Website Localisation in the Corporate Context: A Spanish Perspective

Abstract

Diverse factors such as the development of globalisation processes and an ever-changing economic environment are encouraging companies to access external markets. Localisation, the activity that makes a certain product –for example, a website– linguistically and culturally appropriate for a particular country and language, is an extremely valuable tool for companies who want to pursue internationalisation strategies. In Spain, small and medium enterprises (SMEs) make up over 99% of the country’s business structure. However, the localisation of their websites is often deficient. An analysis of 70 Spanish SME corporate websites was performed with the purpose of assessing the degree and characteristics of website localisation in the SME sector in Spain. It was found out that the web presence of Spanish SMEs presents serious deficiencies and that the contents offered on their websites are often poorly localised, if at all. The information gathered enabled us to put forward a series of practical recommendations for SME corporate website localisation.