I wrote this story with assistance from Luke Easterwood, LeAnn Quasthoff, Jessica Caimi, and Erik Ninomiya, UX writers who have focused on the needs of the Next Billion Users.
John Steinbeck said that “Poetry is the mathematics of writing and closely kin to music.” The Nobel Prize winner in Literature understood the challenge of writing well. Writers must always consider the effect their word choice and grammar have on the meaning and flow of the text, as well as how those choices might make their readers feel.
It can be especially challenging to write for a global audience made up of different cultures, languages, abilities, and expectations. Before you begin, it’s essential to question your own assumptions, deeply understand your users’ contexts, and recognize the potential impact of your writing choices.
The writing guidance you see here includes principles and recommendations for both new and experienced internet users that were formulated after doing user testing around the world. Before going over writing examples, let’s review some of the main challenges involved in creating content for diverse groups of users.
Challenges users face include limited literacy, limited technology experience, or both. Language and technical terms should be simple to accommodate a wide range of user fluency.
Tech fluency means understanding the capabilities of devices and apps. Where mobile use is less common, gestures, such as swiping and dragging, can be unfamiliar. Visual cues and videos are needed as instructional tools. Showing how to swipe might be communicated with a simple animation of the horizontal scroll or swipe as the user lands on the screen. (To learn more, consider following the Material Design guidelines for gestures.)
Users interact with language in a variety of ways. For example, many users in India find inputting text in Indic scripts, like Hindi, difficult due to the complexity of the script. Users might be more comfortable typing in English, in Hinglish (a mix of Hindi and English, written in the Latin alphabet), or in Hindi written in Latin letters. In Kenya, many use a Swahili interface, but search in English.
Translating many technology terms can be counterproductive to enhancing comprehension and can, in fact, make terminology more confusing. Many users first learned technological terms, such as Bluetooth, software, and hardware, in English and might be unfamiliar with the translations in their native language. To determine which technical vocabulary to keep in English, it is best to consult with a localization and translation expert.
Writing strategies for global users
As you’re designing experiences for global users, approach language with care and consideration, and keep the following best practices in mind:
Reduce ambiguity for users with clear and simple language
Provide translation guidance to translators and linguists
Create relevant content that matters in users’ daily lives