Today, you don’t need to break the bank to take your business to international markets. Globalization and digitalization are two big phenomena that make it more convenient for businesses to expand globally and reach out to more customers. Advanced digital technologies and flexible trading policies have made things turn in favor of businesses, and also started a rat race among companies trying their luck in global marketplaces.
The competition is becoming intense in the international business landscape, which demands a unique yet familiar representation of brands for a global audience. To achieve this, companies go about localizing and translating their brand stories, marketing campaigns and website content for overseas audiences. However, it’s not easy to navigate the language variants while localizing the content for multilingual websites. This article will talk about the significance of language variants in translation and the key challenges businesses may face dealing with different language dialects and variants.
Languages Dialects and Regional Differences
Every region and country has its own set of unique vocabulary, pronunciation, and grammar for the same language. Let’s take the example of American and British English. For example, the words “favorite” (American English) and ” favourite” (British English) represent a variant in spelling. These differences in dialects and variants can be so distinct that they may pose challenges for businesses when they are translating their websites for different regions with diverse language variants. Therefore, for seamless website localization, businesses must recognize and address these variations.
Why Language Variants Matter in Website Localization?
It is critical for businesses to deal with these language variants carefully to ensure effective brand communication with their target audience and eliminate cultural gaps. Translators have to be very careful about the cultural nuances while translating business websites; otherwise, it may lead to miscommunication, misunderstanding and, in some cases, also cause offense to the audience. For instance, Spanish is a famous language spoken in various countries across Latin America and Europe. All of these regions share a common language, the vocabulary, idioms, and even verb conjugations can differ significantly. If a business operating in these countries fails to recognize these differences, it can compromise the overall user experience. So, you must invest in professional translation services from reliable LSPs only.
Cultural Significance of Language Variants
When we talk about language variants, it is not just about linguistic intricacies; cultural history and social norms also play a major role in determining the dialects and language variations across different regions. You must adapt your website and get professional website localization services to create relevant translations that will respect and integrate these linguistic and cultural differences and establish cultural inclusivity.
Key Examples of Language Variants
There are a few examples of language variants that will give you an idea of how the same language can have different dialects, spellings, pronunciations and expressions in different regions.
Spanish
Spanish is spoken in many countries and features significant language variants, including European Spanish, Latin American Spanish, and numerous regional dialects within Latin America. For example, the pronunciation of “ll” varies between “y” in some Latin American countries and a “th” sound in European Spanish.
Chinese
In China, Mandarin and Cantonese are major language variants. While Mandarin is the standard official language, Cantonese is more prominent in other regions like Hong Kong and Macau. These language variants differ in pronunciation, vocabulary, and even characters for Chinese script.
English
English is one of the most famous and widely spoken languages globally. People speak different accents of English worldwide; however, typically there are two types of English: British English and American English. In both types of English, there are variations in the spelling, like “colour” in British English vs. “color” in American English, vocabulary, e.g., “elevator” in American English vs. “lift” in British English, and pronunciation.
Challenges Faced by Business in Addressing the Language Variants
It’s quite challenging for businesses to deal with the challenges of diverse language dialects and variants in the same language. Following are some major challenges that businesses should take into consideration while localizing their multilingual websites.
- Language variants often require specialized translation skills, as standard translations may not capture the nuances of regional dialects or idioms. You need to get professional website localization services to deal with this challenge.
- It is a great challenge to maintain language and tone consistency across diverse languages. It’s crucial to confirm that the branding and messaging remain clear and coherent while localizing websites for linguistic and cultural differences.
- The adaptation of website content to cater to the cultural sensitivities of different language variants is a substantial challenge. The translators must have an understanding of the cultural context, symbolism, and taboos unique to each variant of a culture.
- You may need to invest in additional resources, such as professional translation services, localization tools, and quality assurance processes, to deal with language variations.
- Businesses have to constantly look into translation quality and cultural appropriateness across language variants. You must continuously monitor your website and get customers’ feedback to maintain high-quality localized websites.
How Can Professional Translation Services Help Deal with Language Variants?
Any business that wants to establish a global identity must invest in high quality translations and localization services to grasp the attention of more customers. Global businesses must get professional website localization services to effectively navigate through the language variation challenges. Moreover, professional translators are well versed in linguistic nuances and understand how to manage the consistency of your brand in various regions.
Professional translations also allow you to streamline your localization processes, optimize your budget, minimize errors and have complete quality control over your website’s localization.
