The World Service followed suit in October with the relaunch of BBC Persian in the new format and this week with the launch of BBC Brasil.

Over the course of 2009, we will continue to re- launch the portfolio of sites; covering 33 languages, in doing so we will and have been facing some unique challenges. These challenges are subject of this post.

Change comes to the World Service online

The move to 1024 for the World Service sites could have been a fairly mechanical job of applying the BBC's new-look style guidelines, a new 'lick of paint'. Could have, but wasn't. Instead we took the opportunity to rethink our entire offering, both editorially and technically, to make it more appropriate to our many different markets. In other words, to take a step further in our ongoing journey of "localisation".

The look and feel employed currently across the World Service language websites, with the recent exception of Persian and Brazil, follow the model of "one size fits all". That one size is the (pre-1024) English news site. It ensured that the World Service offering was efficient in that it offered a consistent user experience and adhered to the principles of usability. I'm referring to those basic principles that apply to users regardless of their geographical location; the need to master the same techniques for navigation, scanning a page for what is most interesting, and following what is sometimes referred to as "information scent".

However, "one-size-fits-all" doesn't offer much flexibility to adapt to differing user behaviours, preferences and cultural differences. Not to mention the different types and standards of equipment that are commonly used by ordinary people in all those places. Remember: 33 different languages, 33 different markets as far apart as India and Brazil. Each of which hosts numerous local services that are (by definition) designed for the people there. How could a single-design really compete in such a variety of circumstances?

A Balancing act

Earlier I described localisation as an 'ongoing' journey. That's because editorially, the World Service language sites are already targeting their particular market. It may be a surprise for some to learn that the sites are not mere translations of stories written in English. Yes, the non-English sites do take and re-present the most relevant of the English-language content, but they also generate content specifically for the country and language groups they serve. The language services that produce the sites, are staffed by journalists who speak and write in the target language, and who know the target markets profoundly.

So how did the World Service team approach the targeting of a local market within the discipline of design and user experience as well as editorial content? And how can we resolve the tension between this and the need to operate strictly within the principles of a global brand?

There are four main aspects of the local markets we focused on to inform this work:

- The script: Latin-style scripts familiar to English readers impose a certain kind of design. Other scripts, including ones reading from right to left, using characters whose differentiation can be more subtle, suggest a different kind of design. In this area we looked at how to create emphasis, a flow of reading that is easy on the eye as well as how to balance the use of space within the page imposed by each script. These aspects impact the overall page layout, legibility and the treatment of the brand. They require bespoke treatment for each script.

- Editorial design: the layout of the content was looked at in order to reflect not only a hierarchy of importance within the editorial content that is unique to each site, but also the density of content on pages that is expected by users in the market. We also focused on the balance between images and text to denote types of content, as well flexibility in layout that would better reflect the dynamism of the news and the production turn around to support this pace.

- Navigation:The focus here was to explore and research the reorganizing of varying types of information within each site in order to create site structures and a navigation mechanism that enabled easy and clear routes into and across the content.

- Interaction design: Some patterns of behavior such as interacting with carousels or the features that allow users to 'take away' elements of content and ingest in their sites, are familiar in some parts of the world but are not as intuitively understood by users in other parts of the world.

We used a variety of methods to gain a better understanding of these aspects within each market. We carried out a competitor analysis; we did some extensive 'number crunching' to interpret usage statistics and qualitative surveys. And we also engaged with the users themselves. We initiated online forum discussions, where we asked for feedback about specific aspects of the site such as navigation, legibility, layout etc. We also organized user-testing laboratories to find out about the interaction and usability aspects of the sites.

And as all who have worked in user centred design know: we made our designs pass through multiple iterations, informed by these findings, until we felt we got it right.

The solution: uniform building blocks arranged in unique compositions

The result of our research is a palette of common elements: a layout grid, an approach to the chunking of text blocks, an approach to information architecture, a varying set of interactive structures. All of them follow BBC principles of usability, accessibility, readability and simple common sense. All of them respect the BBC brand. However the arrangement of those common content elements into compositions is, or will be, unique to every language service.

Designers now have the tools, namely a repository of building blocks using a coherent style and functionality to make the content work with the visual characteristics inherent in the script itself. With these building blocks they are able to fine-tune the overall design of a piece to its market. They also enable creating sites and additional services that take into account an optimal use of the equipment and connectivity that most of the people in the market actually have.

The Work is not done

The work on the redesign will continue to evolve, even once the sites have launched, informed by the fast moving changes of the web but also and most importantly by the invaluable user feedback that active users provide.

If you are one of those who have already contributed, thanks! Keep those comments coming in!

Tammy Gur is Head of Design, BBC World Service Future Media.