Languages

In this chapter, we will specify which languages the firm publishes content and communicates in (both internally and externally).

Selecting languages

While an investment manager with a multilingual audience would like to communicate with every individual in their preferred language (and which in some areas is a regulatory requirement), it's a huge task: communicating in more than one language can add multiple layers of complexity to systems and processes, and the required ongoing translation work is usually very labour intensive and expensive — although, increasingly, technology can help.

Any desire to please the firm's audiences by communicating in multiple languages must be constrained by the resources available, and the team should be realistic to ensure they don't bite off more than they can chew.

By identifying up front which languages the firm plans on communicating in, the digital marketing team can determine how any added complexity will be addressed and get an idea of the amount of ongoing translation work that will be required.

The choice of languages should be clearly specified across several areas:

• Core website. The static pages of the firm's website (such as the home page).
• Regularly published website content. Any pages or content that will be added to the website on a regular basis (such as blog posts, articles, press releases, reports, videos, and webcasts).
• Marketing materials. Any materials produced by the marketing team.
• Regulatory documents. The team should be clear of any materials that must be made available in certain languages for regulatory reasons (for example, certain documents relating to UCITS funds must be made available in the local language of any country where they are registered for sale).
• Distribution channels. The firm's social media accounts, emails, and advertising copy.

Lewisham's communication languages

Like many other firms around the world, Lewisham have chosen English as their global corporate language, as shown in figure 1.

Communication Type	Language(s)
Internal	English
Website	English
Regularly published website content	English
Materials	English
Regulatory documents	As required
Distribution channels	English

The only exception is for certain regulatory documents that relate to specific share classes of the firm's UCITS fund range, which must be translated into additional languages depending on which countries the share class has been registered for sale (the options are Switzerland, Germany, Spain, France, United Kingdom, Italy, and Luxembourg). To keep the process simple, these documents are produced in all possible required languages by default (English, French, Spanish, Italian and German) for all share classes, regardless of which countries a specific share class is registered for sale.