Multi-Language Translator: Adding and Managing Store Content Translations

User-Generated Content (UGC) refers to the text you provide for your store resources, such as product titles, product descriptions, blog titles, and blog descriptions. The Multi-Language Translator app enables you to translate and edit these UGC fields into multiple languages. This article explains how to use the app to manage and customize your store’s translations.

Accessing the App

First, install the Multi-Language Translator app from SHOPLINE App Store. Then from your SHOPLINE admin panel, go to Apps > My Apps and search for it to open. See the following sections to learn how to use this app.

Customizing Multi-Language Translation

To quickly customize the multi-language translation, follow the steps below:

Selecting the Resource to Translate

The Store content tab displays a list of available resources for translation.  Click the Translate button next to the resources you want to translate.

Selecting the Language to Translate

After selecting the resource, you can see the market selector and language selector in the upper right corner. Use these two selectors to determine your target language and applicable markets.

Here are some examples:

• Suppose you have three markets: China, the United States, and Southeast Asia.
• Suppose you have two store languages: English and Chinese.
• You want to translate the title of product A to “Beautiful”.

If All supported markets and English are selected, it means a general translation of product A for all markets. After translation, the title of product A is displayed as “Beautiful” in China, the United States, and Southeast Asia.

If a market (China, for example) and English are selected, it means localized translation of product A for the Chinese market. After translation, the title of product A is translated into “Beautiful” in China and is not translated for other markets.

If general and localized translations coexist, the results of the latter will be displayed as a priority.

Translating a Specific Resource

After selecting the target language, click Automatic translation to translate the selected resource. You can also manually enter or edit the translated content as needed to ensure accuracy and better localization.

Automatic Translation Limitations

The Multi-Language Translator app enables automatic translation of all UGC resources at once or a specific resource. To automatically translate all resources at once, click the Automatic translation button above the list of resources.

Excluding Specific Content from Automatic Translation

You may have some content that should not be translated (hereafter “DNT content”). For example, proper nouns, brand names, abbreviations, standardized units (such as sizes), and email addresses should be kept in the original language, ensuring the messages are conveyed correctly and accurately.

To enable this feature, switch to the Settings tab and click the + Add texts button in the Don’t translate section. Then enter the DNT content in the pop-up window and click Add. You can add up to 50 DNT entries, with a maximum of 200 characters each. The DNT content will not be translated to the target language if a match is found in a sentence or string.

Automatically Translating the Incremental Content

Your UGC increases or changes when you launch new products or campaigns or update your service policies, for instance. To help you restrict the scope of automatic translation and ensure existing content remains the same, you can now choose to enable automatic translation for only the incremental content (new or edited) from the previous day.

To enable this feature, switch to the Settings tab and turn on the toggle in the Auto bulk translation section. Once you enable it, the system detects and automatically translates the incremental content in the resources that have gone through automatic translation before. This operation is performed at 01:00 (GMT-8) every day, and the translation is applied right away.

If you have installed third-party apps that support UGC translation (listed in the Third-party app section under the UGC Translation tab) and want to enable automatic translation for new or updated content, you can select the apps you want to include. Once enabled, any new or updated content from these apps will be automatically added to translation tasks.

Automatically Translating the Metafield Module

You can activate the Automatic Translation for Metafield Module in the Settings. This enables the system to translate Metafield data types used in the store. You can choose from translation types such as Single-line text, Multi-line text, rich text, and JSON format.

Canceling the Translation in Progress

You can cancel the translation in progress at any time. In the Store content tab, click the Stop button above the list of resources that appears when you have an ongoing translation task. This stops the translation immediately. Translated content will still be applied. If you click the Automatic translation button again, the translation task will resume for untranslated content of the previous task.

Deleting Translated Content

You can delete translated content with one click. In the Store content tab, click the Delete button above the list of resources, select the target language and modules (resources) you want to delete in the pop-up window, and click Confirm. 

If your store has multiple markets and you want the deleted translations to be synced to other markets, go to Settings and enable Auto-sync deleting of content across markets. You can choose the markets and languages you want to sync. Once enabled, when you delete translations with one click, the corresponding languages and modules will also be deleted in the selected markets.

If you set up cross-market sync after deleting translations, go to Recently updated resources and click Recheck to refresh. The system will then sync and delete the corresponding translated content in the selected markets.