term “cross-border eCommerce” refers to the online selling of goods to customers from around the globe.

Today, it’s easier than ever to implement cross-border eCommerce due to reasons like:

• Widespread availability of the internet
• Growing appetite among consumers to buy products that aren’t locally available
• Easy payment processing
• Reliable logistics and shipping methods
• Better trade agreements between countries, elimination or reduction of import duties and other trading barriers, among other things

While industry leaders like Amazon, AliExpress, eBay, etc are established players in the cross-border eCommerce business, a growing number of small businesses also leverage the power of cross-border eCommerce to expand their reach and tap into international markets.

According to Statista, the global B2C cross-border eCommerce market will surge to a staggering 7.9 trillion U.S. dollars by 2030. 

Given the immense potential and opportunities in cross-border eCommerce in the coming years, it’s the perfect time to implement some cross-border eCommerce strategies on your online store and capitalize on the growing global market. 

In this article, we will show you how to do just that but first, let’s take a deep dive into the benefits and challenges of cross-border eCommerce. 

Cross-Border eCommerce Benefits

These are some of the benefits of implementing cross-border eCommerce:

Expanded Customer Base: By engaging in cross-border eCommerce, you can access a larger customer base beyond the domestic market. 

Increased Revenue Collection: It allows you to sell products to customers in different countries including products with low domestic demands. This can lead to more sales and revenue collection. 

Off-Season Safety Net: In domestic markets, demand for products peaks during special occasions and dips during the off-season. Selling products to the international market ensures demand all year round.

Brand Awareness & Trust: Selling products in an international market helps reach a global audience, and generates word-of-mouth and social sharing opportunities. This could result in better brand visibility and trust in the domestic and international markets. 

Increased Business Sustainability: By reducing dependence on a single domestic market and diversifying revenue streams businesses can mitigate risks associated with local economic fluctuations and ensure long-term growth. 

Now that we know about the benefits, let’s take a look at the challenges of implementing cross-border eCommerce on an online store.

Cross-Border eCommerce Challenges

The following are the challenges of implementing cross-border eCommerce:

Complexities in Logistics & Shipping Processes: Although selling products to international customers is easier than ever, it’s still difficult to navigate international shipping processes, coordinate logistics, manage shipping costs, and ensure smooth customs clearance. 

Cultural Barriers & Localization Efforts: Understanding cultural nuances is challenging. Businesses need to carry out extensive research to identify cultural preferences in target markets.

This should be followed by localization of the website, product description, customer support, and marketing endeavors, among other things. Adjusting to a different culture requires a lot of effort, time, and monetary investment.

Currency Conversions: Converting one currency into another during cross-border transactions involves dealing with fluctuating exchange rates, which can lead to potential discrepancies between displayed prices and actual amounts paid. This could cause a bad customer experience and loss of customer trust.

Payment Preferences: Different countries have different payment preferences. For example, credit cards are widely used in some countries, while other countries prefer digital wallets, bank transfers, or localized payment methods like Alipay or WeChat Pay.

Payment Security Concerns: Ensuring that customer payments are securely processed, encrypted, and protected throughout the entire transaction process is a challenge due to the complexity of payment systems, evolving cyber threats, and difficulty in navigating varying legal frameworks and regulations across different countries.

Refunds: Businesses have to navigate varying consumer protection laws and refund policies while providing seamless customer service and maintaining customer satisfaction.

Now that you are aware of all the benefits and challenges of cross-border eCommerce, let’s dive into how to implement it on your online store. 

How to Implement Cross-Border eCommerce on Your Online Store

To implement cross-border eCommerce on your online store, you need to take the following steps:

1. Conduct Extensive Market Research

Before starting to implement cross-border eCommerce strategies, it’s essential to conduct extensive market research because it helps identify potential markets for your business. 

Your market research should include understanding consumer behavior, competition, cultural nuances, and legal and logistical challenges.

• Analyzing consumer behavior helps businesses understand customer preferences, motivations, and behavior patterns. 
• Assessing competitor strengths and weaknesses helps businesses identify opportunities, develop effective marketing strategies, and set realistic goals. 
• Understanding cultural nuances involves recognizing unique customs, values, beliefs, and behaviors of different cultures. 
• Familiarizing yourself with local regulations, laws, and compliance requirements will enable you to address them and ensure smooth operations in foreign markets proactively.

A thorough market research helps businesses tailor their marketing strategies, product development, messaging, pricing, and customer experience to meet local customer needs effectively.

Here’s a guide on how to conduct online market research. 

2. Determine Pricing Strategies

Following thorough market research, you should have information regarding production costs, currency exchange rates, shipping fees, and local market conditions. Knowledge about these factors helps determine pricing strategies for your products. 

• Production costs include indirect costs such as overhead expenses, marketing, distribution, and other operational expenses. 
• Exchange rates often fluctuate as they are determined by factors such as supply and demand dynamics, interest rates, inflation, geopolitical events, and market sentiment. By monitoring exchange rates you can adjust your prices accordingly to help businesses navigate currency fluctuations and maintain business profitability.
• Businesses should consider shipping costs associated with packaging, transportation, customs, and other logistical expenses.
• Businesses should also take into account factors such as demand, competition, and customer purchasing power because they can significantly influence how businesses set prices. 

3. Localize Website

Localization of a website refers to customizing a website’s content and design to suit the preferences, cultural norms, and language of a specific target market.

Localization can be implemented using human or machine translation tools. You can opt for translation agencies, freelance translators, or translation tools like TranslatePress to localize your eCommerce website. 

Depending on the type of content that needs translations, all these services offer options to implement human and machine translation tools to translate websites.

TranslatePress Multilingual

TranslatePress is the easiest way to translate your WordPress site. It's fast, won't slow down your website, works with ANY theme or plugin and it's SEO friendly.

Get the plugin

Or download FREE version

Learn more about the different types of translation services and follow these guides to implement localization on your website: 

• Best translation agencies
• Best freelance translators
• Best free translation tools 

4. Localize Customer Support

Offering multilingual customer support is vital for overcoming language barriers and providing personalized experiences. It helps businesses navigate cultural nuances, comply with local regulations, and build trust with customers, leading to higher satisfaction and success in international markets.

To localize customer support, you need to implement the following steps:

• Understand the cultural norms, preferences, and specific needs of customers in your target market.
• Recruit customer care representatives fluent in the languages spoken in your target market.
• Provide comprehensive training on cultural nuance and customer service best practices to customer care representatives.
• Continuously gather customer feedback to identify areas for improvement. 
• Tailor support processes to align with local regulations, legal requirements, and customer expectations.

5. Leverage 3rd Party Logistics Services

Instead of handling international shipping on your own, you can hire 3rd party logistic services (3PL) as they bring expertise and efficiency while also freeing up your time which you can use to focus on other aspects of your business. 

3rd party logistics services have established networks, resources, and infrastructure which they use to optimize transportation routes and negotiate favorable shipping rates which makes them more cost-effective. 

It is however essential to evaluate the specific pricing structure and services offered by different 3PL service providers to determine their cost-effectiveness for your business. 

Read this article to learn more about 3rd party logistic services, their benefits, disadvantages, types of 3PL services, and how to choose a 3PL service provider for your business, among other things. 

6. Localize Marketing Strategies

Localized marketing strategies enable businesses to establish a personal connection with customers, improve communication, and drive higher brand awareness, customer engagement, and conversion rates.

The strategies involve overcoming language barriers, understanding unique cultural preferences and behaviors of target markets, and tailoring marketing messages, visuals, and campaigns accordingly.

We have dived deep into how to perform localized marketing in a separate article. Take a look. 

7. Add Varying Payment Method

By accommodating diverse payment preferences, businesses can improve conversion rates, enhance trust, and create a more seamless shopping experience for customers.

You can add credit cards, digital wallets, bank transfers, or local payment methods to your online store. 

The process of adding various payment gateways depends on the platform your website is built on. 

If your website is built on WordPress, you can easily incorporate different payment gateways using plugins like WooCommerce, and Easy Digital Downloads. These plugins allow you to integrate with popular payment providers such as PayPal, Stripe, Payoneer, etc. 

But suppose your website is built on Shopify. In that case, you can leverage the built-in payment gateway options or explore additional gateways available through the Shopify App Store like Shopify Payments, PayPal, Stripe, and many more.

When adding multiple payment gateways, be sure to convert prices into local currency so that customers can easily understand the cost of products and make informed purchasing decisions. It creates a transparent and secure shopping experience. 

8. Comply With International Regulations & Data Privacy Laws

Your business should adhere to specific laws surrounding cross-border transactions, consumer protection, data privacy, and taxation of your target countries.

It helps protect the rights of your customers, builds trust and confidence in your brand, and reduces the risk of legal issues and penalties.

To start compliance with international regulations and data privacy laws, begin by researching and understanding laws and regulations in your target countries. Also, we highly recommend that you seek expert advice from legal professionals or consultants specializing in international regulations and data privacy laws.

9. Optimize Continuously

After implementing the points we just listed, it’s important to constantly monitor how your business is performing. 

Some of the business aspects that you should be monitoring include website traffic, conversion rates, average order value, customer feedback, and customer retention. 

By tracking these metrics, you can identify areas that need improvement and make data-driven decisions to optimize your business and maximize its potential in international markets.

Conclusion

Although cross-border eCommerce is a time-consuming, expensive, and challenging process when implemented properly, it’s a great way to draw more customers and boost your revenue collection. 

To successfully implement cross-border eCommerce, you need to implement the following steps:

• Conduct extensive market research to understand your target market
• Determine pricing strategies 
• Localize website, customer support, and marketing strategies 
• Leverage 3rd party logistics 
• Add multiple payment gateways
• Comply with international regulations and data privacy laws
• Optimize continuously 

If you have any questions about cross-border eCommerce, let us know in the comment section below. 

The post What is Cross Border eCommerce (+ Tips on How to Implement it) appeared first on TranslatePress.

For most websites, Google is the most significant source of traffic. 

While other sources of traffic, such as YouTube, social media platforms, referrals, and direct visits, are important, Google’s dominance in the search engine market and its ability to deliver targeted, high-quality traffic make it the most significant traffic source for websites.

And since Google is a significant source of traffic, it’s not surprising that getting found and ranking on Google is difficult, especially for new websites. 

But don’t worry, it’s not an impossible task. With hard work and patience, your website can rank on Google and start drawing tons of traffic. 

In this article, we are covering the steps you need to take to get your website found and ranked on Google.

Let’s dive in. 

Get Found on Google vs Ranking: What’s the Difference

Getting found on Google refers to appearing on any page of Google search. 

During a Google search, the result of the search typically spans across a couple of pages. 

Your website can appear on any of those pages but it won’t draw traffic if it’s not ranking on the first result page. 

Ranking, in general, refers to the position or placement of a website in the search engine results page for a specific search query. But here we are using the term “ranking” to refer to appearing in the first few positions of Google’s first result page. 

So, to reiterate, your website may appear on any of Google’s result pages but the only way it can draw traffic is by ranking on Google’s first result page. Users typically don’t navigate to subsequent pages because often the information they need can be found on the first page.

This means ranking on the first page of Google is more important than just getting found on Google. 

That said, getting found on Google is the first step to ranking on Google’s first page. 

In this next section, you will learn how to get found on Google and also how to rank your website on Google’s first page. 

How to Get Found on Google & Rank on Google Search 

To get found on Google and rank on Google Search, you need to take the following steps: 

1. Add Site to Google Search Console & Analytics

Google Search Console (GSC) is a free tool using which you can use to monitor, analyze, and optimize your website’s presence in Google search results. It’s different from Google Analytics (GA) which provides detailed insights into website traffic and user behavior.

We recommend adding your website to both tools and using the information recorded by the tool to optimize your website to improve your search engine rankings. 

For instance, using the GSC, you can identify duplicate content issues which refers to identical content being found on multiple pages on a website. 

In the eyes of Google, duplicate content can diminish the perceived authority and trustworthiness of a website. The search engine struggles to determine which page is the most relevant for a specific search query. 

In some cases, search engines may apply penalties to address duplicate content issues. This can result in lower search rankings and even temporary or permanent exclusion from search engine results pages.

Such disasters can be avoided if you add your website to GSC and take its warnings and recommendations seriously. 

Like GSC, Google Analytics or GA can also help improve search rankings. For instance, GA records countries from where your website visitors originate. This information helps you tailor your efforts to specific countries. You can translate your website to cater to visitors from that country and end up drawing more traffic and ranking for more keywords. 

Covering how to add your website to GSC and GA is beyond the scope of this article but there are plenty of resources available online to help you out. We recommend the following guides:

• How to Add Your Site to Google Search Console
• How to Add Your Site to Google Analytics

2. Creating an SEO-Friendly Site Structure

SEO stands for search engine optimization and an SEO-friendly site structure refers to the organization and hierarchy of a website’s posts and pages in a way that makes it easy for search engine bots to crawl them. 

To create an ideal site structure, you need to be mindful of your menus and internal links. 

To create SEO-friendly menus in a website you need to plan your menu structure properly.  

Before adding menus to your website, you need to plan out the structure and hierarchy of your website’s pages. 

Websites Menus

Menus typically appear on the site’s header and footer. 

Headers contain the most important pages like pricing, product features, blog, cart, support, contact, about, etc. These are pages that visitors to your website are highly likely to be interested in. 

Footers contain pages that visitors are mildly interested in like careers, disclaimers, privacy policies, terms and conditions, and social media pages, among other things. 

You can also add some of your best blog posts to the footer to prompt people to check them out. It also allows search engine bots to crawl them every time they visit your website. 

For websites that contain too many important pages that need to be added to the header, we recommend adding subcategory pages.

Website Internal Links

As for interlinking, when done properly it plays a crucial role in creating an SEO-friendly site structure. Like the menus, interlinking helps enhance both user experience and search engine visibility.

The basic rule of thumb for interlinking is as follows: 

• Link to relevant pages only 
• Use keyword-rich anchor text
• Avoid using the same anchor text for two different pages
• Be sure to have at least one link in the first 100 words
• Be sure to add as many relevant links as you can
• Try and spread the links evenly 
• Avoid using long anchor text (four words at most)

Here’s a great guide on proper interlinking and another one on how to create WordPress menus.

3. Write Content Worth Ranking on Google

To rank your website on Google, you need to publish high-quality content on your website and it should cater to both visitors as well as search engines.

Creating high-quality content involves conducting thorough keyword research and incorporating those keywords naturally into your content.

It also involves writing well-researched content, using credible sources, and presenting it in a well-structured and engaging manner.

Good content can further enhance its chances of ranking well on Google. Regularly updating and promoting your content can also contribute to its visibility and ranking success.

Use these guides on how to conduct keyword research and write user and SEO-friendly content. 

Pro Tip: When doing keyword research to work on some of your first few articles, be sure to target keywords that don’t have a lot of competition. Look for “Longtail” or “zero search volume keywords” as they usually (not always) have low competition. 

4. SEO Optimize Posts & Pages

SEO optimization of posts and pages involves applying various techniques and strategies to improve the visibility and ranking of individual web pages or blog posts in search engine results. 

Some key aspects of SEO optimization are on-page SEO, off-page, technical, and multilingual SEO for translated websites. 

On-page SEO: It mainly involves mindfully placing keywords, distributing target keywords, using tags, optimizing title & meta descriptions, using inbound & outbound links, and optimizing URLs, among other things. 

Off-page SEO: It involves activities performed outside of a web page that impact its search engine ranking like building high-quality backlinks, social media marketing, online reputation management, influencer outreach, brand mentions monitoring, etc.

Technical SEO: It involves optimizing technical aspects of a website to improve its visibility and crawling by search engines. Technical SEO includes tasks such as generating XML sitemaps, robots.txt, adding schema markup, optimizing site speed, mobile-friendliness, canonicalization, and resolving crawl errors, among other things.

Multilingual SEO: It involves optimizing websites to target multiple languages and includes keyword research and content localization, translating SEO metadata, etc.

Some SEO can be implemented manually and others have to be implemented using tools like Yoast SEO and TranslatePress. 

TranslatePress Multilingual

The best way to turn your website multilingual and get found on Google in every language.

Get the plugin

Or download FREE version

We have separate articles on how to use these tools and implement search engine optimizations:

• WordPress multilingual SEO
• Multilingual Website SEO
• SEO for New Websites

5. Ensure High Loading Speed & Mobile Friendliness

Speed is an important ranking factor of websites on Google. This means the faster your website is the higher chance it has to be found on Google’s first page. 

Google’s purpose in making speed a ranking factor is to ensure that visitors can quickly access any of your posts and pages. 

Google also has a mobile-first indexing policy which means it uses the mobile version of a website’s content for indexing and ranking in search results. As you can imagine, this policy was implemented when Google recognized how its users increasingly access the internet through mobile devices. 

You can check your website speed using speed testing tools like Google PageSpeed Insights, GTmetrix, Pingdom, etc. They offer details on what’s causing the slow site speed. Using these details, you can search for solutions to speed up your website. 

6. Get Backlinks From Authoritative Websites

Getting backlinks from reputed authoritative websites improves your website’s authority and credibility. It signals to search engines that your website is valuable and trustworthy. This helps improve your site ranking and organic traffic. 

While good content can draw backlinks on its merit, you can also implement strategies to attract backlinks to your posts and pages. 

Here’s a quick rundown of some of those strategies:

Guest posting: Reaching out to relevant websites in your industry and offering to write guest posts in return for a backlink.

Building relationships: Engaging with influencers and industry experts through social media, comments, or even email and offering collaborations which could lead to acquiring backlinks to your website. 

Broken link building: Find broken links on other websites within your industry and offer to replace them with relevant and better content from your website. 

To know more backlink strategies and how to implement them, read this guide: Link Building for SEO.

7. Implement SEO Audits Regularly 

SEO audits refer to analyzing and evaluating various aspects of a website to identify areas for improvement. It’s important to audit your website regularly to ensure that it remains optimized for search engines and continues ranking on Google’s first page. 

The easiest way to SEO audit a website is to use a tool like Google Search Console (GSC). 

You can use it to identify indexing issues and review metrics like clicks, impressions, average position, and click-through rate (CTR) to gain insights into your website’s search performance.

GSC can also be used to identify potential keywords or improve low-ranking content. You can monitor backlinks, remove spammy links, and identify mobile-related issues among other things.

SEO auditing of a website involves a lot of steps, most of which are covered in this dedicated guide: SEO site auditing. Use the guide to implement SEO auditing on your website. 

8. Double-down on What’s Working 

So far we have covered many strategies to help your website get found and rank on Google. 

After implementing those strategies, you’ll notice that some strategies work while others don’t offer desired results.

It’s important to note which strategies are working and which ones aren’t. The strategies that aren’t working should be dropped and the ones that are working should be prioritized and further optimized to maximize their impact.

Conclusion

Google is the world’s most popular search engine, drawing millions of users every month. It’s an ideal source of traffic. 

Given that Google is such a lucrative source of traffic, millions of websites are competing with each other to be found on Google. 

So, getting found on Google may seem like an impossible task but it’s not. There are steps you can take to ensure that your website ranks on Google search results and draws traffic. 

We recommend the following steps:

• Add site to Google Search Console & Analytics 
• Create an SEO-friendly site structure 
• Write high-quality content that is worth ranking on Google 
• Implement on-page SEO, off-page SEO, and technical SEO
• Translate website to different languages and multilingual SEO using tools like TranslatePress 
• Ensure high loading speed on desktop and mobile 
• Get backlinks for authoritative websites
• Implement SEO audits regularly and double down on the strategies that are working 

Have any questions about how to get found on Google? Let us know in the comment section below.

The post How to Get Found on Google With SEO in 8 Steps (2024 Guide) appeared first on TranslatePress.

There are mainly two types of translation services: machine-driven translation and human translation services. Both services have many advantages and disadvantages. 

In this article, we have dived into those advantages and disadvantages to help you decide which service type best suits your business needs. 

We have also explained how different types of content need different types of translation services, whether you need a translation agency or a freelance translator, and where to find the best-certified agencies and marketplaces for hiring freelance translators. 

Let’s dive into the article. 

Types of Translation: Machine Translation vs Human Translation

In a nutshell, machine translation involves software that automatically translates your content into different languages. Human translation refers to manual translation by a person or a team of people. 

Machine Translation: Pros & Cons

Pros: You can rely on machine translations for fast and cost-effective translations. 

A machine will take minutes to translate millions of words that a human would require weeks, or most likely months to translate. 

Also, machine translating tools take only a few hundred dollars to translate words that humans would require thousands of dollars to translate. 

Case in point, average human translation services charge $0.10 for translating a single word which means translating 100,000 word source material requires an investment of $10,000. 

Compare this to popular machine translating tools like Google Translate and DeepL which charge around $20 and $25 for translating 100,000 words. 

It’s clear that the cost of human translation is steeper. 

Cons: Machine translations are not 100% accurate. 

Tools like Google Translate and DeepL have improved over the last few years but they achieved only 90-95% accuracy or even less when the specific language pairs are unpopular.

According to a study conducted on Google Translate, content translated by the tool from English to Spanish has high accuracy because it’s a popular and frequently used language pairing. However, content translated from English to Armenian is low on accuracy because the language pair isn’t as popular. 

That said, low accuracy or good enough translations may work for some industries like e-commerce, travel, and social media but for other industries like legal, governmental, engineering, medical and healthcare, etc, translation accuracy is non-negotiable.

Human Translation: Pros & Cons

Pros: Human translations offer absolute accuracy or at least close to 100% accuracy depending on the translator’s proficiency.

People are just better at understanding the context of a text, including cultural nuances, humor, idioms, and colloquialisms. That’s why human translators are better at ensuring cultural sensitivity and avoiding unintentional offense or misinterpretation of cultural references.

Cons: Human translations are expensive and time-consuming.

Most professional translators charge by the word or by the hour. The cost can quickly add up, especially for large volumes of text. This makes human translations a less economical choice for individuals or small businesses.

Human translation is also a very time-intensive process. Translators need adequate time to read, understand, and accurately translate the text. Overtly tight deadlines can lead to human errors like typos, mistranslations, or context oversight.

Translators, intentionally or unintentionally, can introduce their cultural bias into their translation. However, this can be avoided by hiring talented translators who have demonstrated good work in the past but these translators are expensive. 

Also, finding a translator with expertise in highly specialized fields can be difficult and therefore more expensive. 

Different Types of Translation Content

Having clarity on what type of content you want to translate will help determine whether your business requires machine or human translation. 

The types of content that businesses typically translate are: 

Technical content

Nearly all businesses have technical documents like user guides and manuals. Tech-specific businesses have documents related to engineering specifications, blueprints, schematics, and technical drawings. Tech content requires human translators specializing in this field. 

Financial content

It refers to annual reports, financial statements, and investment materials that often require translation, especially for businesses operating in multiple countries or seeking international investors. This type of translation requires precision which is why it’s best done by human translators. 

Marketing content

It includes advertisements, brochures, product packaging, and promotional campaigns. A successful marketing translation adapts the content to resonate with the local audience and considers cultural nuances, humor, and consumer preferences. Human translators, especially those well-versed in marketing and the target market, are indispensable for this content type.

Content for Internal Use

Translating internal company documents, such as memos, announcements, or procedural documents, may not require the precision of human translation, therefore convenient machine translation is recommended.

Social media content

It refers to text posts, images, videos, articles, polls, surveys, ads, gifs, emojis, etc. Machine translation tools are ideal for generating social media content, especially in situations where speed and quantity are a priority. However, since the content directly impacts brand image, human review is strongly recommended.

Website content

Whether you need a machine or a human translator depends entirely on the type of content published on the website. For websites built on WordPress, using a tool like TranslatePress is the best way to translate the site. 

The tool offers two modes of translation: automatic and manual translation. 

Automatic translation is enabled using tools like Google Translate and DeepL. 

The manual translation is implemented via the tool’s Frontend Translation Editor. It can be used by human translators to translate some of the site’s important pages. 

Learn how to translate website content using TranslatePress. 

Now that you have some idea of what type of translation service is suitable for your business needs, let’s try and figure out what is the best way to access translation services, i.e. via an agency or through individual translators. 

Translation Agencies vs Freelance Translators: Whom to Hire

Translation agencies work with multiple translators specializing in different languages and they deliver complex translation projects under tight deadlines because they have access to large resources. 

Freelance translators are individuals who handle the translation projects on their own. They prefer working on small projects with appropriate deadlines.

Both agencies and freelancers rely on machine as well as human translations depending on the type of content that needs translations. 

For example, social media content is generated rapidly using machine translation tools but human review is also implemented to ensure nuanced cultural accuracy.

Translation Agency: Pros & Cons

Pros: Agencies often have a pool of translators specializing in different languages so there’s no need to hire multiple translators for multilingual translation projects. 

They have separate departments for quality control, project management, client communication, and robust data security measures to ensure a seamless and secure experience for clients seeking translation services.

Cons: Translation agencies are expensive due to their significant overhead expenses like physical offices, employing multiple in-house staff, and investing in advanced translation and project management software.

Freelance Translators: Pros & Cons

Pros: Freelance translators offer competitive rates because they have minimal overhead costs and no intermediary fees, unlike translation agencies. 

They also tend to adjust their rates to cater to a broad range of clients, from individuals to small businesses to larger corporations. Such flexibilities allow clients to negotiate rates and secure more cost-effective translation services for their business.

Freelancers directly communicate with clients ensuring that they meet client-specific requirements, preferences, and expectations. 

Cons: Freelance translators specialize in a single language so for multilingual translation projects clients have to hire multiple translators. Needless to say, this is a time-consuming and tiresome task. 

When working with freelance translators, clients often find themselves playing a hands-on role, reviewing, offering feedback, and requesting revisions to ensure the quality of the translation is top-notch. This too can be a tiresome and time-consuming task for some clients. 

Another major drawback of working with freelancers is that they tend to juggle multiple clients and might not be available for urgent or high-volume translation work. 

When collaborating with freelance translators, the responsibility for project management largely rests with the client. So you end up overseeing various aspects of the translation project which includes setting clear objectives, providing source materials, defining timelines, and monitoring progress. 

This level of involvement provides a lot of control, for sure, but it’s also time-consuming, and effort-intensive. 

How to Hire an Agency or Freelancer

Now that you know about the many advantages and disadvantages of using translation agencies and freelance translators, it’s time to make a decision. 

Translation agencies provide a convenient, all-in-one solution for large multilingual projects but tend to be costlier. Freelance translators offer cost-effective and personalized services. They are ideal for small projects but they are time-consuming and require a lot of client involvement. 

In the end, the choice comes down to your specific needs and preferences.

Once you have decided what type of service you require, proceed to hire translators with the help of the following articles:

• Best certified translation agencies
• Best marketplaces to hire freelance translators

What Type of Translation Will You Choose?

Choosing the right type of translation service is super important because you don’t want to switch services midway after realizing that the translation agency or freelancer can’t meet your needs. 

Most translation services, be it agencies or freelancers, are driven by machines, humans, or both. 

Machine lead translation services offer fast and cost-effective translations but they are often not 100% accurate. Human translation can achieve 100% accuracy but they are expensive, time-consuming, and requires a lot of client involvement. 

All these pros and cons are relative of course. 

You might not need 100% accuracy and for solopreneurs and small businesses, agencies can seem expensive. The accuracy of human translations is dependent on the translator’s proficiency and client involvement offers more control over the translation project. For small translation projects, human translation services will be inexpensive. 

The best way to choose a translation service type is to first recognize your own needs. 

In most cases, a hybrid service (like the one TranslatePress offers) where both machine and human translation are involved works best. 

TranslatePress Multilingual

TranslatePress is the easiest way to translate your WordPress site. It's fast, won't slow down your website, works with ANY theme or plugin and it's SEO friendly.

Get the plugin

Or download FREE version

Just be sure to select a translation agency or freelance translator who offers the type of translation service your business needs.

If you have any questions about the different types of translation services, let us know in the comment section below. 

The post Types of Translation Services Best Suited For Your Business in 2024 appeared first on TranslatePress.

In this tutorial, we will show you the exact steps you need to take to implement SEO on your brand-new website. 

But first, you need to have an operational website up and running, complete with a domain name and a hosting plan.

Only after having configured and launched your website can you start implementing SEO (search engine optimization) tactics that will set your website up for future success.

Right off the bat, you should know that SEO is a long-term marketing strategy. This may sound frustrating for a new business but trust me, if you don’t implement it now, you will regret not starting sooner. 

In this tutorial, you will learn how exactly SEO will help your new website draw traffic and even revenue along with how to set your expectations and build a mindset for success. 

Let’s get started. 

What is SEO? Why Does a New Website Need it?

For a new website drawing traffic is a herculean task. 

You may have built the best tools in the world, and offer the best services, advice, or pricing models but without traffic, your website or business will cease to exist within a few weeks. 

Luckily, marketing gurus have tried and tested a number of effective tactics that new sites can implement to draw traffic to their websites. 

SEO is one such marketing tactic. 

It’s short for search engine optimization and involves optimizing site pages in a way that it ranks on search engines like Google and Bing. 

Once a website starts ranking in the first positions of a search engine it starts drawing traffic to the website. 

This traffic can be converted to customers and can become a major source of revenue collection for online businesses and websites. 

That said, SEO results are not immediate and you may have to wait for up to 6 months before seeing any sign of traffic. 

Besides SEO, new websites can also use social media, advertising, YouTube, podcasting, influencer and affiliate marketing, webinars, and offline events to promote their site and draw eyeballs to their offerings. 

But no matter which channel you choose, marketing is a long-term game and you will need to keep at it for a couple of weeks (most likely months) before seeing any results. 

So we highly recommend that you set your expectations correctly before starting to implement the SEO tactics listed in the next section. 

How to Implement SEO For New Websites 

Implementing SEO on a new website involves numerous steps. Some steps need to be implemented before you start optimizing your website for search engines and others need to be implemented post-optimization. 

Both the pre and post-SEO steps are equally important. If these are not implemented properly, your SEO strategy will fail. 

1. Pre-SEO Steps 

Pre-SEO steps mainly involve doing keyword research and creating a content strategy. 

i. Conduct Keyword Research

As you know by now, implementing SEO involves optimizing your site’s pages. This means you either have existing pages that need optimization or you can create new pages and optimize them so that they rank on search engines and draw traffic to your website. 

To optimize existing or new pages, you need to find keywords that your pages can target. 

For instance, let’s say you started a new website selling security plugins. The plugin offers features like a malware scanner, malware remover, firewall, and user activity logs among other things. 

You can create pages targeting these keywords like “malware scanner plugin,” “malware removal plugin,” “firewall plugin,” and “activity log plugin.”

Optimize your pages and wait for the keywords to rank on search engines. Once they start ranking on the first few positions of the search result, users will visit your website and end up buying your plugins. 

So to reiterate, keyword research is the process of identifying keywords that you can target for the pages of your new websites. 

Keyword research is a broad topic but in a nutshell, it involves: 

• Brainstorming terms relevant to your website
• Analyzing competition to find relevant keywords 
• Using keyword research tools like Ahref, SEMrush, or Keywords Everywhere to check the search volume
• Selecting a mix of short-tail (like “malware scanner”) and long-tail keywords (like “how to scan a WordPress site for vulnerabilities”)
• Choose target keywords based on how easily they can be ranked for a new website 

To learn how to conduct keyword research, we recommend guides from industry experts – Semrush and Backlinko. 

ii. Develop a Content Strategy 

Once you have a list of keywords to target, it’s time to create a content strategy which basically means developing a plan that outlines how to create, publish, distribute, and manage content. 

A lot goes into creating a content strategy but for a new website, we suggest keeping things simple and following these guides: How to create a content plan with Ahref and HubSpot. 

2. Implementing SEO 

There are different types of search engine optimizations, namely, on-page, off-page, technical, and multilingual SEO. 

Let’s dive into each type of SEO and learn how to implement them on a new website:

i. On-Page SEO

On-page SEO refers to the technique of optimizing individual web pages to improve your search engine rankings and attract organic traffic. It involves the following components:

Write High-Quality Content

Content is the foundation of a web page. You need to create valuable, well-researched, and engaging content that addresses user needs and interests. 

Poorly written, irrelevant, uninformative content with unexpected self-promotion often results in a negative user experience and it typically fails to rank on search engines. 

Mindfully Placing Keywords

The target keyword (“malware scanner”) and variation of the keywords (“scanning for malware,” “malware scanning on a WordPress website,” etc.) have to be included naturally throughout the article. 

The target keyword must be included in the following locations: 

• Page title
• First 100 words
• Sub-headings
• Meta description
• URL
• Image names and alt text

Distribute Target Keyword

The target keyword has to be present frequently throughout the page. It should appear organically and shouldn’t look forced. 

The ideal frequency varies depending on factors like content length, context, and competition but SEO masters recommend ideal keyword density to be between 1-2%.

Use H tags

Htags are short for header tags that help structure the content of your pages with the goal of making the page easier to consume for visitors as well as search engines. 

There are 6 Htags, namely the H1 tag, H2 tag, H3 tag, and so on. 

There is only one H1 tag and it’s the heading of the page. The rest of the tags appear under each other like a Russian doll. 

Every Htag on a page typically contains the target keyword or variations of it. 

Optimizing Title & Meta Description

The title and meta description are a super important component of your page because they appear on search engines and are responsible for convincing users to click through and view the page. 

Both the title and the meta description should contain the target keywords, they should be unique, engaging, and relevant. They should also adhere to search engine character limits to avoid being cut short on search results. 

Using Inbound & Outbound Links

Inbound (internal) links refer to links from pages of the same website and outbound (external) links refer to links from other websites. 

Inbound links connect pages within your site and aid navigation for both visitors and search engine bots. Outbound links help add context and establish trust by associating with other reputed websites. 

While there are no set numbers of mandatory links, a good rule of thumb is to have one relevant inbound or outbound link after every 100 words. 

Optimizing URL

The URL of your page has to be concise, descriptive, and keyword-rich. 

For instance, the URL of a post titled “3 Best Malware Scanners to Protect Your Website” should look like this: https://example.com/best-malware-scanner/ 

Notice how we didn’t include the number. This is to avoid having to change the URL in the future when we decide to update the article with more scanners. Changing URLs is known to impact page SEO negatively.  

Pro tip: WordPress websites should install an SEO plugin into your website and let the tool guide you on how to insert keywords, how to optimize your title, meta description, images, Htags, links, and much more. 

ii. Off-Page SEO

Off-page SEO refers to the optimization of factors external to your website like acquiring backlinks, social media signals, partnerships, sponsorships, etc. to boost your search engine rankings and overall online presence. 

Implementing off-page SEO requires a lot of dedicated time which is why we recommend skipping this particular SEO strategy for the time being and focusing on on-page, technical, and multilingual SEO. 

Learn more about off-page SEO from these guides: What is off-page SEO and everything you need to know about off-page SEO. 

iii. Technical SEO

Technical SEO involves optimizing website infrastructure to ensure that search engines can crawl, index, and rank your website properly.

The key components of technical SEO include: 

Install an SSL certificate: It adds “https://” to your domain name and ensures secure, encrypted data transfer on your pages.

Optimize website speed for mobile and desktop: Slow websites don’t rank. Optimizing web pages includes image, code, script, and content compression, lazy loading, website caching, and reducing redirects among other things. It ensures that your website loads faster which improves your site’s ranking.

Implement schema markup: Schema markups are codes added to web pages to help search engines understand the content and present it to users in informative snippets on the search result pages.

Generate XML sitemaps robots.txt, and canonical tags: XML sitemaps help search engines crawl and index website content efficiently. The robots.txt file guides search engine bots on which pages to crawl or exclude. Canonical tags are used to indicate the preferred version of a webpage when duplicate content is found on the site.

iv. Multilingual SEO

Multilingual SEO tailors your website’s content and structure for multiple languages helping expand your site’s reach and drawing more traffic.

You need to implement it only when translating your website into other languages. Implementing multilingual SEO involves finding target keywords in the new language, and translating content including page URL, image name, alt text, title, meta description, multilingual sitemaps, hreflang tags, among other things. 

As you can imagine, manually implementing multilingual SEO will be a nightmare therefore we recommend using a tool like TranslatePress to help you translate your website into multiple languages. 

TranslatePress is a powerful translation plugin that comes equipped with a ton of features including automatic translation that’ll help speed up the translation process.

We have separate guides on how to implement multilingual SEO with TranslatePress, check them out:

• Multilingual SEO on WordPress 
• SEO Translation Tips for Multilingual Sites
• Multilingual Website SEO

3. Post-SEO Steps 

After implementing the SEO steps listed in the previous sections, you need to discern which SEO tactics are working and which ones are duds. Here’s how:

i. Add Site to Google Search Console & Google Analytics 

Google Search Console (GSC) and Google Analytics (GA) are free tools that offer insight into visitor behavior and website performance on Google’s search results. 

Create a GSC and GA account, add your website to those tools and they will monitor your site 24×7. Over time they will display the results of your SEO efforts. 

ii. Implement the 80-20 Rule 

The 80-20 Rule also known as the Pareto Principle, suggests that roughly 80% of outcomes result from 20% of causes. 

You can apply this rule to your SEO efforts. Double down on what’s working and reduce the time spent on things that aren’t bringing desired results. 

For instance, let’s say, your article comparing your malware scanner with your competitor’s scanner is drawing tons of traffic each month. This indicates that you should write more comparison articles, covering all your competitors to draw more traffic to your website. 

That’s it. With that we have come to the end of this post on SEO for new websites.

Final Thoughts on SEO for New Websites

Doing SEO for new websites is not easy. It involves the following components: 

• Conducting keyword research 
• Developing content strategy 
• Implement on-page and technical SEO (later off-page and multilingual SEO)
• Monitoring SEO results and 
• Pivoting to better SEO strategies in the near future 

Implementing each of these components requires a lot of time and effort. 

But as difficult as it is to implement SEO, the strategies are also highly rewarding in the long term. 

That said, to see results from SEO, you need to implement the right SEO tactics. 

We tailored this tutorial in a way so that new websites can boost online visibility and draw traffic. 

We hope you found our tutorial helpful. If you have any questions about SEO for new websites, let us know in the comment section below. 

The post SEO For New Websites: Strategies Guaranteed to Work (2024 Guide) appeared first on TranslatePress.

Having an online store allows you to reach a global audience without the constraints of geographical boundaries. It allows you to connect with potential customers from different corners of the world and expand your market presence exponentially.

Or that’s what you thought!

Drawing a global audience into your online store without a face or a physical presence is hard and selling products to a global audience is even harder. 

The key to a successful eCommerce business is to establish and maintain customer trust. 

Localization of your eCommerce website is one of the best ways to earn customer trust because what is familiar is trustworthy.

In the following tutorial, you will learn how to implement localization on your eCommerce site along with the differences between localization, translation, and internationalization, among other things. 

What Exactly is eCommerce Localization?

eCommerce localization is the process of adapting an eCommerce site to make it culturally and linguistically suitable for a local audience in a particular region or country.

Localization is a long and comprehensive process and it involves translating website content, and SEO metadata, adhering to cultural and regional context, changing graphics, modifying layouts, designs, and colors, converting to local currencies and units of measure, formatting dates, addresses, and phone numbers, addressing local regulations and legal requirements, and more. 

Let’s take a quick dive into each of these components – 

1. Translation of Website Content

Translation is a basic component of localization. Translations have to be implemented on posts, pages, image captions, buttons, menus, footers, popups, sidebars, and newsletter boxes, among other things. 

What is the Difference Between Translation & Localization?

It’s worth noting that translation and localization are often used interchangeably and it’s a mistake because translation is only a part of the localization process. 

Localization of an eCommerce website is really about meeting the target audience’s cultural expectations at all levels. It’s an extensive process and involves having a localized marketing strategy and making multiple changes from the ground up. To learn more, take a look at this localization vs translation guide. 

2. Translation of SEO Metadata 

SEO metadata like titles, meta descriptions, meta tags, and sitemap plays a crucial role in optimizing an eCommerce site for search engines. Translating metadata will help you rank in local search engines and draw local traffic from your target region. 

3. Cultural & Regional Sensitivity

During the localization process, you need to ensure that the site’s messaging is not only linguistically correct but also culturally and regionally relevant. 

For instance, when talking of popular sports to a US audience, you can cover football, baseball, and basketball but when localizing your site for a Norwegian audience, you will need to cover skiing, biathlon, and ice hockey instead. 

Also, you may have to use the Nynorsk dialect when targeting Western Norway or the Bokmål dialect when targeting the rest of Norway. 

4. Translation of Media

Pictures of people, objects, or scenes should reflect the local demographic, lifestyle, and preferences.

Images, infographics, illustrations, and logos that display text need to be replaced with graphics with translated text. 

Let’s say, there’s a featured image on your eCommerce site that goes like this:

When localizing the site for Norway, the image should look like this: 

5. Modification of Site Layout, Design & Color 

Languages like the Arabic language do not follow the standard LTR (left-to-right) to RTL (right-to-left) direction, and their script can impact the site layout. 

Some languages are verbose and require more space on the page while others are succinct and require less space. 

You have designed your site’s layout based on the default language but it may need to be modified during localization. 

Color, shapes, icons, object sizes, and even animals have diverse meanings across different cultures. In marriage ceremonies, the color white is revered in Western countries while red is the traditional color of marriage in Eastern countries. And a bear might symbolize strength in some cultures and be associated with fear in others.

6. Currencies & Units of Measure

Displaying correct currency symbols and formats based on the country’s standards is an important component of localization. For instance, the US standard way of displaying monetary value is $10 but in Europe, you will have to display it like 10$.

Likewise, in the US, the distance might be measured in miles, while in many other parts of the world including Europe, kilometers are the preferred unit of measurement. 

7. Dates, Addresses, & Phone Numbers

Incorrect date formats can lead to confusion. For instance, 07/08/2000 – reads as 7th August 2000 in most of the world but in the US, it reads as July 8th, 2000. 

Addresses in the US often include the street address, city, state abbreviation, and ZIP code while In the UK, addresses have a different structure with elements like postal codes, town/city, and county included.

Localizing phone numbers involves adjusting the format, country codes, and local dialing patterns.

8. Adherence to Privacy Laws & Local Regulations 

Failure to comply with local regulations and privacy laws can lead to legal issues, financial penalties, and damaged brand reputation. For example, the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) imposes strict rules on the collection, processing, and storage of personal data. When localizing your eCommerce site for EU countries, you must ensure that your data handling practices are aligned with GDPR requirements.

Localization is a massive process and these are some of the common components. 

In the next few sections, we have covered the benefits of localization and demonstrated how to localize a WordPress eCommerce site. But first, let’s take a dive into internationalization and how it’s related to localization. 

What is the Difference Between Localization & Internationalization?

Like localization and translation, the term localization and internationalization are also sometimes used interchangeably. Granted, these two processes are connected but they are not the same thing. 

Internationalization is the process of building a product in a way that ensures users can easily localize it. This means, internationalization lays the foundation for effective localization.

In WordPress, developers built plugins and themes using functions like “gettext” to help facilitate translations. This is internationalization. 

All said and done, eCommerce site admins don’t have to worry about internationalization unless they are planning on building software. 

Benefits of Localizing eCommerce Sites 

The following benefits will give you a clear picture of how localization can really help your eCommerce website grow. By implementing eCommerce localization, you can: 

SEO Benefits: Localized content improves your search engine visibility in different regions and languages, increasing the chances of your eCommerce store appearing in local search results. 

Improved Conversion Rates: Visitors from new markets are likely to make a purchase as they can read product details, pricing, and checkout processes, among other things in their own language.

Better Brand Reputation: Localization demonstrates clarity, cultural sensitivity, and commitment to serving local customers, fostering trust and positive consumer perception which helps boost brand reputation.

More Loyal Customers: Localized website creates personalized experiences, and enhances emotional connection, trust, and loyalty, leading to repeat business and word-of-mouth referrals.

Competitive Advantage: By offering a localized shopping experience, you gain a competitive edge over businesses that have not yet embraced localization and become a dominant player in the industry. 

If done right, localization can boost your business through the roof. 

How to Localize a WordPress eCommerce Site?

We will demonstrate how to localize an eCommerce website that is built using the world’s most popular CMS – WordPress. 

WordPress sites generally use WooCommerce to sell products and services, so in this tutorial, we will use a tool called TranslatePress to translate WooCommerce products, posts, pages, SEO metadata, and every other content. Let’s start. 

Step 1: Install TranslatePress & Choose Languages 

TranslatePress is the most popular and userfriendly translation plugin. It helps you translate directly from the front end, using a super intuitive visual translation interface.

The plugin has a free and a pro version. 

The free version is loaded with features that can be used to translate texts, images, buttons, menus, text strings, and forms. It works seamlessly with page builders like Divi, Elementor, Beaver Builder, and others. But more important, it integrates perfectly with WooCommerce, the most popular eCommerce plugin for WordPress. 

The pro version lets you add two or more languages, add multilingual SEO capabilities, allow automatic translations via the DeepL, and add “translator” user accounts to your site to have people help you with translations. 

If you aren’t sure which version to install, then start with the free plugin. You can always upgrade the plugin if you need to.

To install the free plugin, open your WordPress dashboard and go to Plugin → Add New. Type in the plugin’s name or download it from the WordPress repo and then upload it to your site. 

After installation, go to Settings → TranslatePress → General → All Languages and choose the language you want to use on your store.

Step 2: Set Up Automatic Translation (Optional) 

Automatic translations save time but it’s entirely optional. You can use it to generate a baseline translation and later edit the translations using the visual editor. 

For manual translation, skip this section and head straight to step 3. But if you choose to automate translations then go to Automatic Translation on the TranslatePress dashboard and set the  Enable Automatic Translation to Yes. Then proceed to choose a translation engine.

The free plugin supports Google Translate but to use DeepL you need the TranslationPress Pro plugin. 

Use these help docs to obtain an API key for both services:

• Google Translation API help doc
• DeepL API help doc

Consider setting daily limits on machine translations, automating slug translation, and saving Google Translate API log requests in your database. 

Step 3: Translate WooCommerce Content 

Now comes the fun part! 

WooCommerce websites have product pages, store, cart, checkout, and account pages, menus, widgets, footers, popups, forms, and SEO metadata. You will be translating them using the TranslatePress visual editor. We’ll show you how to use it. 

Open a product page (or any page you like) and select the Translate Site option from the admin bar. The visual editor, also called Translation Editor should appear on the left side of the screen. 

Choose any text on the page by hovering your cursor over the text and selecting the pencil icon. 

If you enabled Automatic translation, the editor will be prefilled. If not, then add the translated text in the appropriate field. 

Remember to save the translations before closing the page. 

This is how you can translate posts, pages, product and account pages, carts, checkout, menu, widgets, footer, popups, and forms on your WooCommerce site. Translating SEO metadata needs the Pro plugin and requires editing the URL slug, changing the title and meta description, enabling multilingual sitemaps, and setting the correct hreflang attributes for your localized pages.

TranslatePress takes care of your multilingual sitemap and hreflang attributes. But you will need to use the editor to translate the URL slug, title, and meta description. More on that in this multilingual SEO guide. 

To truly localize your WooCommerce site, you will need to display multiple currencies. We have a separate guide on that: How to Add Multiple Currencies to WooCommerce. 

Conclusion

Localizing your eCommerce website is a great way to draw traffic, boost your conversion rates, improve brand reputation, customer loyalty, and gain competitive advantage. 

The process of localization involves the translation of website content, SEO metadata, graphics, cultural and regional sensitivity, modification of site layout, design, color, currencies, units of measurement, dates, addresses, phone numbers, and adherence to privacy laws and local regulations. 

It’s a long and expensive affair. We recommend having a proper strategy in place and active monitoring of what works and what doesn’t. 

For WooCommerce sites wanting to localize, we recommend using TranslatePress for translating pages, store, cart, checkout, and account pages, menus, widgets, footers, popups, forms, and SEO metadata of your website. 

TranslatePress Multilingual

Translate WooCommerce websites without hassle.

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If you have any questions about eCommerce localization, let us know in the comment section below. 

The post eCommerce Localization: Benefits & How to Implement in 2024 appeared first on TranslatePress.

Translating your homepage into different languages is a great idea as it will help attract more visitors and increase your conversion rates as well as revenue collection. 

The most efficient way of translating a homepage is by using a translation plugin like TranslatePress. You can automate the translation of your WordPress homepage using this particular plugin and even implement manual fixes to incorrect translations. 

In this article, we have laid out the steps on how to use TranslatePress to automate the translation of your homepage and also how to manually fix incorrect translations. 

Let’s get started.

How to Translate the Homepage of a WordPress Site 

To translate your homepage into different languages, you need to take the following steps: 

• Install TranslatePress translation plugin 
• Add a secondary language 
• Implement automatic translation 
• Manual fix incorrect translations (if necessary)
• Limit translation to only homepage (optional)
• Review & modify TranslatePress settings

In the next few sections, we will show you how to carry out these steps. 

Step 1: Install TranslatePress Translation Plugin 

TranslatePress is one of the most popular translation plugin out there mainly because it offers a ton of features, it’s easy to use and it offers a version that is free of cost. Let’s take a quick look at all the features that the free TranslatePress plugin offers:

• Automatic translations through the Google Translate API;
• Visual translation interface for live translation;
• Add custom languages;
• Limit daily machine translations;
• A language switcher you can place virtually anywhere on the website (including menus);
• Include or exclude certain pages from automatic translations.

That said, it’s important to note that the plugin has a premium version as well that adds tons of extra functionality. The premium version offers SEO metadata translations and perhaps most importantly, it allows you to add as many languages you need to your website. 

With the free version, you can translate your website into only one additional language. 

In this article, we are going to use the free version of the plugin to demonstrate how to translate your homepage into one other language. But please note that if you choose to use the premium TranslatePress plugin for multiple translations, you can still follow the steps laid out in this article. 

To learn more about the premium version of the plugin, specifically, the add-ons it offers, read this article comparing the free and the pro versions. 

You can purchase the premium plugin from here and then download the plugin from your TranslatePress account to your local computer. If you want to use the free plugin, you can simply download it from the WordPress repository or look for it in the Plugins area of your WordPress dashboard. 

Search for TranslatePress in the search bar, identify it, and then hit the Install Now and Activate buttons to activate the plugin on your website. 

Step 2: Add a Secondary Language 

After installing TranslatePress on your WordPress website, go to Settings → TranslatePress → General → All Languages. 

From the dropdown menu adjacent to All Languages, select the language in which you want to translate your homepage. Then, hit the Add button to add the language as your site’s second language. 

If you are using the premium plugin, then you can add more than one secondary language in the same way. 

Before moving to the next step, remember to scroll down and hit the Save Changes button to save the modifications you just made.

Please note that if you can’t find the language of your choice, TranslatePress also offers the option to add a custom language. All you need to do is go to Settings → TranslatePress → Advanced → Custom Language and add details of the custom language. Most of these details are easily available on the internet. But if you require help adding custom languages, take a look at this tutorial on WordPress custom languages.

Step 3: Implement Automatic Translation (Google Translate Homepage)

TranslatePress offers an automatic translation feature that when enabled automatically translates your homepage into the second language you choose in the previous step. 

To enable automatic translation, go to Settings → TranslatePress → Automatic Translation → Enable Automatic Translation and choose Yes from the dropdown menu. 

Next, you need to select a Translation Engine. 

Translation engines are technologies that allow TranslatePress to automatically translate your homepage. You have the option to choose between two of the most popular and efficient translation engines: Google Translate and DeepL. 

You can use Google Translate with the free TranslatePress plugin. But if you’d rather use DeepL, then you need to upgrade to the premium version of the TranslatePress plugin. 

It’s worth noting that Google Translate is free up to a point (translation of 500,000 characters) and beyond that, you will need to pay directly to Google to continue using the service. Learn more about Google Translation service cost and how it compares to other machine translation services.

Generate Translation Engine Key

Whichever translation engine you prefer, you will need to integrate the technology with your website. This can be done by generating an API key and adding it to your website. 

We have separate articles on how to generate and add translation engine keys to your website:

• Generate a DeepL API key
• Generate a Google Translate API key

After you have added your preferred translation engine, scroll down and hit the Save Changes button. 

The automatic translation of your homepage will be triggered only when someone visits the page in the secondary language for the first time. 

We recommend reviewing the homepage after logging out from your WordPress dashboard. Simply go to the homepage and switch to your additional language from the language switcher.

A typical WordPress homepage has the following elements: 

• Header and navigation menu
• Banner headline, button, and text
• Page content, buttons, and images 
• Footer and footer bar

Each of these elements may contain text that has been automatically translated by TranslatePress. Be sure to check the text and ensure that the translation is correct. Incorrect translations can be manually fixed by using the Translate Page button. More on this in the next step. 

Step 4: Manually Fix Incorrect Translations 

Incorrect text on the homepage can be fixed manually. Here’s how: 

Log into your WordPress dashboard, open your homepage, and select the Translate Page button located in the admin bar. 

A Translation Editor will appear on the left side of the screen. You will be using this editor to manually translate texts. 

Now, take your cursor over to the text your want to fix and select the blue pen to appear beside the text. It will allow the text to appear on the transition editor where you can replace it with the correct translation. 

Hit the Save button located at the top of the editor for the modification. 

In this manner, you can identify the incorrect translations on the homepage and replace them with the correct translations. 

Step 5: Limit Translation to Only Homepage (Optional)

TranslatePress’ automatic translation feature is by default implemented on all posts, pages, buttons, images, and elements of your entire website. 

As we said earlier, the automatic transition is initiated only when someone visits the page for the first time. So if you want to translate your entire website, you can either open all the pages on your own or allow visitors to open the pages and initiate the translation process. 

But if you don’t want to translate the entire WordPress website and would prefer limiting the translation to only your homepage, then here’s what you need to do: 

Go to Settings → TranslatePress → Advanced → Exclude Strings → Do Not Translate Certain Paths and select Translate Only Certain Paths. Then enter this in the white box: {{home}}

This will ensure that only your homepage is being translated. 

If you want to learn more including and excluding pages from being automatically translated, then take a look at this help doc: Translate Only Certain Pages. 

Step 6: Review & Modify TranslatePress Settings

So far you have automatically translated your homepage, manually fixed incorrect translations, and even limited translations to only your site’s homepage. Now, all that’s left to do is review and modify TranslatePress’ settings. 

In the previous steps, you have only had to modify some of the TranslatePress settings, but we recommend that you take a look at all the setting pages and see if there’s anything you’d want to modify to suit your needs. 

For instance, you may want to modify the color, location, and other design aspects of the Language Switcher or force your site’s second language into custom links. These can be achieved from the General settings page of the TranslatePress plugin. 

If you decide to use TranslatePress to translate your entire website, then you can try minimizing translation costs by blocking crawlers and setting a daily limit for the automatically translated characters. These can be achieved from the Automatic Translation settings tab. 

That’s all for this one folks! With that, we have come to the end of this tutorial. 

Conclusion 

Translating a homepage is not a difficult task if you have the right tools at your disposal. While there are several translation plugins to choose from, TranslatePress is the most popular and user-friendly plugin out there. 

Translating your homepage using TranslatePress involves the following steps: 

• Install the TranslatePress plugin;
• Add a secondary language; 
• Enable automatic translation; 
• Manually fix incorrect translations; 
• Limit translation to only the homepage (optional);
• Review and modify TranslatPress settings as and when required.

TranslatePress Multilingual

Most efficient and user-friendly translation plugin for your homepage.

Get the plugin

Or download FREE version

So, get TranslatePress and start translating your homepage today!

If you have any questions on how to translate a homepage, then leave us a comment below. 

The post How to Easily Translate Your Homepage (Or Even Entire Website) appeared first on TranslatePress.