A recent client project forced us to think in great detail about multi-language online communities, particularly those for professionals. While we had some good understanding to bring to the table, we decided that we needed to learn more. It the suggestion of my colleague Bill Johnston, I used this case as an opportunity to try LinkedIn Answers, posting the following query:

We are designing a professional community that will be small in size, at least initially, and will have at least five languages. While some members will be multilingual, many will not. The idea is that we want members to be able to access the best knowledge created in the community regardless of language ability, which I think means translating key content. I would be curious if others know of "best practices" regarding small, professional, multi-lingual online communities. Cost will be a major concern, so I am particularly interested in ways to think about cost-benefit for translation (what to translate, when, by whom, how, etc.).

Mixing what we learned with what we already knew, the following points emerged:

• Translate core elements and content - The site owner should translate main site elements (i.e., navigation, section titles, page descriptions, core topics) into the five core languages. As my former partner and internationally renowned user experience expert Nam-ho Park said, "If [users] can't navigate, they will abandon the site without even trying." Core content - that of which all members should be aware - also needs to be in all key languages.
• Consider translating all titles and summaries - The owner may also want to translate at least the titles, and perhaps also the summaries, of other content. Nam-ho had this thought here: "... at least this way all members will be aware of the what they are missing. Once they know what the [content] is about they may even make the effort to read [the content], or translate [it] themselves... This lowers the barrier for them to get that far."
• Allow user-selected language filtering - The site needs to allow users to filter the presentation of content to preferred languages. Clearly this means allowing users to set any number of available languages as preferred, not just one.
• Let the community decide what to translate - The site owner will need to manage the community carefully anyway, and one way to handle translations is to make certain the community understands it has role to play in the task. All users should be able to - and be encouraged to - "vote" on which content is most valuable for the wider community (as one person said, "let the community filter content"). This would be one signal (along with direct user interactions) for the site owner to identify content it needs to ensure gets translated. The site owner may need to do what needs to be done to translate this content, but, ideally, it can also count on the community for some of this. Suppose ongoing free/discounted membership depended on doing some work in the community, e.g., translation, as one was able? For this it would be important to make it extremely easy to contribute translations, i.e., allow any
  user to enter a translation of a piece of content via an easy-to-find link /
  button.
• Have a strong taxonomy - Obviously the site's structure needs to provide for easy discovery of relevant information, even if it is not in a preferred language. Including a strong subject-matter categorization and multi-language search capability will allow the users to see that there is more content related to a subject of their choosing. They may choose to dig deeper on their own or identify the content as important to translate. Obviously tags can be valuable here, but these also may add to translation complexity.
  
  
• It isn't just about the language - As one person said, "The best practice to go multi-lingual is going multi-culture... Different environments create different ideas." Different language-based filters of the community may need to include cultural nuances broader than the language to bring all users into the community in a comfortable way.
• Aggressively set the tone and expectations - Above all, as with all online communities, it is critical that the site owner clearly lay out the goal(s) for the community and expectations of participants. This includes a tone for interactions and use of languages. Such "rules of engagement" would need to state that individuals of many languages will be utilizing the content and, if one is able, one should make efforts to translate what they can themselves and notify the site owner if the author believes the content will be valuable to the entire community.
  
  

Once again, in the words of Nam-ho Park, "The focus is not on the technology but on the users." Very true. It is also clear, however, that the focus also needs to be squarely on management practices.