{"id":182043,"date":"2021-09-23T14:41:01","date_gmt":"2021-09-23T14:41:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.motionpoint.com\/?post_type=pillar&#038;p=182043"},"modified":"2021-09-23T14:41:01","modified_gmt":"2021-09-23T14:41:01","slug":"international-website-redesigns","status":"publish","type":"pillar","link":"https:\/\/www.motionpoint.com\/translation\/international-website-redesigns\/","title":{"rendered":"Website Redesigns and Website Translation"},"template":"","class_list":["post-182043","pillar","type-pillar","status-publish","hentry"],"acf":{"pillar_minute_read":"12","meta_title":"International Website Redesigns & CMS Replatform ","meta_description":"Learn about the best practices for international website redesigns, CMS replatform, data migration prior to implementing website translation solution.","meta_keywords":"website redesigns, international website redesigns, CMS replatform, data migration","pillar_hero_title":"Website Redesigns and Website Translation","pillar_hero_subtitle":"Planning a website redesign? That\u2019s a perfect time to think global and localize the site for new international customers. But you\u2019ll want to keep these tips in mind.","pillar_content":"<h2><strong>Introduction<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>Website redesigns have become a fairly common occurrence for most companies, but few consider the opportunity to localize their websites alongside a redesign project.<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"tweet\">Combining a website translation project with a redesign project makes business sense and delivers major value for growing companies.<\/span> Further, <a href=\"\/translation\/\">website translation services<\/a> now exist that can seamlessly support a translated website before, during and after a redesign project.<\/p>\n<h3><strong>Long-Term Value of Website Translation<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p>With the right solution, website translation projects can be deployed in about 45 days or less. The best website translation services leverage technologies and smart optimizations to dramatically reduce translation costs, too.<\/p>\n<p>This means <strong>the spend for website translation is small compared to the budget required for a redesign<\/strong> and can be easily implemented before\u2014or during\u2014your redesign begins.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"\/translation\/\">Website translation services<\/a> exist that can ensure that your IT team is barely impacted by the translation project. These solutions often operate independently of your website\u2019s design or CMS, which means your site\u2019s structure and supporting technologies can always be updated at any time, and your multilingual site will seamlessly operate throughout the process.<\/p>\n<p>These solutions are future-proofed for redesigns, for years to come.<\/p>\n<div id=\"pillar-sidebar\">\n<p class=\"sidebar-heading\"><strong>Don\u2019t Wait Until After a Redesign<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Many companies that want to translate their websites often believe it\u2019s best to do so <em>after<\/em> their website redesigns. Why?<\/p>\n<p>Decision makers often think their websites\u2019 translatable content will change dramatically throughout the redesign project. This suggests that they\u2019ll pay for website translation \u201ctwice\u201d\u2014once before the redesign, and again afterwards.<\/p>\n<p>In fact, most redesign changes impact design and functionality only. The editorial changes made to translatable content are far less than imagined. Translation costs are often minimal.<\/p>\n<p>Even if a redesign does result in some additional translation costs, they are outweighed by the opportunity cost of neglecting website translation while companies wait to begin, manage and complete their redesign projects:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Redesigns always take more time to complete than initially forecasted<\/li>\n<li>Ongoing delays stunt the company\u2019s ability to generate rapid conversions and revenue in multilingual markets<\/li>\n<li>They\u2019ll also delay significant gains in brand awareness and SEO benefits<\/li>\n<li>Ultimately, this leads to an increased risk of losing potential customers to the competition.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>When weighing the costs of translation against the lost opportunity of waiting until after the redesign, there\u2019s far more to gain by translating your website sooner than later.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<h2><strong>Controlling Translation Costs During Website Redesigns<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>The design-related decisions you make in preparation for your redesign can positively\u2014or negatively\u2014affect your customers\u2019 localized user experience. These best practices can help you deliver the ideal UX for your multilingual redesign project:<\/p>\n<h4><strong>Determining the Scope of Work<\/strong><\/h4>\n<p>Ideally, offering translated websites generates the best possible UX for your customers. But like most business decisions, the scope of your translated website will probably be defined by budget\u2014which means you may not be able to fully localize your redesigned website.<\/p>\n<p>That\u2019s okay. Launching a fully translated website isn\u2019t always necessary.<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"tweet\">Advanced <a href=\"\/translation\/\">website translation services<\/a> can clearly define what on-site content should be translated\u2014down to the individual page level, or even specific sections of those pages.<\/span> Selecting only the most important and relevant website sections or pages to translate can reduce your spend while still successfully pursuing its international business goals.<\/p>\n<h4><strong>What to Keep, What to Cut<\/strong><\/h4>\n<p>Once you\u2019ve determined your business goals and budget, it\u2019s time to determine what content on your redesigned site should be localized, and what won\u2019t be. High-profile and strategically important pages should always remain in scope. This \u201cmust have\u201d content usually includes:<\/p>\n<ul class=\"checkmark\">\n<li>Your site\u2019s homepage and landing pages<\/li>\n<li>Site navigation<\/li>\n<li>\u201cAbout\u201d pages<\/li>\n<li>Promotional sections<\/li>\n<li>Highly trafficked content<\/li>\n<li>Conversion paths<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>And on the other hand, the following content may be less relevant to your multilingual customers and can be excluded from the project\u2019s scope:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Blog posts, especially those older than 6 months<\/li>\n<li>Archived news<\/li>\n<li>Career pages that don\u2019t apply to secondary and tertiary markets<\/li>\n<li>Pages for products or services not supported in secondary and tertiary markets<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<div class=\"insert\"><\/div>\n<h2>CMS Replatform Projects and Website Translation<\/h2>\n<p>Migrating your content from one content-management platform to another can be a daunting task. Factoring in translation-related tasks often requires some careful planning. However, if you follow these tips during your replatform project, you can dramatically reduce translation costs and avoid dips in hard-earned SEO placements. Some things to be mindful of:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Maintain your site\u2019s current URL structure to preserve SEO and any bookmarks, social media, or documents linking to your site<\/li>\n<li>Preserve markup structure, including metadata, for SEO and translation pickup<\/li>\n<li>Remember your users and data associated with users<\/li>\n<li>Don\u2019t forget complex or highly customized data structures such as user data, custom post types, categories, taxonomies, tags and custom field types<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>It\u2019s also important to share news about the replatforming project with your translation vendor as early as possible. This ensures all parties are well informed about, and can support, your new replatforming project.<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Development &amp; Template Conversion<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>Most replatforming projects don\u2019t involve a complete website redesign, and certainly not a full website rewrite. That\u2019s good news from a translation perspective. This means that nearly all (if not all) of the translatable content has already been translated and exists within translation memory. Those existing translations can simply be applied to the alternate-language site. Great vendors do this at no cost.<\/p>\n<p>But there are some considerations that must be addressed to ensure a seamless transition from one CMS to another. Remember that a true replatform project isn\u2019t a redesign project and migrating from one kind of website template (such as the one you\u2019re currently using) to another (such as a prepaid WordPress template) can create unplanned, costly work for you and your translation vendor.<\/p>\n<h4><strong>The Risks of Using a Pre-Built Template<\/strong><\/h4>\n<p>If your organization was simply operating a single-language website, using a prebuilt plug-and-play website template is an easy way to get rolling with a replatforming project. After all, after the template swap, the content of the English (source language) website wouldn\u2019t be affected in any visible way.<\/p>\n<p>But things get a bit tricky when you operate multilingual sites. Since the goal is to provide content and capability parity between the origin and translated sites, it\u2019s critical that many disparate elements\u2014from data to text formatting\u2014properly align on the backend between the platforms.<\/p>\n<p>We believe it\u2019s vital to preserve the same structure of your current website as much as possible as you move from one platform to another. Here\u2019s why:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Remember, your translated content is stored in phrase- or sentence-length chunks called <em>segments<\/em><\/li>\n<li>Computer Assisted Translation (CAT) tools don\u2019t see these segments the way people do<\/li>\n<li><em>Every aspect<\/em> of a unique segment is examined and catalogged by CAT tools, including punctuation and text formatting<\/li>\n<li>This means that common text-formatting HTML tags\u2014such as &lt;strong&gt; and &lt;em&gt;\u2014are in fact integral parts of the segment<\/li>\n<li>If <em>any<\/em> HTML element is altered or removed by a new website template, the segment is <em>no longer recognized as translated<\/em><\/li>\n<li>Now your <a href=\"\/translation\/\">website translation service<\/a> provider will have to \u201ctranslate\u201d this content again<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>This is why it\u2019s really important to <strong>manually convert your website template<\/strong> rather than using a pre-made template. Your developers must keep the HTML code modification to a minimum and focus on modifying only parts of the template code that is dynamic to pull data from the database.<\/p>\n<p>This helps address any potential issue that can arise in addressing new content that may need to be translated.<\/p>\n<h4><strong>Infrastructure Setup<\/strong><\/h4>\n<p>You\u2019ll also want to consider the hosting and platform infrastructure of your new CMS.<\/p>\n<h4><strong>Hosting<\/strong><\/h4>\n<p>Replatforming can be a good opportunity to make changes to your hosting provider. It allows for work on the new platform without interrupting current production. You may want to look for a solution that offers:<\/p>\n<ul class=\"checkmark\">\n<li>Hosting optimized for your new platform<\/li>\n<li>Better storage and bandwidth<\/li>\n<li>Dedicated hosting for more control and stability<\/li>\n<li>And more<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Look for scalable hosting that can easily be expanded as your website grows. Some <a href=\"\/translation\/\">website translation services<\/a> offer robust hosting options as part of their solutions.<\/p>\n<p>Ideally, you\u2019ll find something that fits your needs, saves money and scales easily if needed.<\/p>\n<h4><strong>Infrastructure<\/strong><\/h4>\n<p>How many websites or subdomains are you migrating? Is there an opportunity to consolidate?<\/p>\n<p>If you\u2019re running several sites, take the opportunity to combine them into a multi-site install that shares resources such as users, plugins and hosting, while having the flexibility of different styles, content types and user roles for different sites and subdomains.<\/p>\n<h2><strong>\u00a03 Considerations for Data Migration and Website Translation<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>As you move toward migrating your data from one CMS to another, keep these important things in mind:<\/p>\n<h4><strong>Complexity<\/strong><\/h4>\n<p>First, how complex or customized is your content? For instance, do you have different content or post types such as blogs, careers, events, case studies, etc., or do you use custom categories, taxonomies, or tags?<\/p>\n<p>What about custom fields and field types such as grid or repeater rows, image and file uploads, checkboxes, dropdowns, and more? The more customizations you\u2019ve made to your site and how it classifies data, the more control you\u2019ll want to have over the data migration process.<\/p>\n<h4><strong>User Data<\/strong><\/h4>\n<p><span class=\"tweet\">If your site has content or data tied to users on your site, or users associated with the content, consider migrating that content, too. This could be user reviews, posts, favorites, settings, user \u201clikes\u201d and so on.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>Often this data is tied to a specific user ID, so be sure that these data IDs are maintained during migration. This way, users don\u2019t lose their saved content \u2026 and the content is still associated with appropriate users or authors.<\/p>\n<h4><strong>URL Structure<\/strong><\/h4>\n<p>If you wish to maintain the URL structure of your current website (which is important for SEO, bookmarks, etc.), you\u2019ll want control over how <em>content slugs<\/em> are set up. (Slugs are part of the URL structure that tells from where the platform should load content data and templates.)<\/p>\n<h3><strong>Data Migration Processes and Website Translation<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p>Once you\u2019ve sussed out the considerations above and have made a migration plan, it\u2019s time to actually migrate the data. The three common options are:<\/p>\n<h4><strong>Outsource It<\/strong><\/h4>\n<p>You can pay a company to migrate the data for you. The upside: it alleviates effort from your team. The potential downside: you have little control and insight into how the data is being structured and organized when migrated. Are IDs being maintained? Are custom sections configured in ways that make sense and can easily flow back into your templates? Will URL structures be maintained?<\/p>\n<h4><strong>Plugins<\/strong><\/h4>\n<p>CMS plugins can migrate your data. Some plugins can import from XML or CSV formats. To support any of your site\u2019s custom content and fields, however, you\u2019ll probably need to pay for premium versions of these plugins.<\/p>\n<p>When using plugins, keep in mind the preservation of user data and how it\u2019s tied to user IDs. For instance, let\u2019s say\u2026<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>You have a customized content type for users\u2019 \u201clikes\u201d<\/li>\n<li>And this activity is tied to a user ID<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>In this situation, a plugin might not suit your needs. Why? Plugins often auto-assign IDs as content is imported, which destroys the link between user and content. It might not have the ability to preserve the metrics associated with a user\u2019s \u201clikes,\u201d especially out of the box.<\/p>\n<p>To preserve these connections, you\u2019ll want to leverage a solution that grants you more control and visibility.<\/p>\n<h4><strong>DIY It<\/strong><\/h4>\n<p>For the greatest control and precision, you can migrate data on your own\u2014or you can try a \u201chybrid\u201d approach by using a plugin that\u2019s been customized to preserve the integrity of your bespoke data and IDs.<\/p>\n<p>In either instance, you\u2019ll want to first configure the new platform to your specifications. Set up the custom content types, the custom fields, and the custom categories so the data being migrated has a place to be mapped to.<\/p>\n<p>Next, make sure to populate some <em>dummy data<\/em>\u2014in other words, make an entry manually that you will not need later, but you need your new platform to have some data to analyze.<\/p>\n<p>If your platform has a built-in export\/import functionality, perform an export of this dummy data.<\/p>\n<p>In your current platform, create a template that outputs the data in the same format (typically XML) of the export file from the new platform. Essentially, you\u2019re recreating the export file from the new platform but populated with data\u2014and most importantly IDs\u2014of your current platform.<\/p>\n<p>Back in your new platform, test importing this \u201cexport\u201d file. You can test just a few entries at a time and then review and see if your data is being mapped properly. Modify and adjust as needed until your data flows into the new platform as you like. Repeat this for each custom content type.<\/p>\n<div class=\"insert\"><\/div>\n<h3><strong>Website Localization Support for Local Formats &amp; Currencies<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p>Also, make sure your new CMS can display information such as dates, times and units of measure in proper local formats. For transactional sites, you\u2019ll want support for localizing currency units, payment options and contact information, too. This provides a seamless UX and increases on-site conversions.<\/p>\n<p>Legal notices and security banners should also be localized. These website elements might not seem important, but they build trust when engaging new audiences. They also help local customer service teams communicate more effectively with multilingual prospects and customers.<\/p>\n<h3><strong>Website Localization Support for User Forms<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p><span class=\"tweet\">When it comes to serving multilingual customers, not all CMS databases support the ability to collect \u201ccontact us\u201d form information in other languages. Confirm that your database can. <\/span>If it doesn\u2019t, the database will be populated with unintelligible data. This is especially likely if you\u2019re capturing inputs from dual-byte character languages like Chinese.<\/p>\n<p>When designing your digital forms, also be sure to enable the input of non-Latin scripts such as Arabic, Japanese or Russian. Forcing international users to \u201cRomanize\u201d their personal information (such as like names and addresses) often causes frustration and leads to abandonment of shopping carts and other conversion funnels.<\/p>\n<h3><strong>Accommodate Local Fonts &amp; Scripts<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p>Font types and sizes also matter for on-site legibility, especially for languages that use non-Latin scripts like Chinese and Japanese. Choose a font that\u2019s available for all languages you plan to translate into and select font sizes that ensure readability in all languages.<\/p>\n<p>When translating into languages that read right-to-left\u2014such as Arabic or Hebrew\u2014be sure to customize formatting to ensure the text displays correctly.<\/p>\n<p>If you\u2019re leveraging any plugins or <a href=\"\/connectors\/adobe-experience-manager\/\">translation connectors<\/a> for website translation, confirm that they support right-to-left languages.<\/p>\n<h3><strong>Word Growth<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p>We mentioned <em>word growth <\/em>in a previous section, but it bears repeating here: When translating text from English to other languages, the content can take up 20% to 45% more on-page space than this English copy. Alternately, the translated copy can take up much less space, if the target language is Chinese, Korean or Japanese.<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"tweet\">The side effects of website localization \u201cword growth\u201d can create a messy, amateurish user experience. That\u2019s a bad look for a brand. <\/span>Tight spaces like drop-down menu boxes are most affected by word growth.<\/p>\n<p>Responsive website design can mitigate some of the risk, but there are other ways to eliminate the negative impact of word growth on your localized website\u2019s UX:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Build fully dynamic page templates that allow <em>word wrap<\/em> in any text boxes<\/li>\n<li>This is different than <em>word overflow,<\/em> which can spill translated text outside a templated area<\/li>\n<li>If you\u2019re overlaying text on images, allow \u201cbreathing room\u201d around the text to accommodate any length differences<\/li>\n<li>Ensure that your JS, CSS, and HTML templates have that padding in place<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Read more about website translation in our <a href=\"\/translation\/guide-to-website-translation\/\">ultimate guide to website translation<\/a>.<\/p>\n","pillar_social_image":{"ID":182090,"id":182090,"title":"Website-Redesigns-and-Website-Translation-OG","filename":"Website-Redesigns-and-Website-Translation-OG.png","filesize":14478,"url":"https:\/\/www.motionpoint.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/Website-Redesigns-and-Website-Translation-OG.png","link":"https:\/\/www.motionpoint.com\/translation\/multilingual-customer-support\/website-redesigns-and-website-translation-og\/","alt":"","author":"3","description":"","caption":"","name":"website-redesigns-and-website-translation-og","status":"inherit","uploaded_to":182016,"date":"2021-09-22 19:39:26","modified":"2021-09-22 19:39:26","menu_order":0,"mime_type":"image\/png","type":"image","subtype":"png","icon":"https:\/\/www.motionpoint.com\/wp-includes\/images\/media\/default.png","width":1200,"height":627,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/www.motionpoint.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/Website-Redesigns-and-Website-Translation-OG-150x150.png","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/www.motionpoint.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/Website-Redesigns-and-Website-Translation-OG-300x157.png","medium-width":300,"medium-height":157,"medium_large":"https:\/\/www.motionpoint.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/Website-Redesigns-and-Website-Translation-OG-768x401.png","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":401,"large":"https:\/\/www.motionpoint.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/Website-Redesigns-and-Website-Translation-OG-1024x535.png","large-width":1024,"large-height":535,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/www.motionpoint.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/Website-Redesigns-and-Website-Translation-OG.png","1536x1536-width":1200,"1536x1536-height":627,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/www.motionpoint.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/Website-Redesigns-and-Website-Translation-OG.png","2048x2048-width":1200,"2048x2048-height":627}},"pillar_ad_inserts":[{"ID":182063,"post_author":"3","post_date":"2021-09-23 14:41:17","post_date_gmt":"2021-09-23 14:41:17","post_content":"","post_title":"Effortless Translation Solution for Multilingual Web and Digital Content.","post_excerpt":"","post_status":"publish","comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","post_password":"","post_name":"effortless-translation-solution-for-multilingual-web-and-digital-content","to_ping":"","pinged":"","post_modified":"2021-09-23 14:41:17","post_modified_gmt":"2021-09-23 14:41:17","post_content_filtered":"","post_parent":0,"guid":"https:\/\/www.motionpoint.com\/?post_type=pillar-ads&#038;p=182063","menu_order":0,"post_type":"pillar-ads","post_mime_type":"","comment_count":"0","filter":"raw"},{"ID":182060,"post_author":"3","post_date":"2021-09-23 14:41:17","post_date_gmt":"2021-09-23 14:41:17","post_content":"","post_title":"Meet MotionPoint\u2019s AEM Connector Solution","post_excerpt":"","post_status":"publish","comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","post_password":"","post_name":"meet-motionpoints-aem-connector-solution","to_ping":"","pinged":"","post_modified":"2021-09-23 14:41:17","post_modified_gmt":"2021-09-23 14:41:17","post_content_filtered":"","post_parent":0,"guid":"https:\/\/www.motionpoint.com\/?post_type=pillar-ads&#038;p=182060","menu_order":0,"post_type":"pillar-ads","post_mime_type":"","comment_count":"0","filter":"raw"}]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.motionpoint.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pillar\/182043","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.motionpoint.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pillar"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.motionpoint.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/pillar"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.motionpoint.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=182043"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}