Apple’s China apology and the value of a flexible global template

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Apple China Apology

Here is the image used on Apple’s China home page to announce Tim Cook’s apology letter regarding Apple repair and warranty “misunderstandings.”

Here is The Wall Street Journal take on the matter.

From a web globalization perspective, what interests me is how Apple’s design template allows for localized messages.

Apple China home page

Apple placed this message in one of its “lesser” promotional windows, the one near the footer of the page.

These windows are quite handy for localized announcements. Every company should build into its global template the flexibility to allow for last-minute local announcements.

Now, what I don’t like about these windows is that they rely exclusively on images with embedded text. Locking in text may allow complete control over appearance but also cost you in localization overhead. While it may be trivial to localize a Photoshop file for one market — multiply that by 30 markets on a weekly or monthly basis and costs do become a factor.

But what I do like about the windows is that they can be easily swapped in and out based on the market, for local products, promotions, or, in this case, a heartfelt apology.

 

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John Yunker

John Yunker

John is co-founder of Byte Level Research and author of Think Outside the Country as well as 19 editions of The Web Globalization Report Card.
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