Ok, we all know what the world wide web is. But what about the world coming to our doorstep, and the world coming to our neighborhood?
According to recent research from Pew Internet & American Life Project, Latinos comprise 14% of the U.S. adult population and about half of this growing group(56%) goes online.
Are we ignoring this fast growing group? Does your site have a Spanish alternative? And if your site does have a Spanish alternative, are you surveying those customers to make sure you’re meeting their needs just like you survey your English-speaking customers?
1. Don’t assume you can just translate your content directly from English into Spanish and be done with it. Don’t assume they want or need the same exact information. Our client GobiernoUSA.gov (the Spanish version of USA.gov) found that their Spanish-speaking constituents needed information on immigration and VISAs that visitors to USA.gov didn’t need as prominently displayed. In fact, they found they had an entirely different audience than their English counterpart, USA.gov.
2. Don’t assume the same things will satisfy or dissatisfy them. You need to ask all your customer segments in their own language what they need and want from your site; then you need to develop content accordingly. Your English speakers may find the navigation is cumbersome but the search function is fine, while your multilingual visitors may have the opposite experience.
3. Don’t survey multilingual visitors in English. You’d be amazed at how many people make this basic mistake. It reverses any goodwill you get from asking their opinion in the first place if you pop up an English survey on a Spanish site.
Leilani Martinez at GobiernoUSA.gov likes to make the point that creating an excellent multilingual site is not rocket science. If you know how to create a website, you know how to do it in Spanish. People are too easily intimidated by an audience they are less familiar with. All the more reason to survey all your customers directly and let them guide you!
