Product Norms of Website Localization into Persian

Following the process of global integration of markets, resulting from the international exchange of services and products, website localization into Persian is increasingly in demand, and an increasing number of companies are developing to reach the Iranian market to sell their products and services. Given the fairly limited amount of research in terms of the need and expectations of the Iranian internet users with regards to localized websites, the present study aimed at exploring and classifying the expectancy norms of localized websites into Persian in the Iranian context. Based on a mixed-methods design, using semi-structured in-depth and focus group interviews with a purposive sample of internet users, a pool of basic data was formed, based on which a self-designed questionnaire instrument of 25 items was constructed. Having established the face and content validity of the instrument, using SurveyMonkey.com potential participants were invited to contribute and eventually nearly 403 Iranian internet users responded to the questions. After establishing the psychometric properties of the data obtained, the results revealed the expectations, wants and needs of the Persian-speaking, Iranian nationals regarding an ideally localized commercial website for the Iranian locale. The results showed that there are 19 important factors in 3 categories as -direction from right to left -micro level design adaptation and -macro level design adaptation that should be considered during the process of website localization into Persian. The results of the study can be of instrumental use of website localization practitioners, teachers and students.

کلیدواژه ها:

website localization ، product norms ، user interface design ، UI design