A multilingual theme needs improvement to make it a perfect fit for native shoppers. We need to look out for specific perks and features when we select a suitable Arabic theme for the Arabic audience.
In recent times, the focus is increasing on vernacular languages like Arabic. The E-commerce boom is taking place in the MENA (Middle Eastern & North African) region.
However, there are only a few well-customized Arabic themes offered by platforms like Plaktheme.
For better success at selling, we must know what to look for in any Arabic Theme. We are here to help you identify those characteristics of a Theme.
6 things to look at when looking for Arabic theme
1. RTL support
RTL (Right to Left) support is a must-have feature for an Arabic theme. There are a handful of languages including Arabic that need RTL support. However, the market of Middle Eastern and North African (MENA) users is growing to be larger than once anticipated.
Customizing your store with the RTL feature can be of huge advantage to convert your visitors to long time loyal shoppers.
RTL support makes the page appear horizontally flipped. As a result, a mirror image of the page is created. Once you have RTL flow on your page, it becomes easier to customize the layout as per the Arabic text. As a result, it becomes much easier for native shoppers to read.
Only a few premium themes like Plaktheme offers RTL support.
2. Cross-browser Compatibility
Cross-browser compatibility is super important to give a user-friendly experience to your shoppers. As time goes more shoppers are on Mobile Browsers.
Cross-browser compatibility makes the theme functional across different browsers. It also allows graceful degradation when browser features are missing.
As a merchant, you would be looking for themes that are responsive. I.e. the view adapts to a Mobile-friendly layout and text when the shopper is on Mobile.
On both mobile and desktop, you’d look for themes that support popular browsers such as Chrome, Safari, Firefox & Microsoft Edge. You never know which browser or device your MENA shopper will visit your store!
3. SEO Friendly
SEO optimization is key to growth in the digital market. Themes impact the SEO of your store. You need an SEO-friendly theme to offer the best experience to your shoppers.
Brands that appear first in google ranking hold higher credibility and are good for brand awareness. SEO-friendly themes are easy to crawl for search engines.
As a result, Your website will appear higher in Google Index ranking. It will increase your website exposure and make it more accessible to MENA shoppers.
A well-designed theme will boost your organic rankings and positively affect your stand on a keyword. It will improve your stores’ digital performance.
As a merchant, You need to pick the best and the most effective Arabic theme. Themes that are easier to crawl for search engines and that will help build credibility and generate revenue in your store.
4. Highly Responsive
Highly responsive themes are easily readable by search engines. One of the major steps of creating a perfect fit multilingual (including Arabic) theme is to make it adaptable and responsive.
More and more shoppers prefer shopping on smartphones. So your theme should be mobile-friendly to be easy for your audience. Otherwise, you will lose your shoppers to your competition.
Your store deserves a highly-responsive theme irrespective of the device.
It will result in shortened loading time and save your users from frustration. This will also be helpful when search engines will rank your website.
The faster and more responsive your theme is, the better it will perform among competitors.
A responsive theme will also increase your search engine optimization and boost your store ranking. So, when MENA shoppers will be looking for local products or services, your store will be the first to pop up.
5. Translation Ready
47% of users love visiting websites in their native language. This rate is much higher in MENA countries. That’s why you need your store to be available in multiple languages. So that each of your customers can easily access it.
One of the major steps of creating a perfect fit multilingual theme is to make it translation ready. A Translation-ready store will help you create goodwill and confidence among your shoppers. They will treat your brand as an international name.
At the same time, your Shoppers will feel your sensitivity & care towards natives. Big brands going local are being appreciated everywhere. This could become your chance to be in the spotlight and win the heart of your native shoppers.
Select a theme compatible with multiple languages and easily adaptable to other languages. It will make your shop more accessible and easy to comprehend.
6. Typography
At this stage, your theme has every basic feature. But how do you select the best Arabic theme and make it distinctive? How will your shoppers realise that your brand is different from others?
You need to leave the best impression in their mind. Typography plays a role here. Better typography means improving the numbers, letters, punctuation, and text-related symbols to make them appealing to your shoppers.
While having a beautiful theme is important, typography will help you generate a rich user interface design for your store.
Good typography will enhance the visual hierarchy and will add a graphic balance to your site. Overall it will improve the time your shoppers are spending on your website by giving them a good feel.
The longer they will stay on your website, the more products they will look for. Hence, this can improve your sales.
Plaktheme offers hundreds of Google fonts and custom color schemes that MENA shoppers can relate to. Such a theme makes theme improvement easier and allows easy text editing.
While selecting a theme, keep all these points in your mind. It will help you select the best Arabic theme for your Arabic audience. A good theme will keep your shoppers hooked to your website.
You can look for such appealing themes which are curated especially for MENA audiences here.