How to Translate a Website into Ukrainian

Ukrainian businesses need a Ukrainian-language platform. This will help to increase user reach and search volume. Translating a website into Ukrainian is an essential part of web resource localization. With a multilingual website, companies can reach a wider audience, enhance user interaction, and boost traffic and sales.

In this article, I will discuss the benefits of translating your website into Ukrainian for businesses, and also explain how to do it correctly. 

The Importance of Translating Your Website into Ukrainian

As of July 16, 2022, the second and sixth articles of the Law of Ukraine On Ensuring the Functioning of the Ukrainian Language as the State Language came into force. These articles regulate the use of Ukrainian as the main language for websites and software interfaces by website owners.

• All websites, internet resources, social media pages, and messaging apps operating in Ukraine must have a Ukrainian-language version as the default.
• Foreign websites operating in Ukraine and selling goods or services must provide a Ukrainian-language version with enough information to understand their core business activities.

Failure to provide a Ukrainian-language version of a business website after July 16, 2022, constitutes a violation of Ukrainian language laws. 

What Happens If You Don’t Translate Your Website into Ukrainian?

A recent study showed an active growth of commercial queries in Ukrainian to 26%. This trend indicates a change in user behavior when entering search queries online.

The lack of translation of a web resource to Ukrainian will lead to certain negative consequences:

In the context of digital competition, it is important for business owners to pay attention to the current needs of potential customers - in this case, it is a professional translation of the website into Ukrainian, as customer orientation will help to improve traffic to the website and increase the loyalty of the target audience.

How to Keep Your Website’s Search Engine Rankings After Translation

You can keep your positions in search engines by following these tips:

• Do not change the URLs of existing pages. This is an important step that will help search engines index language versions of pages without any problems.
• Use hreflang attributes. This attribute helps search engines identify language versions of pages and choose the best option for the user.
• Set up a sitemap. Adding links to Ukrainian language versions of pages to the sitemap will help search engines find and index them faster.
• Check in Google Search Console. This tool will help you make sure that both language versions of pages are displayed correctly in Google Search Console.
• Use relevant keywords in titles, meta descriptions, and the actual content of the pages. This will help Google search engines better understand what the content of your pages is about.
• Make sure that language versions of pages have the same structure and content. This will show that the two versions of the page are actually the same page, just written in different languages.
• Have the content of pages translated by professional translators. This will help you ensure high-quality translation and avoid errors that could negatively impact the ranking of pages in search engines.

According to an analysis by SerpStat, although the presence of pages in Ukrainian language exceeds the amount of Russian-language content, Russian sources still rank for Ukrainian queries. However, websites that operate in Ukrainian language prevail in the top 10 search results, as leading sources.

Translating your website to Ukrainian is guaranteed to increase traffic, as pages will be ranked for a wider range of queries. Properly configuring a multilingual website with SEO in mind helps to avoid losing rankings in search engine results. You will have more pages and cover a wider range of semantic queries, which means that more users will see your website for relevant Ukrainian queries. 

Things to Consider When Translating Websites into Ukrainian sites in Ukrainian

Planned and consistent work on professional translation of a website into Ukrainian will help to maintain search engine rankings and attract more local organic traffic. Implementing a website translation into Ukrainian may have several nuances that need to be taken into account.

Structure Integrity

When translating a website into Ukrainian, it is important to keep the structure, page organization, and navigation logic. The sequence of sections should be preserved so that users can easily find the necessary information. This will improve the user experience and help increase the brand's reputation as a professional in their niche.

Dialects and Regionality

The Ukrainian language is rich in various dialectal expressions depending on the region. Professional translation requires careful selection of the forms of expressions and words that will be understandable and acceptable to a wide audience from all over the country. It is important that the translation reflects the nuances of our culture and speech, as well as meets the target audience of the web resource.

Content Localization

All content on a business website must be localized. Action buttons, meta tags, images, audio files, videos, and more must meet the perception and requirements of the Ukrainian audience. Content localization includes not only professional translation and further filling the site with text, but also adapting the website design for better compliance with the cultural and local preferences of users.

Semantic Core

For the Ukrainian version of the site, it is necessary to build a separate semantic core, where all keywords and queries will fully correspond to the required context and dialects. Optimization of the Ukrainian-language website, taking into account all aspects, including domains and meta tags, will contribute to the promotion of the web resource to high positions in the search results for relevant queries in the Ukrainian language.

Why You Shouldn’t Use Google Translate or Other Tools

Google Translate or other translation programs are not able to capture the main idea or full context of a text. This can lead to misunderstandings or loss of important details, especially in technical or specialized texts.

Automatic translation tools generate content with grammatical errors, incorrect expressions, and structural flaws, which makes the translation unprofessional and of poor quality. This affects the website's ranking by users and search engines. 

Machine translation does not take into account important keywords, phrases, and terminology. They can be lost or misused, and the programs also do not take into account cultural differences and nuances that are important for local audiences. They simply use word-for-word translation without semantic or logical meaning.

An illustrative example. How Google Translate translates text. Pay attention to "for gambling sites and bucketing".

Here is how a native speaker translates. As you can see, there is a pun in the Ukrainian version, "content of all suits of cards" which was not in the English version, but I added it to the Ukrainian version to improve the text. 

Machine translations cannot capture the unique style of your brand or the nuances of your language, which can impact the overall impression of your website. While Google Translate is a quick and affordable process, it cannot replace professional translation that takes into account all possible subtleties and nuances.

The Reasons Behind Hiring a Pro to Translate Your Website

Ordering professional translation for your website is a key step that allows you to not only expand your audience but also be the first to occupy niches that were previously dominated by Russian-language pages. 

I always do adaptive website translation. I consider your business's niche and the target audience's peculiarities and needs and research keywords and phrases, considering the dialects important for search engine optimization.

Professional translation allows you to preserve style, grammar, and logic, which is important for the perception of your brand and interaction with your audience. As a result, multilingual content is created that not only conveys words, but also reflects the thoughts, emotions, and message of your brand.

You can also learn more about the need for multilinguality of a resource for a business that is aimed at expanding its global presence in my article, “Why website translation is important for the global success of a business”.

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