Training Industry Magazine - July/August 2019 - 52

G L O B A L
O U T LO O K

LOCALIZING E-LEARNING PROGRAMS
FOR AN INTERNATIONAL AUDIENCE
BY RALPH MICHAEL STROZZA

Thanks to the Internet and evolving
technologies, education has never
been more accessible. To ensure that
language is not a barrier when delivering
education to global audiences, e-learning
localization requires strategy and
expertise to ensure a successful outcome.
The aim of e-learning localization is to
give a course the look and feel of having
been created specifically for a particular
market, regardless of language, culture or
location. This article serves as a high-level
blueprint for e-learning developers who
are considering localizing their programs
in one or more languages.
E-LEARNING IS HERE TO STAY,
GLOBALLY

average growth rate, different regions
around the world experienced much
higher growth rates, with Asia and Eastern
Europe experiencing close to 17% growth
and Africa and Latin America estimated
close to 15%. Just five years later in
2016, market size rose to $46.67 billion,
according to Docebo.

MAKING COURSES
AVAILABLE IN MULTIPLE
LANGUAGES IS CRITICAL
TO REACHING A
WIDER AUDIENCE.

Due to the numerous advantages
e-learning-based education provides to
organizations, it is not only going to remain
an effective delivery platform for training; it
is projected to show significant growth in
the coming years.

What is fueling this growth? It can be
attributed to a combination of several
factors:

The "E-Learning-Global Market Outlook"
report by Orbis Research estimates that
the global market for technology-based
training will grow at a compound annual
growth rate of 9.5%, from $176 billion in
2017 to over $398 billion by 2026. While
e-learning revenue levels and growth
estimates vary, most data point to a
continued upward trend on a global scale.

* Course design and implementation speed
* Easy accessibility
* Increased effectiveness through animated
learning
* Escalation in number of internet users
* Growing access of broadband
* Savings to organizations in terms of
capital expenditures
* Reduction in operational expenses

In 2011, the worldwide market for selfpaced e-learning was $35.6 billion. At
that time, the annual growth rate was
projected to be 7.6%, or $51.5 billion, by
2016. Although 7.6% was the estimated

Given the growth rates and revenues
cited previously, it appears to be
universally accepted that self-paced
e-learning is not going away anytime
soon. Additionally, while English is

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currently the primary language of
e-learning course development, making
courses available in multiple languages
is critical to reaching a wider audience
and achieving overall program success.
TOOL DESIGNS FACILITATE
LOCALIZATION
In the early days of Flash-based e-learning
localization, developing e-learning courses
was a time-consuming, manual process
and constituted one of the major
roadblocks to multilingual e-learning
course availability. Thanks to the latest
development tools available today,
e-learning course localization is now
relatively straightforward.
Popular state of the art tools, such as
Adobe Captivate, incorporate XML file
export and import for a simplified and
streamlined localization process. For
example, Captivate's functionality includes
the export of captions to a text or an XML
Localization Interchange File Format
(XLIFF) file, as well as the subsequent
import of the translated text file into a
copy of the original project file. Tools such
as Articulate StoryLine support right-toleft languages such as Arabic and Hebrew,
as well as double-byte character sets for
languages such as Chinese (simplified and
traditional), Japanese and Korean.
Today's technology eliminates many
of the barriers organizations used to
face when localizing their e-learning
programs into multiple languages,
making localization more feasible
to those who may have previously
https://www.docebo.com/landing/contactform/elearning-market-trends-and-forecast-2014-2016-docebo-report.pdf
Training Industry Magazine - July/August 2019

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