A search typed in Chinese or Punjabi mostly finds pages written in that language. If your staff can serve customers in it, translate the core pages properly, link them clearly and use one name everywhere.

Searches an English page cannot match

In Richmond, Burnaby, Surrey, Coquitlam and much of Vancouver, many customers type their searches in Chinese, Punjabi or Korean.

Google answers a search with pages that contain what was typed. A search in Chinese characters mostly returns pages written in Chinese, and a search in Punjabi mostly returns pages in Punjabi.

An English-only website, however good, contains none of those words. For those customers it rarely appears, and they find a competitor or a directory with a page in their language.

Plenty of businesses in those cities have staff who speak the language fluently. Nothing on the site says so.

Signs you are missing these searches

The first is the clearest evidence, and the one most owners have never counted. Ask whoever answers the phone to tally calls by language for two weeks.

Decide whether you can serve them

A page in Punjabi makes a promise: that someone will understand the customer when they call or walk in. If nobody can, the page sets up a worse experience than no page at all.

So the decision starts with staff, not search. Which languages can you actually serve in, on which days, and for which parts of the job: booking, the work itself, the paperwork?

It is usually best to start with one language, the one your team already speaks, and add another only when someone can answer in it.

The pages worth translating first

Not the whole site. A translated page has to be kept current, and every page you add is a page to maintain in two languages.

Start with the pages that bring people in and get them booked: what you do, the main services, prices if you publish them, how to book, and your location and hours.

Add one page that says plainly who speaks the language and when they are in. It often matters more than any other, because it answers the question the customer is really asking.

The contact form and the confirmation email it sends need the same thought. A page in Chinese that ends in a form labelled only in English loses people at the last step.

Translation done by a person

A widget that translates the page in the visitor's browser looks like a shortcut. For search it is not one: the translated text never exists as pages Google can find.

Machine translation also reads badly, sometimes embarrassingly, and Google has long discouraged publishing it without human review.

Use a professional translator, ideally one who knows your field, and have a staff member who speaks the language read every page before it goes live.

Chinese adds a choice between simplified and traditional characters. Which one your customers read depends on where they or their families come from, so ask rather than guess.

A worked example

A speech-language pathology practice with three clinicians works from a medical building in Richmond. One clinician speaks Cantonese and Mandarin, and many of the families who call have children growing up with two languages at home.

The website was entirely in English. The clinician's languages appeared once, in the last line of her biography.

Parents searching in Chinese for help with a child's speech found other clinics and a directory. The practice's best answer, a clinician who could assess a child in the home language, was invisible to them.

The practice asked at intake which characters families read, and most read traditional.

A professional translator wrote five pages, checked by the clinician: what an assessment involves, assessment in the home language, how to book, fees, and the days she is in.

The English pages now link to that section with a link written in Chinese.

The Chinese name already on the practice's door appears in exactly the same form on every page, in its community newspaper ads and on its business cards.

One name in every language

If your business uses a name in another language, on a sign or in community advertising, use exactly the same characters everywhere: sign, website, business cards, advertising and directories.

Names translated separately by different people drift apart. Customers, and search engines, then see two or three names and cannot tell they belong to one business.

The Google listing is stricter. Its name should match the real-world name on your sign, and adding words or a second name you do not actually use breaks Google's guidelines and puts the listing at risk.

Telling Google which page is which

Each language version needs its own address on the site, such as a section for the Chinese pages, so search engines can find and show each one.

The pages should link to their equivalents in the other language, and a small piece of code called hreflang tells Google which page is in which language, so the right version appears for the right search.

Avoid sending visitors to a language automatically based on their browser settings. Google advises against it, partly because its crawler may never see the other versions. Offer a clear link instead.

The counter-case

If customers who prefer another language are few, or nobody on staff can serve them in it, translated pages are premature.

A sentence in English saying which languages your team speaks costs nothing, and it helps the relatives who search on a parent's behalf.

Translation is also a lasting commitment. A business that cannot keep two versions current should translate fewer pages, not abandon the idea.

Where staff can serve customers in a language and those customers search in it, though, pages in that language are what make the business findable to them.

Count first, then translate

  1. Count calls by language for two weeks.
  2. List who on staff speaks each language.
  3. Say so in English on your contact page.
  4. Translate the core pages with a professional.
  5. Have a speaker on staff read every page.
  6. Use one name in each language, everywhere.
  7. Update translations whenever the English changes.

Step one decides everything else. Without a count, the choice of language is a guess; with one, it is usually obvious.

Customers whose searches differ from your regulars' are also the subject of visitors planning a trip before they arrive.

Frequently asked questions

Will an English site appear for Chinese searches?

Rarely. Google matches what was typed to words on pages, so a search in Chinese characters mostly returns pages written in Chinese. An English-only page contains none of those words.

Is a translation widget good enough?

No. A widget translates in the visitor's browser, so search engines never see translated pages, and machine translation without human review reads badly and is discouraged by Google.

Which pages should be translated first?

The main services, prices if you publish them, how to book, location and hours, and a page saying who on staff speaks the language and when they are in.

Simplified or traditional Chinese characters?

It depends on where your customers or their families come from. Ask at intake or at the counter, and choose the form most of them actually read.

Should my Google listing show both names?

Only if both are part of the name on your sign. The listing name should match the real-world name, and adding extra words breaks Google's guidelines.

What if nobody on staff speaks the language?

Then translated pages promise service you cannot give. Say in English which languages you can serve in, and revisit the question when your team changes.

West Coast Media Solutions Inc. provides web design, web development, hosting, digital marketing, and business consulting to organisations across Canada, drawing on more than twenty-five years in the field.

Staff who speak Punjabi, Korean or Chinese?

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