Asana's Localization Strategy: Boosting Global User Engagement and Growth

The Nimdzi Lessons in Localization series highlights the most innovative, up-and-coming, or successful globalization programs in the world.

In this Lesson in Localization, we look at how Asana does localization.

About Asana

Asana is a leading enterprise work management platform, based in San Francisco. Their platform is designed to help businesses organize, track, and manage their work efficiently.

Asana's mission is to empower businesses and individuals to thrive by organizing work in a connected space. They aim to help teams focus on the work that truly matters. Asana offers various features such as artificial intelligence, shared calendars, request forms, workflow builder, app integrations, automation, timelines, reporting, and boards.

Asana's international expansion. Markets, Locales, Languages and Content Types

Asana has over 150,000 customers and millions of users in 200+ countries and territories.

Asana was officially launched to the public in English in 2012 and, since then, has adopted a staggered approach to localization. It launched in Japanese in 2017 and French, German, Spanish, and Portuguese in 2018. Then in 2021 came the biggest language expansion to Chinese, Russian, Swedish, Indonesian, Italian, Korean, Polish, and Dutch, bringing the total number of languages to twelve.

The introduction of additional languages was a strategic move designed not only to dismantle language barriers but also to forge strong relationships through an appreciation of cultural nuances. As a matter of fact, Asana is on a journey to provide more market-specific experiences by refining the sign-up journey for new users of the product or by optimizing their main landing page (Asana.com/ja is a good example).

2021 was also the year when the localization team started to heavily localize long-form content for the Content, SEO, and Web teams. This move resulted in an exponential expansion of Asana’s user engagement.

Notably, the assimilation of Spanish led to an uptick in web traffic to the tune of 2.2 million additional visits monthly, alongside notable increases in visits from non-English-speaking demographics. This strategic diversification contributed to a remarkable 70 percent surge in Asana’s web traffic over three years.

The spike in web engagement mirrored revenue growth as the margin increased. Asana’s broad-based appeal is a testament to its connection with an extensive array of cultural backgrounds.

Integrating localization into its business strategies helped Asana grow its reach, and Asana almost doubled its turnover in the mere span of three years.

Regarding product adoption, currently, one-fourth of Asana’s users work in a language other than English, with high product-language adoption in key markets such as Japan, France, and Germany.

About the interviewee: María Caravaca Gómez

María Caravaca Gómez is an accomplished Localization Program Manager at Asana. Hailing from Spain, María is currently based in Dublin, Ireland, where she is a key player in Asana's mission to enhance global user experiences.

Before joining Asana, María carved out a successful career path at language services providers, where she honed her skills in project management.

Apart from being a key localization driver at Asana, she is also involved with Women in Localization Ireland, a professional organization that promotes and supports women in the localization industry, and she actively contributes to Translators Without Borders as a translator.

TL;DR

Asana empowers organizations to work smarter. Asana has over 150,000 customers and millions of users in 200+ countries and territories. Customers like Amazon, Roche, and T-Mobile, rely on Asana to manage everything from goal setting and tracking to capacity planning, to product launches. They currently localize their software into twelve languages, including English.

Based in Dublin, María Caravaca Gomez is the Localization Program Manager at Asana, with a team that has now expanded from one to three members, including Cody Connell and Leanne Geoghegan.

The team used to follow a service provider approach in their stakeholder relationship. A full program revamp happened one and a half years ago. María led the implementation of new technology and processes. The revamp also included positioning as a strategic partner advising on international strategies across diverse teams, MT implementation, and automation of 70% of intakes.

María's team at Asana is focused on measuring global user experience to track quality, and they have fully embraced MT for support content.

Fast facts:

Included in this Lesson in Localization

1. About the company
2. The company’s international expansion. Markets, Locales, and Languages
3. About the interviewee
4. TL;DR (Too long; didn't read)
5. Fast Facts
6. Program Overview:
- Culture of the team
- Organization
7. Project and Process Management
8. Supply Chain/Vendor Management
9. Quality Control
10. Technology
11. KPIs
12. Interesting Initiatives
13. The Future

This has been a preview. The full report can be accessed online by Nimdzi's membership clients and organizations participating in the Lessons in Localization briefings.

If you are not a client, or are interested in how your company can participate in Lessons in Localization, contact us.

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