What is Localized Content [+When to Use It]

For businesses to grow in today’s climate, marketers need to think about their content and strategies on a global scale.

The internet has opened doors to new markets around the world, and yet marketers can miss significant opportunities without taking into account the preferences and culture of these new customers.

How can marketers ensure that their content is ready to open new markets?

Localized content is key to attracting new customers’ attention and creating a place where they want to spend their time and do their shopping.

With content based on a personalized experience, you can guide new customers through the customer lifecycle, no matter where in the world they live.

In today’s post, we’ll discuss what localized content is and when to use it.

When we talk about entering new global markets, the first thing you might think of is content translation. After all, it should be so easy to run your content through Google Translate and send it to customers on their travels, right? Not so fast!

Translation is a complex process. While machine translations like Google Translate can process low-value content relatively easily, your higher-value content deserves a more personal touch – not only the words we use, but also the way we use them are important. Otherwise we have a conversation without context and customers cannot establish a relationship with you.

While the words are important, other elements of your presence in a new market are important. Take a look at your website: You may be viewing images that make sense to a North American audience. But would a customer in Asia understand the photo? Could you see yourself as one of your customers?

This way of thinking has to be clear from every piece of your presence. Images and colors should meet a customer’s cultural expectations. The prices should be given in their local currency. The brand logos you display should be recognizable on the market. These elements all come together and tell your customers the story of your brand in a conscious and subliminal way.

Companies that understand localization are best suited to adapt their content to the culture, language and mannerisms of a customer. While translators focus on the words of your content, localization also adjusts currency, dates, and units of measure – the factors that may seem small but make for a truly inviting experience for a global customer.

The need for localized content is growing in parallel with the expansion of global markets. The Internet serves as the primary medium for reaching these new customers, because of all Internet users in the world 7.6% live in North America. In context, more than 50% live in Asia. If your content only appeals to North American buyers, you’re missing out on most of the world’s Internet traffic – and the customers it brings.

Customers are equally critical of their purchases no matter where they live. They expect the same personalized brand experience that North American customers would get. When localizing content, this desire for a personalized experience should serve as a guide to reformatting and changing content to adapt it to the culture and expectations of a new market.

As with any other part of your product or sales process, you should look for cultural norms. Did you know that Orange has one? specific religious connotation in Northern Ireland? Or if you translate text from English to Finnish, the size of your content may vary expand up to 60%? Your global customers expect you not only to know about these tiny differences, but also to create content that capitalizes on them. They want to be as impressed as their English-speaking colleagues.

Marketers need to create content that offers potential customers everything they need to make buying decisions. With an attentive eye for researching a new culture, you can set up your brand to have unforgettable experiences with customers and strengthen brand loyalty.

Localize content for the customer lifecycle

To strengthen brand loyalty, you obviously need a large amount of content that is ready to be localized in different markets. Depending on how much content you need, the amount of localization to be done can increase very quickly. For example, if you have three buyer personalities that you want to target with content and localize content for five languages, invest time and resources to prepare content in fifteen different ways.

Take this example and extend it to websites and other content media that you use. That number is likely to increase even further. When you start localizing content, it pays to be wise which parts you localize first. Like your native language content, you know that certain parts perform much better than others or offer customers high added value.

When you enter a new market, keep in mind that customers will follow Customer life cycle model: Discovery, education, purchase, engagement after purchase and advocacy. Just as you would guide a customer through the life cycle in your native language, your global customers will also buy in this way and expect a similar path.

Since you are already creating content for each phase of the lifecycle, this content is likely to be high quality content that is ready for localization.

Let’s review the content that needs to be localized at every stage of the customer lifecycle.

discovery

Customers are gradually becoming aware of your company and the products you offer. In this phase, your content focuses on creating brand awareness with social media ads or introductions to your product offerings. Make sure that content, such as product descriptions, is properly translated and includes the context of your new market. Find many cultures Video content So remember to localize video content not only with subtitles, but also with local images or to present products that you would know.

education

Customers have done research and want to learn more about your brand and products. For your native language content, you probably have a knowledge base with articles or frequently asked questions (FAQs) in which you can learn more about your product offerings or present thought leaders. While much of the content can be repeated on frequently asked questions and can be mostly supported by machine translation, human translators can provide the context for your written content. The human touch for localizing blog posts with high data traffic can train customers better in language.

purchase

When your customer is ready to do their shopping, they should get a seamless process that makes it easy to shop in language. The seemingly small factors like using the most popular payment platform in this country can make a big difference for a customer completing a transaction.

Commitment after purchase

Once your customer has completed their purchase, you want to keep them busy so they can come back later and buy more. Content such as a thank-you email or follow-up email with content about new products should be localized in their language. Customer support is also an important component in customer loyalty. Both the self-service content of a knowledge base and the interaction with customer support staff should reflect the needs of individual cultures.

Advocacy

Customers who are satisfied with your products want to share their experiences. Your recommendations, ratings and reviews should all be written in the language and contain a relevant context that includes other customers in this market. Including user feedback such as reviews on your website should be a localized process. Domestic customer reviews written in their native language are more effective in attracting other customers.

Perhaps most critical is that every point of contact you have with your customers should be in the language. Regardless of location, each of your customers should have a seamless experience in their own language. If your customers switch languages ​​during the customer lifecycle, they are looking for a competitor who can perform a seamless process.

As you translate your content as part of the localization process, human translators can help address these potential issues and provide your customers with an excellent experience. While machine translation can process much of your content, your human translators will find the gaps in context and fill in the nuances that a global customer would otherwise notice.

People buy from people, and your content should already be written like this. Human translators ensure that this is the case and offer additional creativity and cultural knowledge to achieve this in your content. This process of “Transcreation”Realizes the concept of localization by sharing the same message as in other markets, but adjusting the content to fit the language. With transcreation, you can breathe new life into your content and ensure that it has the creativity and cultural knowledge required to reach your new audience.

When is content localized?

Your content is an important part of your first impressions in a new market. Your potential customers expect language experience from day one, and you should be ready to offer it and be ready to adapt to changes in the market and culture as they occur.

So when it comes to that when You should localize content, you should think about it from the start. For example, when planning your website, consider how you can template websites to simplify the localization process for each new market. Each type of content can also be templateed in some way to simplify the process. When you produce a video, you create a time-coded script. If you need to translate the text for subtitles, you have what you need to do it as efficiently as possible.

If your company is preparing to expand into global markets, this is the right time to focus on localizing content. With a thorough analysis of the cultures and contents of your markets, which have been prepared for every phase of the customer life cycle, you can generate these critical first impressions of the market and begin to build brand loyalty with new customers all over the world.