Tutorial: Creating a Dictionary for Your Promotion Follow
Easypromos Dictionaries enable you to customize all the public system wording of our platform in any of the languages we support.
With the Dictionaries feature the promotion or contest administrator has control over all the system labels on any of the pages visible to promotion participants.
An application created with Easypromos is comprised of the following wording:
1. Labels set up by the administrator: these words can be edited by the administrator via the promotion editing tool. Examples include: Title, Description, Legal Bases, Final Messages, Promotion Footer, plus some button texts.
2. System labels: these are the labels which come with the platform by default. They cannot be edited using the promotion editing tool. Examples include: titles of form fields, Share and Invite buttons, warning messages to users, and so on.
For system labels which cannot be edited with the editing tool, the administrator can create a Promotion Dictionary with which to customize as many system wording as needed.
An Easypromos user can create as many Dictionaries in as many languages as he or she needs. Dictionaries are common to all the promotions of a single account.
Example: Suppose you’re going to launch two promotional campaigns aimed at very different audiences – young people and the elderly for example. You will obviously want to use different styles of language and treatment in each of these two campaigns.
To solve this problem you could create two Dictionaries – one for each target audience – with which to customize the system labels and adapt them to your own copy.
If, in addition, you want to launch these campaigns in two different languages, you could add both languages to each dictionary. This will enable you to customize the system labels for both languages.
When might it be useful to create a Dictionary?
The main use of a Dictionary is to enable you to change any of the default system wording. This can be handy in the following situations:
- When a system title is not available in the language you want to set up.
- When you want to adapt a system title to your own style manual or to the target audience of your campaign.
- When you want to add a new language from scratch by translating all the wording into said language.
Below, we explain how to create a Dictionary with which to modify the default system labels, and how to link the Dictionary to your promotion:
-
Step 1: Create a Dictionary
-
Step 2: Edit the system labels in your Dictionary
-
Step 3: Link the Dictionary to your promotion
Step 1: Create a Dictionary
1. First click on the "Settings" menu:
2. Next click on "Dictionaries" under the "Utilities" section:
3. Click on "Create a New Dictionary".
4. Enter a name and description for this Dictionary:
5. Add languages to the Dictionary. All promotions linked to this Dictionary, and which use one of its languages, will include the customized labels.
Step 2. Edit the system labels of your Dictionary
1. From the list of Dictionaries click on the language you wish to edit:
2. In the Translation Form you can see three types of information for each system labels:
1. Original title in English. To show the start and end of the label clearly, the title is in quotation marks; these should not be included in the translation.
2. System title with the translation into the corresponding language – not editable.
3. Text field for customizing the system title.
Note: The color code for each of these titles is as follows:
1. Red : The wording has neither a system translation nor a customized version. The original version of the wording in English will be shown.
2. Orange : The wording has a system translation but not a customized version.
3. Green : The wording has a customized translation.
3. Continue adding customized translations to each of the system wording you’d like to edit. These changes will be saved automatically when you leave the wording field.
Step 3. Link the dictionary to your promotion
Once you’ve created a Dictionary and its languages the next step is to link the Dictionary to the promotion. This will ensure that all default system labels are replaced by the labels you’ve translated in the Dictionary.
To link a Dictionary to a promotion, you'll only need to access the Promotion Dashboard and follow the steps below:
1. Click on "Editor":
2. Go to General > Languages, where you'll find the option 'Dictionary' to select the dictionary you want to use:
Note: For a multi-language promotion (available in the White Label version), it is only possible to assign a single Dictionary. If you wish to customize system labels in more than one language, this Dictionary should have all the languages defined.
FAQs
- There are strange symbols such as %s
and %d
in the system labels. What do they mean?
Easypromos uses sprintf()
variable localization technology which makes it possible to have labels with modular parts. In order for these parts to be replaced by other wording or HTML code at the moment of browser visualization they must be specified via these symbols. The symbols must be kept exactly as they are in translations to ensure that the labels are displayed properly.
The difference between %s
and %d
is that the former will be replaced by a title (string) while the second will be replaced by a number (digit). But they behave in the same way.
A good example of their use in labels is in the opt-in for accepting the legal bases of a contest.
The original HTML text displayed in the browser is:
Check to accept the <a href="#">Terms and conditions</a> of this promotion
This wording is actually made up of two parts:
- The system title
Check to accept the %s of this promotion
- The system title
Terms and conditions
, to which the HTML tag is added to convert it into a link.
To translate this system wording into another language, you simply need to translate the following two titles:
I agree to the %s
terms and conditions
for your own labels, and the application will now take care of the rest by transforming the sentence.
Other variable elements that can appear between the texts to be translated and that must also be kept as they appear are:
***
at the beginning of a text. There can be several asterisks at the beginning of a translation and are used to differentiate texts that are the same but are used in different situations. Asterisks must be kept as they appear.- The
{name_variable}
tag that may contain some of the texts of the platform. This tag includes a variable content, be it a word or set of words, a hyperlink, etc. Example:***I have read and accept the {policy}
. The{policy}
tag will be replaced byPrivacy policy
. Therefore, the{name_variable}
tag must be kept as it appears as well.
- I can see HTML code in the system labels. What should I do?
We’re gradually deleting the HTML code that was initially present in the early versions of the platform so there aren’t many instances of HTML in the system titles. In more recent versions of the platform the %s
and %d
placeholders (see above) are used instead, to simplify the labels. However, in the few cases of HTML code still embedded in the system labels, it’s important to leave the code unchanged so as to maintain the final layout.
For example, this original system sentence:
Maximum number of entries reached.<br/>Try the following promotion, thanks!
Can be changed maintaining the line break (<br/>
) exactly as it is:
No more entries allowed.<br/>Keep an eye on our next promotions, thank you!
- There are many system labels. Should I translate them all to ensure that the Dictionary works?
The answer is no. A Dictionary can be used to replace a single system label or to replace them all.
The display order for a system label in a given language is as follows:
- If there is a customized label, this is displayed.
- If there is no customized label, but there is a system translation, this is displayed.
- If neither of the above exists, then the original text is displayed in English.
- Do all Easypromos applications include a Dictionaries system?
Dictionaries are not currently supported in the following three instances:
- The Home Page of a Promotions Group
- The Winners Page of the quick giveaways:
- Facebook giveaway.
- Instagram giveaway.
- Twitter giveaway.
- Youtube giveaway.
- Pick-a-winner app.
- The Claim Your Prize Page of the quick giveaways:
- Facebook giveaway.
- Instagram giveaway.
- Twitter giveaway.
- Youtube giveaway.
- Pick-a-winner app.
- How can I check the texts that I have translated with the Dictionaries system?
In order to check and review the texts you have entered with the Dictionaries system, you must use the Test Mode tool, which allows you to see each of the promotion screens as users will see it when the promotion is published.
Note: In the Promotion Editor, that is, the place where you edit the different fields and settings of the promotion, the changes in the texts that you have translated with the Dictionaries system are not reflected. To do this you should always use the Test Mode tool.
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