Taking Your Website Global

We've said it before and we'll say it again: going global is an art, not a science. We've all heard the example of the Chevy Nova. When Chevy tried to penetrate Latin America with its Nova, they got giggles, not sales. Why? Because Nova (or no va) means "Doesn't go" in Spanish.

It's easy to laugh at Chevy's lack of foresight, but we hope that little anecdote makes you think instead. Because when it comes to going global, you simply won't be able to anticipate all the problems that will crop up. Chevy didn't see the Nova snafu coming. And you won't be able to see every little mix-up that will occur with your own company. But just taking your website global, now that's a little easier. This week we tapped the expert help of Janet Heppner, CEO of eTranslate, who knows a thing or two about bringing a site to a global audience. Heppner taught us some of the easiest and most practical tricks we've ever come across for bringing your site to an international audience.

Minimize Graphics and Beware the One-Size-Fits-All Page

One of the first things you'll want to think about when considering opening your site to a global audience is your use of graphics. Minimal is best. For one thing, customers in other countries may have per-minute phone or Internet charges. And for another thing, as Heppner tells us, graphics are more difficult to translate than text.

"It's very difficult to localize. What looks like a mailbox to us here, may not be recognized as a mailbox at all to somebody in another country," says Heppner. Graphics can also be fraught with potential for errors - you wouldn't want to provide a graphic of a woman with bare arms to a Moslem country, for instance. Don't try to use the same graphical approach in every country without checking for cultural errors. "Companies like McDonald's want to get the same look and feel around the world. You go into McDonald's anywhere in the world and it feels about the same. That's what many companies are trying to do with their whole globalization effort, but there's an art to that," she says. See related interviews on global business: Founder of Transparent Language CTO of IXL, Inc. "Companies want toolbars across the top and their logo a certain way and in a certain color, but in different countries where that logo is placed or what that logo or color means may be different. For example in China, if you've got the color red around a name, that implies a bad thing is happening to that person or a bad thing is happening to that name. Green is good in the US, but it's not in some of the Buddhist countries or Israel," Heppner says.

Separate Code From Text

It's kind of a pain technologically, but if you separate your HTML code from your text, you'll find it easier to translate and update your pages. To a browser, HTML code is HTML code. But it'll be less of a headache for you if the text that needs to be translated is separated out. Heppner suggests keeping text in a database for the easiest translation.

"Separating the text from the code is difficult. It goes back to overall maintenance and it really requires a database in order to work appropriately," she says.

Use Central Control With Localized Assistance

Many companies get hung on the horns of a dilemma - should they try to administer a global outreach from one location? Or farm out responsibility to many locales? Both have their upsides and their failings. Accordingly, Heppner recommends a balance between the two.

"That's through the experience we are having with many of the Fortune 500 companies right now. At the beginning of the globalization experience, they were letting each country localize into their own areas. However, you have a lot of redundancy, which produces cost," she says.

Instead, she recommends companies keep information in a central database, which is then localized in each country. That includes language translation as well as a more subtle cultural translation. "Some goods or content could offend people in some countries. For example, Yahoo! had a French auction site selling Nazi artifacts, which caused a lot of controversy," Heppner says.

And the last thing you want when launching a global initiative is controversy - of the wrong sort, that is. Don't botch your entrée into a new market by making simple, easily avoidable web errors.