Adventures in web globalization, since 2002
John Yunker 
If someone from outside the US lands on your US-centric .com home page, what is their first impression? And what if they don’t speak English? What visual and textual clues will they look for when searching for a localized websites …
Here’s a reason, courtesy of Wimbledon… To learn more about web globalization best practices, register for Lead the World to Your Website, taking place October 27th.
First of all, this device looks really cool. The ocean also looks inviting right about now. But while visiting the Flite website I couldn’t help but notice the US flag in the upper right corner. Perfect placement, by the way, …
I was in Ecuador recently and carved a bit of time to visit a few global websites — as in the .com address of global brands — to see just how successfully (or not) these brands localize for Ecuadorians. No …
I’ve announced the top 25 global websites from the 2023 Web Globalization Report Card. But that only tells part of the story. To better understand how companies compete against their peers, I grouped the websites into 13 categories — from …
When I see NA I generally think “not applicable.” Which was why I gave the Corpay global gateway a second look when I visited recently: Naturally, I clicked on the globe icon — which, by the way, is the perfect …
We’ve heard of peak oil and peak TV to indicate a point in time when growth ends and decline begins. It appears that we have reached a similar peak in languages. Last year was the first time in 19 editions …
I’m pleased to announce the publication of the 2023 Web Globalization Report Card. This is the 19th annual edition of the Report Card, yes, 19th. And while there are a number of very familiar faces in this list, there are some …
And do you even have a global navigation strategy? For example, if someone from outside the US lands on your US-centric .com home page, what is their experience? Surprisingly, even companies that support 50 or more localized websites don’t often …
Lunar New Year is here and, with it, my whirlwind tour of global and local websites taking full advantage of this holiday. Here was my tour last year of the year of the tiger. Not surprisingly, the celebratory color red …
For many years, the addition of languages (as part of website localization) has ranked one of the least-promoted developments on any given website. Languages were added. End of story. Perhaps this is because localization teams have rarely been looked upon …
I’ve long appreciated how Duolingo removes so much friction from trying on a new language — and demystifying languages in general. Duolingo now claims an impressive 500 million language learners around the world. Based on its latest year-end post, here …
Bogan is one of those Australian words that I still find highly entertaining, perhaps because I too am a little bit bogan. For example, boxed wine is known as a Bogan Briefcase: If you want to learn more about boganism, …
Awhile back I mentioned the missing scrollbar from the Delta Airlines global gateway. It seems that Delta is not alone in making this rookie mistake. Even the folks at Google are not immune, as seen below on the Google Firebase …
It seems like only yesterday (2009 actually) when Google Translate had reached 50 languages. And for the past few years it appeared that Google has largely plateaued at the low 100s. It currently supports 133 languages, having most recently added …