When important work needs international reach
Your mission doesn’t stop at borders. Whether you’re shaping policy across Europe, supporting communities in multiple countries, or publishing research for international audiences, language shouldn’t be a barrier to your impact.
But not everyone will tell you how simple it can be. Traditional translation services for websites come with eye-watering price tags and long turnarounds that put full-site multilingual out of reach for most mission-driven organisations.
Using the power of Wagtail localisation, we help changemakers reach global audiences with AI-powered translation that’s affordable, scalable, and keeps your editorial team in full control.
Open up your mission to everyone
If you’re working in the nonprofit, think tank, education, or public sector space, chances are your work matters beyond your home country. You might be:
- Publishing research that informs policy internationally
- Running programmes across multiple regions with different primary languages
- Serving multilingual partners who need information in their own language
- Meeting legal requirements (such as Welsh or Gaelic obligations for public bodies)
Finding a manual translator for websites takes time. Agencies generally charge per word, making full-site translation expensive and slowing down your publishing workflow. Meanwhile, embedding Google Translate widgets can give clunky, unreliable results that potentially damage your credibility.
So here you are: stuck between wanting to reach global audiences with quality multilingual website content and having the time and budget to do it properly.
Multilingual websites without the massive costs
Let’s talk real numbers. When traditional translation services for websites price per word, even a modest website can quickly spiral into five-figure territory. Say you’re a think tank with a decade of research in the archives? You’re looking at costs upwards of £80,000, that can take months to deliver.
At a fraction of the price, AI-powered multilingual CMS integration flips the model completely.
How it works with Cursive:
One-off setup fee to translate existing content and configure your multilingual website
Pay-as-you-go for new content at predictable, transparent rates as you publish
No ongoing subscription fees for translation services you’re not using
No manual intervention required from your already-stretched team
How we make your website multilingual, fast
With almost 20 years’ of webcraft expertise, we’ve tried all the content management systems – Wagtail is by far the best CMS for multilingual website needs. But this isn’t a straight alternative to Google Translate for websites. It’s way better, and just one of many reasons we love Wagtail.
Implementing AI-powered translation on your platform is straightforward. We start with a discovery step to understand your needs: which languages, how much content, what your publishing workflow looks like.
Then we set up the translation system, run the initial translation of your existing content, and make sure your team knows how to manage translations (or just let them happen automatically).
Once it’s live, your content team doesn’t need to think about it. There’s no separate workflow for translations. No chasing translators for website updates. No delays. You publish in English (or your primary language), and the translations happen in the background.
For product owners and website managers, this means:
No publishing backlogs when you need to update content across languages
Consistent content across all language versions
No manual duplication of work
Time and money that goes back into your mission
And we’re not just here to launch and leave. We stay in your corner, making sure your multilingual platform keeps working for your mission, so you can focus on furthering your cause.
Real-world examples of multilingual websites
We help mission-led organisations of all sizes and sectors reach global audiences:
ODI Global is translating all 16,000 pages of think tank research into French and Spanish, with more languages planned. The system scales effortlessly across decades of research, making it easy for ODI’s editorial team to share insights with policymakers and researchers around the world.
Country Land Association serves members across England and Wales with a bilingual platform that meets Welsh Language Act requirements. We automated its content translation so its small team can handle both languages without extra complexity or duplication.
Girls Not Brides came to us with a Wagtail site containing some manually translated content. We helped them implement AI-powered translation, creating a workflow that balances automation with editorial review – giving its global network of more than 1,500 member organisations access to multilingual content that's both accurate and easy to manage.
From member organisations to global think tanks, different languages to different scales – Wagtail’s multilingual flexibility means we can tailor the approach to your specific needs and budget realities.
How reliable is AI for website translation?
It’s a fair question – machine translation hasn’t always had the best reputation for nuance. Thankfully, the Wagtail’s localisation system is built with care, not hype, and always puts editorial control first.
We can integrate with a range of AI translation providers, including DeepL and AWS Translate, and we’ll always recommend the right solution for your needs (or work with your existing setup).
Wagtail’s AI translation features are:
- Context aware – understands context and handles sector-specific language, not just word-for-word substitution.
- Editorially controlled – editors can review, refine, or override translations at any point.
- Flexible to your workflow – whether you want to auto-publish translations or review and moderate them first, we configure it around your team.
For mission-driven organisations publishing policy research, campaigns, or complex programme information, this really matters. Your translations need to preserve your brand voice, respect your sector language, and represent your work accurately.
Balancing automation with human review
AI doesn’t replace human translators entirely. For sensitive content, legal documents, or high-stakes comms, editors can tweak translations manually within Wagtail. The AI does the heavy lifting, your team fine-tunes where needed.
For example, one of our clients uses a moderation workflow where automatically translated pages display a notice until they’ve been reviewed by a human editor. Others prefer to hold translations back until they’ve been checked by someone fluent, while some choose a fully automated workflow where content goes live instantly.
Every organisation’s balance between automation and review is different – and we can configure each setup so your team stays in full control.
Translation-ready from the start
Your digital platform is your bridge to the world. It should carry your message as it grows – not lose it in translation. Even if you don’t need multilingual CMS capabilities right now, we can futureproof your Wagtail build so you’re ready when international reach becomes a priority.
When we build digital platforms for clients, we think about this from day one: How’s the content structured? How will URLs work across languages? What happens to forms and user-generated content? We’ve seen too many changemakers outgrow their platforms because multilingual website development wasn’t part of the original plan.
Getting this right early saves expensive do-overs down the line:
No costly rebuilds when your mission expands globally
Flexible content structure that accommodates different language needs
Proper URL management for SEO across all language versions
Performance optimisation that keeps every language version fast
Think your Wagtail platform is too big and mean and complex? Our multilingual builds scale without breaking your architecture. We’ve proven it with ODI’s 16,000-page translation – the system handled it seamlessly.
Got more questions? We've got answers
As the CMS of choice for the NHS, NASA, and many NGOs, Wagtail’s thoughtful AI translation handles charity, policy, educational, and research content really well. For most purposes – campaign pages, blog posts, resource libraries – it delivers professional quality. For particularly sensitive content like legal documents or medical information, it’s easy to bring human review into your workflow.
We can configure translation for virtually any language pair. Common choices for UK mission-led organisations include French, Spanish, Welsh, Arabic, and major European languages. Tell us which audiences you need to reach and we’ll make it happen. And if you need to add more down the line, we’re ready when you are.
Absolutely. Every translation is editable through your Wagtail CMS, so your bilingual team members can refine terminology, adjust tone, or perfect particularly important content. After trying many platforms over the years, we’ve found Wagtail to be the best multilingual CMS for flexible editorial control.
New content gets translated automatically as you publish. Your editors work in their primary language as usual, and our language translation software for websites distributes it to all configured language versions.
Yes. We can retrofit multilingual CMS capabilities into existing Wagtail builds, though there may be some structural work needed depending on how your current site is architected. We’ll always assess and advise during discovery to make sure you get what you need.
Properly implemented Wagtail multilingual websites handle all the SEO fundamentals automatically – hreflang tags, appropriate URL structures, meta data for each language version. Search engines will find and index your content in all languages.
