Sunny greetings, dear reader!
We are approaching the end. Not the end of the world. But the end of our fun design mini series. Today we clear up some more details when it comes to imagery and your design.
Visuals are tricky across cultures
We already talked about flags, maps and icons. Now I would like to chat a bit about images, illustrations and photos. A picture might be worth a thousand words, but be mindful of color, gestures, people, animals, analogies and regional symbols.
Easy examples:
You have an ad campaign with a photo of people who are sitting around a table, being social and drinking wine and beer. If you ran this ad campaign in Saudi Arabia or Brunei, it wouldn’t speak to the audience, as alcohol is prohibited in those countries – you could even offend them! In France, alcohol advertising doesn’t get a free pass. It’s tightly regulated: no targeting minors, no implying health or social benefits. On TV or radio, it can only appear after 10 pm. What seems normal in one market can be completely off-limits in another.
Excitement is all around. Thanksgiving is around the corner. You want to add a bit of fun to the landing page and add an image of some turkeys standing in an autumnal scenery. Here comes the bummer. Not every country is celebrating Thanksgiving like the US does and not everywhere in the world is it fall season. It is worth noting that for holidays or region-specific events, it is often better to create a dedicated landing page for each market. Looping back to Thanksgiving. The US celebrates it in November, while Canada’s Thanksgiving is in October. The same goes for Mother’s Day or Father’s Day. Celebrated globally, but on different dates. Planning for these differences keeps your content timely and avoids confusing users.
Furthermore, make sure that if you have illustrations or images that contain text, this text can be translated and replace the original language. If you use screenshots, make them either super neutral so that no words or anything else specific are included or use the appropriate screenshots for each language and country.
Good to know:
- Skip embedded text, it cuts localization costs
- Seasonal content isn’t universal; it changes by culture
- Symbols, colors and social behaviour carry cultural, religious and historical weight
Designer’s fix:
- Avoid embedded text in images – use legends or icon-based design instead
- If text must appear in graphics, make them fully localizable and route them through localization workflows
You made it to the end – your design has a passport now!
This, my friends, was the last of the series “Global design”. Designing for a global audience isn’t about adding polish at the end – it’s about baking flexibility into your design from day one. Think of your layouts, fonts, colors and icons as travelers: if they can survive German buttons, Arabic mirroring and Chinese characters, they can survive (almost) anything.
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