Enhancing Live Chat with Multilingual Support

As businesses expand into global markets, the need for real-time, localized customer support becomes increasingly critical. In today’s digital landscape, customers expect seamless communication in their native languages—making multilingual live chat widgets not just a competitive advantage, but a necessity. These tools bridge language gaps, enabling businesses to deliver personalized, efficient support across borders.

This article explores the benefits, technical considerations, and implementation strategies for integrating multilingual support into live chat systems, helping companies enhance customer satisfaction and scale their global reach.

Key Features of Multilingual Live Chat Widgets

• Enable Multi-Language Support
  Configure your live chat widget to support multiple languages, allowing users from different regions to interact with your website in their preferred language.

• Display the Widget in a Specific Language
  Customize the widget to appear in a specific language based on user preferences or regional settings, ensuring a consistent and localized user experience.

• Automatically Match Browser Language Settings
  Dynamically update the widget’s language by adjusting the culture parameter in the widget URL. This ensures the chat interface automatically aligns with the user’s browser language, creating a seamless and personalized interaction.

Enabling multi-language support

Multi-language support in a live chat widget allows the interface and messages to be displayed in various languages. This feature ensures that users from different regions can interact with the live chat widget in their preferred language, providing a personalized customer experience. Learn more on How to Configure Multi-Language Support.

How to display the widget in a specific language

1. Navigate to Admin > Chat > Live Chat.

2. Copy the provided Embed Code as indicated in the following image.
   

3. Add the language code manually into the URL.

   Example for French:

   Example for Japanese:

4. Embed the script on your website to display the live chat widget in a specific language.

Automatically adjust widget language with the user’s browser preferences

Follow these steps to automatically change the culture parameter of the widget based on the browser’s preferred language:

1. Retrieve the preferred language by using the ‘navigator.language’ property.
2. Construct the widget URL by appending the retrieved language as the ‘culture’ parameter in the widget URL.
3. Add a script tag in your website to load the widget with the updated URL.

// Get the browser's preferred language
const preferredLanguage = navigator.language;

// Construct the widget URL with the culture parameter
const widgetURL = `https://www.example.com/chatwidget-api/widget/3bda8530-486e-4659-8eff-460dfb819682?culture=${preferredLanguage}`;

// Create a script tag to load the widget
const script = document.createElement('script');
script.src = widgetURL;
script.defer = true;
script.async = true;

// Append the script tag to the document head
document.head.appendChild(script); 

FAQs

1. Can I set a fallback language if the user’s browser language is not supported?
   Yes, you can implement logic in your script to check if the browser language is supported. If not, you can default to a fallback language like English.

2. How can I test the widget in different languages before going live?
   You can simulate different browser languages using browser developer tools or extensions that allow you to change the navigator.language value temporarily.

3. Can I use different widgets for different languages on the same website?
   Yes, you can embed multiple widget scripts with different culture parameters on different pages or conditionally load them based on user selection.

4. Does the widget support right-to-left (RTL) languages like Arabic or Hebrew?
   BoldDesk generally supports RTL languages. You should verify this in the List of Supported Languages and test the layout accordingly.

5. Will the language setting persist across sessions for returning users?
   No, BoldDesk does not automatically persist the language setting across sessions for returning users by default.

6. Can users manually switch the widget language from the chat interface?
   No, users cannot manually switch the widget language from within the BoldDesk live chat interface itself.

7. How often is the list of supported languages updated?
   The list of supported languages for the live chat widget does not follow a fixed update schedule. However, BoldDesk actively maintains and expands this list based on user demand and internal development priorities.

8. Are custom messages (like greetings or offline messages) translatable too?
   Yes, but you’ll need to manually configure these in the String Resources section under Language Translation in the admin panel.

9. Does the widget support dynamic language switching without reloading the page?
   Typically, dynamic switching would require reinitializing the widget with a new script URL containing the updated culture code.