International Design and the Power of Localization
Stéphanie Schuh is a program manager at Microsoft and an international design specialist. She delivered key insights into design and localization at Welocalize’s LocLeaders Forum 2016 in Montreal as part of the session, “The Art and Science of Globalization.” In this blog, Stéphanie highlights some of important considerations when bringing together design and user experience for products and services destined for global markets.
Design is Emotion
Design is essential to products and user experiences. Every day, we experience and react to design without even realizing it. Have you ever approached a door that you were not sure if you had to push it or pull it, or that you pushed even though the sign said ‘pull’? Design is emotion, design triggers emotions. We can’t ignore design and companies are now paying more and more attention to it. Design should be an integral part of the globalization and localization process.
Words and Experiences
Localization is not just about words. Localization is about experiences. Localization is about how our international customers and users emotionally connect to the products and features they interact with around the world. Using the correct words and concepts are important, yet even the best translations in poorly designed experiences won’t have the impact we want them to have.
Ask yourself, which would you prefer to use; a well-designed and easy to use product with some awkward translation or wording or a poorly designed and not so easy to use product with excellent translation and wording? You might find yourself choosing experience over words. What is your emotional reaction when you can’t figure out how to use something? What is your emotional reaction when there is a typo or incorrect word? Which one is stronger, which one would drive you to make a purchase decision?
Localization is Design
Design is about inclusivity. It is inclusivity of all abilities and audiences, whether those abilities are speaking another language, reading Braille or navigating a UI in the sun wearing sunglasses. People speaking different languages and from different cultures experience the world differently. Are the products we localize designed to match their experiences? Are those audiences accounted for in the early designs?
Localization professionals have the unique opportunity and power to contribute international design improvements by reaching out, educating, and influencing designers to ensure products and user experiences are ready for the world. Localization teams sit in different parts of organizations; however, they all have an opportunity, if not responsibility, to reach out to their designers to help them understand their international audiences and their many nuances.
It might seem like a big challenge, but localization and design have a lot to learn and benefit from each other. Reaching out to designers means that downstream issues can be prevented before anything gets coded. Early engagement with design helps development teams too, as they won’t have to fix issues that localization would normally bring to them when localization is only involved downstream.
Localization has so much more to bring to the production cycle than the language dimension. Localization can help shape the entire cultural experience of a product or feature. Our industry is changing, we have knowledge and expertise that can be used beyond our standard localization activities to help design relevant cultural differentiators.
