Retail ecommerce sales reached over $3.5 trillion back in 2019. As the world recovers from the pandemic, there will be further growth in marketplaces globally. As more and more people discover the convenience of shopping online and as the technology used for marketplaces continues to improve, the number of users and the market itself will just continue to increase.
If you want to take advantage of the increased interest in eCommerce then you should consider running a multilingual platform.
Translation Company Recommendations for Running a Multilingual Marketplace
Running an ecommerce shop can be challenging on its own. When you want to convert that into a multilingual marketplace, then you can expect to be really complicated. Here are a few recommendations from Tomedes, a seasoned translation company, on how to run a multilingual marketplace. These ideas come from several years as a translation company and as a language industry player working with companies building their own multilingual eCommerce platforms.
Use Dynamic Content
Dynamic content refers to a type of web content that changes based on the preferences and interests of the users. The content can also be affected by other factors but the main idea is that it adjusts.
The aim of dynamic content is to increase the engagement of the users by delivering content that is customized for them. One way to do that is by presenting the users with content that’s written in their own language.
While there are so many features of a site that can be enhanced with dynamic content, we are concerned mainly with the language of the website. The language used on the text of a site can be changed depending on the location of the user. For example, if a user is in France, then the content can be changed into French to make it more engaging for him.
Incorporate the Multilingual Component in the Domains and Subdomains
The most recommended way of running a multilingual website and this is not just for ecommerce platforms but for other types of sites as well, is to use different subdomains for each version. So for example, if your website has a Spanish version, then you need to have a subdomain for that. That is true for any language version of your website that you want to build.
For example, your main website is website.com. The content on that site is written in English. If you have a Spanish version of the site then it should be website.es. If you have a Japanese version of the site, then its domain can be website.jp.
Why should you have a separate version of the site for each version? There are several reasons for having a separate domain for each language version of your site. First of all, it helps with SEO of your website. It is easier to make a version of your site rank for a certain language.
It might seem counterintuitive, but having a separate domain for each version can save you time and labor. By having a separate domain you only have to translate the important sessions and leave the others in the original language. If it’s not a separate domain and if you retain some content in the original language on the other language version, that might end up confusing users. A translation company can help out with this.
Provide Multilingual Support
When you are building a multilingual marketplace, you need to provide multilingual support as well. If you have Spanish, Japanese, and German versions of your websites, on top of the main one which is in English, then it’s crucial that you provide customer support under those languages.
You are attracting visitors and customers to your site and so when they go visit your site, you have to be there ready to answer their questions in the language they use. This doesn’t necessarily mean that you have to hire people who speak those languages or outsource the service.
There are multilingual chatbots that can be used to provide this kind of support. Translation companies can also provide support in creating content that will be used for the chats.
Ensure Clarity in Content
When you are building a multilingual marketplace for your business, you need to make sure that you are creating clear content for the main website from which all the other versions are based. You need to keep in mind that the content will be translated. As much as possible, avoid using idioms and figures of speech that will be difficult to translate. Translation companies can assist with ensuring the clarity of content for all site versions.
Get International SEO Experts
It’s not enough that you build different language versions of your site, you also need to have them optimized. To ensure that you need help from international SEO experts. You may also need help from a translation services company as your sites are optimized.
These are the tips for running a multilingual marketplace from a translation company. The great thing about these experiences is that they are based on real-world experiences. You can use these to lead your company to multilingual success.