Having a blog in several languages can multiply your potential audience. If you are not bilingual, this means a significant increase in work. Is it worth it? In this post I give you my point of view on whether it makes sense or not to translate your posts.
Carlos Bravo30
I was born and lived almost all my life in Germany. I have a Spanish passport, but I am still fluent in both spoken and written German. Starting a blog 2 years ago in Spanish has helped me improve my writing skills. Living in Spain for almost 4 years now has probably not hurt either. Writing posts for this blog is now as easy for me as in German. You could say that I am practically bilingual. At the moment I don't see myself translating the articles into German to add a second language to the blog.
translate a blog
Why there is no point in translating a blog
Most of you wondering whether or not it makes sense to translate journalist emails your blog into another language probably have one of the following 2 scenarios.
Translate the blog from Spanish to English.
Translate the blog from Catalan to Spanish.
There are probably more cases but I assume these 2 are true for most of you. The next points cover the 2 scenarios presented and can be applied to other language combinations as well.
1. More work : This is obvious but important. In the case of translating posts, the work and time must be multiplied by 2. If you are not bilingual, it will probably be 2.5-3 times more if you need someone to review your translations.
2. Target audience : if you write in Catalan, your readers will be largely Catalan. In this case, there are two options. Either you create content that is relevant to the inhabitants of Catalonia or not. In the first case, there is really no need to translate into Spanish. In the second case, you have simply chosen the wrong language, since you could have a wider audience, and by choosing a language that not all of them speak, you limit your possibilities.
3. Invalid content : a post in Spanish that provides very interesting and valid content does not have to be valid in English. If you have a blog to find a job, write a CV, etc. you can give advice that is very helpful in Spain but that is totally counterproductive in Anglo-Saxon cultures where other rules apply.