Whether you’re selling to a customer who’s an ocean away or one border over, there’s no question that ecommerce is a global industry. When it comes to reaching these diverse customers, localization often starts with saying “hello”—in their native language. This is why we’ve been hearing from Shopify merchants and agencies from across the globe about how important their translated content is to their online stores. Today, we’re excited to be extending the Rewind peace of mind to translations managed within the Shopify Translate & Adapt app.
What’s at stake when it comes to store translations?
Translating your online store can be a painstaking process that takes time, money, and effort – but the payoff means reaching shoppers in different markets. The bad news is that this work can easily be wiped out by something as extreme as malicious activity or as simple as human error. Imagine making a routine update to your Shopify store, and *poof* your translated content gets wiped out unexpectedly.
We’ve heard from brands and agencies using the Shopify Translate & Adapt app who have seen translations get unexpectedly deleted when changing their store’s theme, or accidentally deleted a product and lost it in every language. Currently, the app does not maintain a backup of translation data, leaving multi-market stores vulnerable to this type of loss.
What does this mean for your store?
1. Lost sales
The most obvious impact to a Shopify store after losing its translations is a drop in sales in those markets. Simply put, shoppers typically prefer to navigate your online store in their own language whenever possible. Even with the option of in-browser translations through something like Google Translate, this could cause miscommunication across everything from a product description to a return policy, not to mention it offers a poor user experience.
2. Wasted resources
The merchants we’ve talked to opt to translate their content without the use of auto-translation features like Google Translate, which can miss nuanced language and won’t follow SEO best practices. When you commit to maintaining an online store in more than one language, any work on your store–and the associated cost–is automatically multiplied. A multi-language store could easily end up with hundreds or even thousands of pages of localized content, especially for brands with a high number of SKUs. Even if you’ve saved your translated content outside of Shopify, your team would need to re-input that content into the Shopify Translate & Adapt app if something were to go wrong. With ecommerce brands needing to do less with more these days, there’s no time to be repeating work because of a simple mistake.
3. Localized SEO impacts
If you’re selling in multiple markets, it’s likely that shoppers are finding you via a search engine. In fact, “almost half of online retail consumers begin their purchasing journey with an internet search.” Although product descriptions are typically the first to be translated, we’ve also seen merchants invest heavily in their international blog strategy. Losing this content even for a short while re-importing your translations could cause long-term SEO impacts, all the while producing a negative domino effect on traffic and sales.
4. Compliance risks
Depending on which markets you sell into, there could be regulatory requirements for translations. For example, companies selling within the EU, or Canadian businesses selling in Quebec, could be subject to language requirements.
“We have more and more enterprise clients that are multi-site and multi-region. Beyond letting your customers buy in their own language, translations are important to comply with regulations like the GDPR and CCPA.” – Heath Hudgins, Business Solutions Engineer at Domaine (Shopify Plus Partner)
What is Shopify Translate & Adapt?
Shopify Translate & Adapt is a popular translation app for creating and maintaining translated content on your Shopify store. The app was created by Shopify themselves and is downloadable for free in the Shopify App Store. Although the app includes an auto-translate option using Google Translate, many Shopify and Shopify Plus merchants prefer to input their own translations as best practice.
What types of translated content can you backup with Rewind?
Starting today, Shopify stores can use Rewind to back up Product translations in Shopify Translate & Adapt. Keep an eye on your inbox to be the first to know when new functionality is released.
Support for Shopify Translate & Adapt is now included on all Rewind Backups for Shopify and Rewind Protection Suite plans. Already backing up your store with Rewind? Simply sign into your Rewind account and follow the prompts to activate your backups.
Existing customers: Please note that your store translation backups will not begin until you have logged in and granted Rewind permission to back up the Shopify Translate & Adapt app.
Protect your store translations today
If you’re not already benefiting from the peace of mind of backups for Shopify, join the thousands of merchants who protect their online stores with Rewind. There’s a reason why Rewind is the only backup solution with 1000+ reviews in the Shopify App Store, and the only approved backup solution for Shopify Plus.
Oh, and P.S…Rewind is currently the only backup solution that supports Shopify Translate & Adapt.
Larissa Hildebrandt">
