What is localization?
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At Clonable, the word localization comes up tremendously often. What exactly does it mean? Localization is making sure that a customer feels more at home on your website. This is achieved by adapting certain words or phrases to fit the local language and culture.
An example: German in Germany and German in Austria differ. For a German, "January" is "Januar," while for an Austrian it is "Jänner. For website targeting Austria, it is smart to translate words like 'January' into Austrian German. That way the average Austrian will feel more at home on the website.
Moreover, Clonable allows you to replace more than words. For example, if you want to replace the "language flag" at the top of your website, you can! An Austrian can then see his own flag, instead of a German one. So there are more parts of your website that can be replaced. Examples are color schemes, logos and shipping costs. Videos can also be replaced. For more applications of Clonable substitutions, click here.
Why localization
Localization has several advantages, including:
- Entering a new market;
- The customer feels more at home;
- The customer trusts your website more;
- Wider reach: some are very attached to their culture, and avoid "internationalized" websites;
- Improved SEO rankings in the target area.
The only downside to localization, is that it takes more effort. With Clonable, however, localization is a snap. We'll go into more detail about it below.
Localization with Clonable
With Clonable, you will have localization mastered in no time. Take the aforementioned example with Austria. You take a German website, and clone it to an Austrian domain. You then replace German words with their Austrian counterparts, such as replacing 'Januar' with 'Jänner'. This replacement can be done with substitutions. You enter the word to be replaced under 'original'. The replacement word is entered under 'Replacement'. Then you tap 'case insensitive' if you want to ignore capital letters when replacing (for more information on case sensitive, click here).
Localization in steps
1. Consider what you want to locate to
The first step is to think of your target language. Are there markets for which you can localize? For example, if you have a French Web site, you may want to look into localizing for Quebec or for Switzerland. Or suppose you have a German Web site. Then you can localize for Austria, Switzerland, or Luxembourg, among others. So there is a whole laundry list of possibilities for localization. All possible sales markets!
2. Consider what you want to replace
Next, it is smart to make a list of the words and parts of your website to replace. With Clonable, you can replace the following things:
- Certain words;
- Pieces of text;
- Specific words;
- Images;
- Logos;
- Banners;
- Videos;
- Shipping costs;
- Email addresses;
- Phone numbers;
- The preselected country (e.g., when paying);
- The standard payment method
This is not all! Check further on our Knowledgebase for more examples, options and explanations. Think about what all you would want to replace for localization. Also think about what you will replace all of this with. To replace certain words or phrases, you can collect translations. Many times such lists of common differences between languages can be found online.
A tip: When replacing certain words, it is helpful to pay attention to SEO. You can find more information about this in this article.
3. Replace!
The next step is hopefully logical: substitute what you want for localization!
For information per part to be replaced, please visit our Knowledgebase. If you really don't understand something, please contact us.
4. Check that all changes are correct
Sometimes an error can slip in during substitution. Perhaps there are certain cases that you did not want to translate. Clonable has a solution for this: the so-called substitution exclusions. If you enter something here, it will not be translated. This is useful for specific email addresses, phone numbers and contact information, among other things. For more information on substitution exclusions, see our Knowledgebase.
5. Your Clone is ready!
If there are no more errors to be found, the localization is complete! Enjoy your clone!
Want to know more?
Want to know more? Check out one of our other articles, or visit the knowledgebase. Are you interested, and would you like to take out a Clonable subscription? Click here for our offer.
