This half-day workshop looks at the good, the bad, and the ugly of global websites. Along the way, we discuss best practices, see some stellar examples, and analyze some disasters.

1. Taking Your Content to
Global Proportions
Val Swisher
CEO, Content Rules, Inc.
@ContentRulesInc
@ValSwisher

2. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.
Today’s Agenda
• 9:00 – 10:15 Work work work
• 10:15 – 10:35 Eat yummy things
• 10:35 – 12:00 Practice, work, work, work
• 12:00 – 1:30 Eat more yummy things

3. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.
Val
Credentials Founder and CEO
Content Rules
Passion Board member
Translators without Borders
Talk to me: Content strategy
Content quality
Global readiness
Read: Third book, “Global Content Strategy: A Primer,”
published by XML Press

4. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.
Content
Strategy
Content
Development
Global
Readiness • Single-sourcing, reuse,
structured authoring
• Content quality
• Content optimization
• Write
• Edit
• Illustration
• Design
• Project Management
• Prepare content to be translated
• Save time
• Save money
• Ensure quality in all
languages

5. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

6. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

7. Global Content
Strategy Best
Practices

8. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.
Best Practices Matter
1. Improve content quality in all languages
2. Save money localizing and translating content
3. Get to market faster in all countries
4. Protect your brand
5. Maintain (or restore) your sanity
Excellent resource for best practice information:
“Web Globalization Report Card”
–John Yunker, bytelevel.com

9. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.
Best Practice Categories
External Best Practices
Internal Best Practices

10. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.
External Best Practices
Include:
§ Finding your global websites
§ Navigating within your global websites
§ Eliminating meaningless and offensive content

11. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.
Finding Your Global Websites
Three choices for displaying global sites:
1. Splash global gateway
2. Geolocation
3. Button on the homepage

12. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.
Best Practices for Organizing a Splash Global Gateway
§ Segment by region
§ Include the name written in the native language
§ Alphabetize according to native language
§ Country Language
§ Flag Language

13. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

14. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

15. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

16. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

17. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.
Geolocation
§ Becoming the best practice, particularly for mobile
§ Browser figures out where you are and displays the
appropriate information
§ Pros: You don’t have to do anything. The “correct”
information is served up based on your location.
§ Cons: Difficult for people who travel. Can be kinda
creepy, particularly when taken to an extreme.

18. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

19. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.
Global Button
§ Used instead of splash global gateway
§ Upper right corner is the best place for it
§ Keep button in the same place for each language
§ Use icon if possible

20. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

21. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

22. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

23. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

24. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

25. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.
What Not to Do…
Some companies make it very difficult to find global sites

26. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

27. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

28. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

29. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

30. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

31. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.
What Not to Do…
Some companies make it very confusing to find global sites

32. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

33. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

34. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

35. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

36. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

37. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

38. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

39. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

40. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

41. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.
Recap External Best Practices:
Locating Your International Sites
§ Use geolocation or a splash global gateway
§ Display region or country names in the native language
§ Flag ≠ Language
§ Country ≠ Language
§ Avoid lengthy drop-downs
§ Be careful when emphasizing certain locations over others
§ Don’t hide your global sites
§ Be consistent

42. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.
Navigating Within A Global Site
§ Make it easy for people to find what they need, in the
language they need it in, on the device they want to use.
§ Think like a customer when you lay out your global
navigation.

43. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

44. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

45. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

46. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

47. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.
Cultural Sensitivity
§ Eliminate what is offensive
§ Be mindful of models
§ Include region-specific information and images

48. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.
Avoid Offensive and Unrecognizable Images

50. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

51. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

52. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.
Use Culturally-Appropriate Models

53. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.
Be Sure to Include
§ Region-specific imagery and layout
§ Region-specific acknowledgements
§ Region-specific events

55. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

57. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.
How Far Do You Go with Translation?
§ Deciding how many pages deep to translate can be tricky
§ Plan it out carefully
§ Translate what is important
§ Allow people to search in their own language, regardless
of the language on the landing page

58. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

59. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

60. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.
Recap - External Best Practices
§ Affect the user experience
§ Pay attention to:
§ Locating international sites
§ Navigation within international sites
§ Consistency
§ Cultural sensitivities, particularly images
§ Which content gets translated

61. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.
Internal Best Practices
§ How you create, manage and maintain your sites
§ Know when to translate, when to localize, and when to
transcreate
§ Reuse content wherever possible
§ Keep text out of graphics
§ Be consistent
§ Collaborate

62. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.
Literal word-for word
translation of everything
-
The meaning stays the
same
Different content
developed to meet
business objectives
The content stays the
same
Language Translate the meaning of
the words in a way that is
culturally appropriate
Developed in local
language; English may be
used as part of the brand
vocabulary
Images No change Change to fit local
expectations / product
needs
Change to fit local
expectations / product
needs
Layout No change Minimize changes Change to fit local
expectations
Brand
Vocabulary
No change No change Enhance and expand
Translation Localization Transcreation
Methods Of Handling Global Content

63. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.
Translation

66. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

67. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

68. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.
Localization

69. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

70. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

71. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.
Transcreation

72. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

73. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

74. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

75. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

76. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.
Reuse Content

77. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.
Text Within Graphics
§ Not picked up by machine translation, including Google
translate or Bing translate
§ Not picked up by optimization engines
§ Require a separate process to translate
§ Not searchable
§ Instead, overlay text on top of graphics

78. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

79. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

80. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

81. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.
Choose Consistency

82. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.

83. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.
Don’t Work in a Silo

84. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.
Recap - Internal Best Practices
§ Know when to translate, when to localize, and when to
transcreate
§ Reuse content wherever possible
§ Keep text out of graphics
§ Be consistent
§ Collaborate

85. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.
Categorize the following websites into best or worst
Exercise

86. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.
Axa
Booking.com
Budweiser
Citibank
Kayak
Merck
Nestle
Nivea
Ramada
Walmart
J
L
L
L L
LJ
J
J
J
Navigation to Global Sites
Ease of Use
Cultural Sensitivities
Best or Worst?

87. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.
Val Swisher
CEO & Founder
vals@contentrules.com
www.contentrules.com
@ContentRulesInc
@ValSwisher

88. © 2015. Content Rules, Inc. All rights reserved.