AgilePress

Tag: Weglot

  • The Translation Trap: Do You Really Need a Multilingual Website?

    It is one of the most common requests we receive: “I want my website to be in English, Spanish, and French.”

    The client envisions a sleek language switcher in the menu. They imagine global reach. They see “Flags” as a status symbol for their business.

    But they rarely calculate the cost.

    At AgilePress, we have a golden rule: Adding a language is not a feature; it is a multiplication. When you add a second language, you don’t just install a plugin. You double your content creation workload. You double your SEO strategy. You double your maintenance efforts.

    Before we discuss how to translate, we must ask: Should you translate?

    The Hidden Cost of “x2”

    The biggest mistake business owners make is thinking that translation is a one-time task. It isn’t.

    • Content Sync: Every time you update a blog post in English, you must update it in Spanish. If you don’t, your site looks abandoned.
    • Design Breaks: A button that looks perfect with the word “Buy” might break your layout when translated to the German “Kaufen”.
    • Support Reality: If a customer navigates your site in French and sends you an email in French, can you answer them? If not, the translation is useless.

    The AgilePress Rule: If you don’t have a support team or a specific marketing strategy for a language, don’t translate. A perfect single-language site converts better than a broken, outdated multilingual mess.

    However, if you must go global, here is how to do it without destroying your website’s performance.

    Level 0: The “Good Enough” Automation (GTranslate)

    Best for: Informational sites, Restaurants, Tourism, Low Budgets.

    If you just want a visitor from Japan to be able to read your menu or your “About Us” page, you don’t need a complex system. You need automation.

    The Solution: GTranslate (or similar JavaScript wrappers).

    • How it works: It uses the Google Translate engine on the fly.
    • The Pros: It adds zero bloat to your database. It is instant. It costs nothing.
    • The Cons: The translation is not perfect (it’s robotic). In the free version, the translated pages do not exist for Google, so they won’t help your SEO.
    • Verdict: The perfect Agile solution for removing language barriers without technical debt.

    Level 1: Translation as a Service (Weglot)

    Best for: Corporate sites with budget but no technical time.

    If you need professional-grade translations and SEO indexing, but you don’t want to manage complex plugins inside WordPress.

    The Solution: Weglot.

    • How it works: Your content lives on Weglot’s servers. They serve the translated version to the user.
    • The Pros: Set up takes 5 minutes. It doesn’t overload your server.
    • The Cons (The SaaS Tax): It is expensive. If you stop paying the monthly fee, your translations disappear. You are renting your content.
    • Verdict: High ROI for small teams with money, but bad for long-term ownership.

    Level 2: The Native Approach (And Why We Ban WPML)

    Best for: Standard Business Sites & Blogs.

    If you need full control and ownership of your translations inside WordPress, you need a plugin. But be careful.

    The Villain: WPML

    For years, WPML was the standard. We avoid it.

    • Why? It is heavy. It creates dozens of custom tables in your database. It is notorious for slowing down the WordPress admin area and causing conflicts during updates. It is the definition of “bloatware.”

    The Hero: Polylang

    • Why we choose it: Polylang is lightweight. It uses the native WordPress structure (taxonomies) to link languages. It is fast, clean, and follows WordPress coding standards.
    • Alternative: TranslatePress. If you absolutely need to translate visually (clicking on the text on the front end), TranslatePress is a decent middle ground. It is heavier than Polylang but lighter than WPML.

    Verdict: If we build a multilingual site, Polylang is our standard.

    Level 3: The Nuclear Option (WordPress Multisite)

    Best for: Enterprise, International E-commerce, Different Markets.

    Sometimes, translation isn’t enough. Maybe your US store sells in Dollars with a specific catalog, and your EU store sells in Euros with different products.

    The Solution: WordPress Multisite.

    • How it works: We create a network. site.com is technically a different website from es.site.com.
    • The Tool: We connect them using lightweight tools like Multisite Language Switcher or MultilingualPress.
    • The Pros: Total isolation. If you install a plugin on the US site, it doesn’t slow down the Spanish site. The database queries are separate. Performance is native.
    • The Cons: It requires advanced server management and maintenance.

    Verdict: This is the only way to scale high-traffic international shops without performance degradation.

    Conclusion: Complexity is a Choice

    Translation is often a vanity metric.

    Before you ask for a multi-language setup, look at your analytics. Do you have traffic from France? Do you have sales from France?

    If the answer is “No,” keep your site in English (or your main language).

    If the answer is “Yes,” choose the tool that matches your resources:

    1. GTranslate for zero friction.
    2. Polylang for clean, native performance.
    3. Multisite for distinct global markets.

    At AgilePress, we build for markets, not for flags.