Poor English on a business site ....

[pmhoran]

I must have a burr under my butt this morning or something

But another thing that has me perplexed ... I can understand companies wanting to have an English language site or English pages on their site. Despite there being a couple hundred or so languages in the world ... English seems to have pretty much established itself as the "language of business".

What I do not understand is ... if they are targeting an English audience, why would they be satisfied with poorly worded content on that site??

Most people who know English and its a second language to them ... they are also aware of their own limitations with the language. When they are developing a site ... why wouldn't they make the extra effort to have a friend or online acquaintance who has a good grasp of the English language proofread their site and make suggestions on how something might be reworded. Or even pay an online service to do it ... if they don't know someone that could help for free.

I stumbled across a site a few days ago that I swear, the owners must have learned English from instant messaging slang and "short hand". As if that is going to impress anyone. I don't use any of the chat programs ... and trying to read their English pages I felt I should have either had my 16 yr old neice beside me ... or had a translation program that could decipher what was printed on the pages.

And ... the number of sites I go to that the simple use of a "spell check" program would leave the viewer with a much better impression of their site.

I must have posted something about this sometime since joining this forum. I am suddenly feeling a bit of "deja vu" Well ... even if I did ... it warrants being said again.

If you are in business ... have someone proofread your site(s) for you ... especially if you are not fluent in English. I happened across a site a while ago, English was a second language for the webmaster. He admitted he had used "Babel Fish" quite a bit. Trouble was ... one sentence in particular on his main page ... I am sure he used a totally acceptable phrase in his native language ... but Babel Fish's translation made it sound like something that was right rude in English. So, Babel Fish is a handy tool most of the time, but you should still have someone more familiar with the language actually proofread things for you.

Anyway, I found my pliers so I can remove that burr. End of my "pet peeve" postings for today

Take care
Peter

 

[eTech|Stacy]

Bad Impression

Yes, you are absolutely right. Many websites pride themselves as the best and brag about their quality, without ever checking their website's content. This leaves a bad impression on any customer, who feels that what quality they would provide, if they can’t even detect their own website’s spelling mistakes. One or two mistakes can be understood, but mistakes in whole page only shows carelessness.

Most of the websites on the Internet are in English language, how can website builders take such a huge risk? Especially on business site!! It is a high stake on the website's reputation.

I would stay away from such sites, which cannot write simple English.