What is Localisation?
Translation swaps words, localisation swaps reference points. A piece citing Austrian statutes, euro amounts and Viennese reference clients does not become useful to a reader in Manchester through a correct English translation. It is localised only once currency, legal framework, units, examples and the evidence named belong to the target market.
The second half is voice. A brand that is informal and dry in German quickly reads as stiff or ingratiating in literal translation. Localisation therefore includes a short language guide per language: form of address, sentence length, which technical terms stay, which expressions are never used. Without that guide every translator decides again, and the brand ends up with two personalities.
Localisation does not mean translating everything. The most sensible cut starts with the pages that sell something and leaves blog and archive in one language until demand is proven. It is also the only lever that genuinely lowers the running cost, because that cost does not arise at launch but with every later change, which then has to be made twice.
Why does Localisation matter?
In 2020 CSA Research surveyed 8,709 consumers in 29 countries with Kantar: 76 per cent prefer information in their own language when choosing between two similar products, 40 per cent never buy from websites in other languages, and in Germany 57 per cent buy only at local-language websites. The report itself is available to members only, what is publicly verifiable is the institute's release.
Localisation in practice
- 01A price in euros with Austrian VAT becomes, for the German market, the same amount with a note on the rule that applies there.
- 02A case study featuring a Viennese trade business is replaced in the English version by an example the target market recognises.
- 03The language guide states that the English version uses British English and that product names stay untranslated.
