There are more speakers of Spanish and Chinese combined on the Internet than English
Does this scenario sound familiar? When you first launched your website, you weren’t even thinking about potential traffic coming in from different countries. You were probably focused on getting your first customers and hadn’t focused on much beyond that point.
While that’s a good place to start, you need to be constantly thinking about ways to increase your traffic, reach, and of course, sales. While improving your marketing tactics, networking more, and increasing your exposure are all important to your business’s growth, they’re not the only steps you can take to get more quality traffic. By translating your website into one or more foreign languages, you could increase traffic and sales quickly—without a lot of outreach or hassle.
Why Does a Translated Website Perform Better?
First, translating your website opens up entire new markets to your business. Mandarin and Spanish, for example, represent a huge new customer base for your website and add to your potential for increased sales. While many people globally know some English, most prefer the experience of reading in their native language, since it’s easier and faster for them to understand the content. By translating your website, you offer these potential customers a better experience than forcing them to translate your page for themselves, and they’re more likely to stay on your site—and even convert into customers. Additionally, the more visitors your page has, the greater your presence on Google, and the higher your SEO ranking will be.
Proof in Numbers
We live in a data-driven world, and getting an idea of how much translating your website can really impact traffic is important for seeing what kind of value you can expect from the project. Fortunately, some have crunched the numbers, including influential marketing blogger Neil Patel. Neil’s experiment of translating his blog into 82 languages increased his search traffic by 47% in just 3 weeks! Now, Neil’s blog already has a lot of SEO value and leverage, but his data just goes to show how powerful website translation can be for boosting website traffic.
The Translation Quality Matters
Isn’t it tempting just to choose a free translation plugin for your site and move on with your life? While that might be the easiest way to quickly translate your website, but there are several pitfalls to this approach. First off, it looks sloppy. If you’ve ever used a plugin to translate a page, then you know that deciphering the meaning can be a challenge. It can even change the entire meaning of the text—resulting in the exact opposite of what you want your website to say! Moreover, if you are willing to risk any miscommunications to potential new customers about your products and services, what does that say about your image?
It’s one thing for bloggers to use a translation plugin—they are constantly putting out content, and it’s not cost-effective to use a translator for every post. For a business website, however, it’s definitely worth the time and money to hire a professional translation agency. That way, every visitor to your website has a consistent experience, and your message comes across crystal clear.
Simplify the Process
Interested in getting more traffic with a translation? Hiring a translation service simplifies the process immensely, leaving you free to work on other projects. While hiring a freelancer can be a good option for some companies, it’s often more complex to find, vet, and bring on a freelancer than to choose a turnkey solution like a translation service (learn more about hiring a translation service over a freelancer here). By choosing a reputable translation service, you’re setting yourself up for success—and more website traffic in no time at all.