How to Get Multilingual Websites Right in Switzerland

Switzerland is one of the most linguistically diverse countries in Europe with 4 national languages + English due to its highly international population. While this is great in terms of culture and diversity, it also causes some serious challenges for businesses that cater to the country as a whole. To ensure a website, app or any marketing material for that matter, meet the requirements to suit multiple languages, they must be planned, designed and developed accordingly. 

Here are some tips and best practices to think about prior to developing a multi language platform:

Clear language architecture

• Language selection must be intuitive and easy to find, without changing pages. 
• All languages need to have a clearly defined section, making sure URLS are also adapted for each language. 
• Language should be proposed based on the user’s browser settings, even for a first visit. 
• Ensure everything is translated, not just the titles and body texts, but all buttons, footers and menu points.

Localisation

• Make sure all texts are translated and proofread by a native speaker! Despite the significant improvements in online translation tools and AI, there are mistakes that occur that only natives will notice. Reading a text in your mother tongue with errors that simply don’t make sense leads to immediate distrust in the source. 
• Content style should be adapted to the market, based on the language group. Culturally, Switzerland is quite dispersed with preferences that vary based on lifestyle and location. Keeping this in mind, the tone and presentation of information can be adapted to increase user experience throughout the county. 

Flexible content within a consistent design 

• The brand look needs to come through no matter the language; this is always a priority. 
• Accommodate the difference length of words and titles, start the design with this in mind! Keep lots of white space that can absorb the lengthier languages. We highly recommend starting the design with the longest language. 

Multilingual SEO

• We know how important SEO optimisation is today with the competition to appear as one of the top search results being so fierce. Ensuring your website is optimised for all available languages is a must! Adding keywords and meta descriptions in multiple languages goes a long way with SEO.

Test with real users

• As with content translation, real people are necessary for testing your website as well. To increase user experience, the intuitive flow of your platform must be consistent in all languages, ensuring the tone and wording are aligned with your users without any cultural mishaps and awkward phrases. 

Both WordPress and Drupal are well equipped for multilingual websites, many plugins exist to translate the content for your website as well. While some are pay per view based, there are also multiple options that require a one time fee.

WordPress mainly uses 3 plugins where manual translations can be uploaded: 

• WPML
• Polylang
• TranslatePress

There are also automatic translation providers such as:

• Weglot
• GTranslate
• Loco Translate

Drupal has Core Multilingual Modules already in its ecosystem, which just need to be enabled for use, the Core Four being:

• Language
• Content Translation
• Interface Translation
• Configuration Translation

While additional modules can be added for AI translation or more complex translation management tools.

Swiss Tomato and multilingual platforms

At Swiss Tomato we have created a number of platforms in multiple languages, it is rare that a project is only available in one language! As we cater to our clients needs based in Switzerland, our websites are often available in 4 languages, for example Hottinger available in English, French, German and Spanish. With lots of international organisations and non profit organisations, we have also had the pleasure to explore additional languages that require additional planning and design compared to most European languages, such as mandarin, arabic as was the case for one of the pages of the Federation Dentaire International! Adding the translations is often done manually, however as for the Der Die Das book website, translations can also be done using WMPL AI! 

We have all given up on a website we were visiting due to poor translation, multiple languages on a page, or simply unreadable content in a language. By following the few suggestions above and relying on the entrusted web development agency, Swiss Tomato, we can avoid losing trust from our visitors. A well-thought-out and developed multilingual website strengthens the bond with users and potential clients, as well as boosts engagement and drives conversions!