Take Your Business Mobile with Mobile Search Translation

The eighties were about the mobile phone. The nineties were the era of the internet. In the 20 teens, the mobile revolution once again rules but this time, it’s mobile search that’s snapping up the headlines and turning the way we live and do business on its head. For many businesses, the advent of mobile search has raised the question of mobile search translations and the need to find a savvy website translation service with an understanding of this cyber neighbourhood.

When it comes to breaking records, mobile is outstripping much of the technology that came before it. Mobile search is the fastest growing media platform on the planet – not surprising when you consider that a recent Silicon India report predicted saturation levels of 7.3 billion mobiles in the world by next year, more than the global population.

A United Nations study in March of this year found that more people have access to a mobile phone than a toilet.

In Australia, a comprehensive study into mobile internet use found that 11% of all online purchases come from mobiles, generating as much as $18.6 billion, excluding spend on travel, each year.

In the US, 17% of internet users only access the web from the mobile phone.

Google’s Mobile Search Moments Study found that mobile search drives behaviour in the moment; this means 55% of mobile shoppers take action within two hours. Three out of four mobile search queries lead to a follow through such as calling into a shop or making a call to the retailer. Crucially, 81% of all mobile searchers are a result of convenience. This last statistic is the most important for businesses without a mobile site or without a mobile site performing well.

The point of a mobile website is that it is a highly powerful, high performing sales tools. As all of these studies show, mobile search is most likely to have customers popping in, downloading literature or clicking to buy. They can only do this if your mobile site is up to scratch. If you’re able to ship to other locations or welcome customers from other countries, mobile search offers an unprecedented opportunity to take your brand global. But this can only take place if your destination language mobile site text is up to scratch.

In just the same way as designing a mobile website varies from designing a standard website, translating a mobile website differs to translating a standard website. Mobile sites have much less space for text, due to the smaller screens of the device the site will be displayed on. For many the temptation is simply to cut existing text down to side – remove a sentence or two here and delete a paragraph or two there. This approach may work in English, although you’ll likely end up with content that does not do your site or your service justice, but isn’t an option when dealing with content in a second language.

If you have invested time and money in building a mobile website, it makes sense to call in a professional translation service skilled in website translation. A professional translator specialising in web copy will have an awareness of the nuances of mobile website translation and will be able to condense messages into the smaller space of a mobile site without losing the core message in the cut.

Mobile is the fastest growing media platform in the world and with 79% of all smartphone owners shopping online, your mobile website need to stand out. This post will look at translation from the perspective of mobile sites, which more and more businesses are launching. Mobile sites generally have less text to fit on the smaller screen – this post can make the point that it is no advisable to simply chop an existing translation but call in the experts to make sure your message doesn’t get lost in the content cull.