Every company needs to have a business strategy, and that would not be complete without at least a cursory glance at both short term and long term growth and expansion.
Whether the company is an online business or a brick and mortar store, the most definitive goal for growth and expansion is to expand the customer base. The additional benefit, of course, is the potential for a greatly increased revenue stream in addition to adding to the profitability of the company as a whole.
In the case of businesses that provide services to the local population, there will always be restrictions on the number of customers available. For anyone who is selling products that are not restricted by import/export laws or subject to other restrictions, the obvious solution is the globalization of the business. The key to success in globalization, is learning about localization. View more information about localization and how it is defined here. Confused? It will all be made perfectly clear in the course of this article.
How to Develop a Localization Strategy For Domestic Markets
Whether expanding across the country or across the globe, the localization strategy should include little tips and hints that the company itself is local to the area being targeted for marketing.
The localization process itself revolves around making the consumer feel as if that product has been made specifically for them and at least hints at things that will make the customer feel like the advertiser is speaking directly to them, likely through referencing things that the individual will be familiar with.
When expanding from a local market to a broader national or domestic marketplace, this involves different campaigns that can be run in different areas.
This is easily accomplished through the use of a skilled AdWords campaign marketer. Ads can be set to run according to geographically specific markets based on the IP of the people receiving or seeing those ads. By utilizing these techniques it becomes possible to use local points of reference that the potential customers will recognize.
These may be in the form of notable landmarks, specific idioms or the inclusion of a more localized vernacular or other similar techniques that will help to generate an emotional response on the part of the person who is seeing the advertisements.
Localization Strategies for International Markets
The utilization of additional languages can often be useful, even in domestic marketing campaigns. Many larger cities have large pockets of people who will speak a language other than the national language at home. There is a very large Polish community in the city of Chicago and a very large Chinese speaking population in cities like San Francisco and New York. Cities like Los Angeles have more than two hundred languages other than English spoken by people in their homes.
Germany already had a very large Turkish population long before the expansion caused by the global refugee crisis. The number of refugees throughout Europe are not only introducing a great many languages into domestic markets, but also greatly increase the potential for businesses to expand their customer bases through a selective marketing campaign including localization strategies.
How to Use Language Localization
For people raised in a bilingual or multilingual environment, language translation may not be the most challenging aspect of international marketing and localization efforts. Even then, however, there are going to be idiosyncrasies even in different locations that are native to the same language. Read more about language localization.
In India and some of the surrounding nations, for example, it is very common for people to grow up speaking their native language and English. However, most of the English being spoken is geared more towards a British influence.
Conversely, in the Philippines as well, people often grow up speaking both Tagalog and English, though the English are more inclined towards an American understanding. There are commonalities of course, but there are also a great many minors (and major) linguistic differences as well.
In terms of domestic expansion of the marketing strategies, as was previously noted, this will often mean phrases that are local to a given region. While much of this variation is limited to verbal communications, some of it will also be reflected in the written word as well. For this example, grab the refreshing beverage of your choice and read on.
In parts of the US, if someone were to order a “pop” they will be looked at askance, with the person taking the order wondering why you would want to be served a father. They may refer to that refreshing drink as a “cola” rather than a pop. In other locations, it would be best to order a soda as a pop would again be a father and a cola would be representative only of a single brand of soda.
These unique variations of the same language become even larger and more difficult to overcome when moving from country to country. American English and a person speaking English from Scotland will have entirely different words for the same thing.
Even something as simple as directions can be easily confused where the first floor would be the same as a ground floor in some locations, and a second-floor would be the first floor which is the floor above the ground floor in another location.
Professional Translation Services in Localization Marketing Strategies
One of the greatest benefits of using professional translation services is the ability to guarantee that the work is going to be geared specifically towards the local market being targeted in the campaign.
This will alleviate any need to be concerned about misplaced efforts that in some cases, can actually cause a great offense, as some of the linguistic differences can tend to have that impact on people when used improperly, even if unintentionally.
Furthermore, the use of professional translation companies generally guarantees that the work will be completed, not only properly but also on time.
This will greatly assist in the ability of the company to focus on planning out advertising and marketing campaigns and running them in a more efficient manner. This would be especially prudent in cases where companies have promotions centered around holidays or in any areas of marketing where time is considered to be of the essence.
What Business and Marketing Operations Need to Focus on Localization?
Localization is an important marketing strategy for anyone conducting business online.
These days, however, there really is no excuse for any company not to have an online presence as part of their ongoing marketing and advertising.
Well, this is at least true for any company that does not wish to be left behind and relegated only to the people living within their neighborhood. For the mom-and-pop store down on the corner, an online presence will probably not prove to be much of an advantage.
For any company that does provide for a larger market however, an online presence is imperative to the success of the company.
Company Website
The company website should be professionally translated into as many languages as may be applicable. In this case, it may not be advisable to focus on too much geographically specific language as it may alienate a portion of the intended audience.
An English website may be edited somewhat to differentiate between American and British English, but getting into more limited geographically limited idioms may do just as much harm as it does good.
Focusing on the Welsh may be offensive to some of the Irish and focusing on the Irish may be offensive to some of the British viewers, so a very broad means of localization is advisable in such a case.
Email Marketing Campaigns
It is estimated that more than one-half of the population of the world currently uses email as a prevalent means of communication. That makes it a big addition to any customer base, though capturing such a vast audience will take a highly focused and individualized effort for marketing.
Care should be taken however, as unsolicited emails can get marked as spam and lead to websites being deindexed or otherwise lost and even criminal charges in some locations.
There should always be an option for people to sign up for an email list, with newsletters being one of the more common methods of accomplishing this. Including a section in the sign-up forms for locations where the people live will allow for the marketing to be more directly targeted to the individual.
Adwords Campaigns
Adwords campaigns are a great means to practice and perfect and even just to learn how to start a localization campaign. Google ads can easily be restricted to geographical areas, allowing for very specific emotional and visual triggers to be used within those ads.
Reaching the heart of the target audience is the key to winning their hearts, and getting them to open up their wallets for whatever the company may be selling.
Informational Products
Among the most common products for internet marketers, are informational products, content marketing and other means of generating an income stream through the use of informational products.
In this case, there are a couple of very easy means to greatly expand the potential customer base. Localization of the marketing campaign is one, but one that is often overlooked is the ability to use professional translation services to translate the informational products into additional languages.
In such a way, rather than being a simple affiliate, the ambitious internet marketer may even be able to form a full joint venture with the product owner, and perhaps even gain exclusive rights to some products in additional languages.
Localization Services to Increase Return On Investment (ROI)
Localization strategies are a tool, but like any tool, they are only as good as the person using that tool. The tips provided here are a good start, but it may take even the most proficient of marketers some time to master the arts and to realize the full potential to increase both their share of the marketplace and their income, but it can be done.
One of the best methods to accomplish this is through the use of “split testing” or always running two campaigns for each potential market. Retain the campaign that does best and begin testing another one for a couple of weeks. In this way, there should always be a way to trigger the right response and increase the customer base and the income of the company.
