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We all can agree that companies want to grow and evolve. Some choose a wider business adoption, while others expand the list of services and products they have to offer.
The goal of growing the business seems appealing, though expanding into new markets could be a challenging task if a business is unwilling to change its marketing collateral, digital content and tactics depending on the new target markets.
Even if you believe that you have perfect products or services for the specific region, the truth is that not changing your marketing collateral and adapting your solution to the new market is an essential point to achieve global success.
There is a one-size-fits-all strategy that can be used by all businesses out there. Luckily, it isn't something that companies expect in today's highly competitive market.
The reason for that is different markets have different needs, preferences, different languages, and, therefore, cultural challenges and differences. And all these things can be covered only when you localize your business and digital campaigns through marketing and advertising translations.
In contrast to popular belief, localization is much more than simply translating your website content through marketing translation services. It requires you to consider local markets, customer preferences there, and the differences each market has, creating a highly personalized shopping experience.
Localizing marketing campaigns requires strong and detailed research, a marketing translation company or AI-powered tools, and a clear understanding of what market you want to enter.
Just imagine how you can boost your marketing through market reposting - translate everything, cut it into different channels, add subtitles and you are ready to go!
We created this article to help you dive deeper into the marketing translation services and localization, as well as the steps and experienced marketing translators you may consider for your business in 2024.
Let's get to the point.
What is Marketing Localization?
Marketing localization means customizing and adapting advertising and marketing content for specific locales by translating it into the local’s own language and covering cultural nuances so the target audience feels that the product and service are relevant and authentic.
Marketing localization is responsible for covering and resolving all the issues marketing teams may face to develop a solid promotion plan tailored to specific cultural nuances and contexts of each chosen locale achieved through advertising translation services.
As we mentioned, more than a simple translation is needed. While making your marketing elements and advertising and marketing content in a local’s own language is still essential, marketing localization also entails tailoring marketing to local customs, beliefs, etiquette, values, behavior patterns, and cultural norms.
Being a crucial part of any global marketing collateral, localization is a common practice used by small and large brands alike to create an emotional connection, grow engagement, and eventually increase sales in other countries.
It is worth mentioning that each business will have specific things to localize depending on the domain, though the most common things that marketing localization should adopt include the following:
- Original message;
- Marketing material;
- Promotion channels;
- Product portfolio;
- Business model;
- Marketing brochures;
- Target language.
4 Main Elements of Marketing Localization
A successful marketing localization strategy entails several crucial elements, including exceptional marketing translation services, that work together and create an engaging and personalized experience for a specific target audience.
Website Advertising Translation, Localization, and Targeted SEO
Using exceptional marketing translation services for marketing and advertising of a website is the first step. Marketing translation services organize the first touchpoint between a brand and the target audience. In addition, making sure the website covers cultural nuances and differences guarantees customer satisfaction and relevance when using the website.
We recommend ensuring that the website marketing content is accurately translated and checked by a native speaker (this is an ideal option). You can use marketing translation services like Rask AI or hire certified translators if you are more keen on working with people rather than marketing translators.
Language translation isn't enough - you should also consider and invest time in adapting the overall style and color palette of the website, changing images if required, and text alignment for some countries and dates after using advertising translation services.
The next point at this stage would be establishing proper Search Engine Optimization (SEO). When we say proper - we mean local ad-targeted SEO optimization that attracts relevant customers from a needed locale and helps you establish yourself as a trusted source of information in relevant search engines.
Adapt Promotional Emails
Marketing doesn't stop on ads and social media channels. Even though email marketing is pretty traditional and, for some, outdated promotion methods, it still works. And it can work especially well in specific countries if you do enough research.
Entering a global market could be a challenge in terms of brand reputation and differentiating your business from the rest of the market. While SEO optimization needs time to help you grow in positions, email marketing allows you to quickly establish relationships with potential or existing customers.
However, it is also essential to adapt all marketing campaigns, ensuring the email messaging resonates with local customers from the very start. This process usually means adapting marketing campaigns to reflect the culture and values of chosen clients.
Do not forget about personalization. While it is crucial in any locale, it becomes even more vital when expanding your business. Addressing as personally as possible is the key to success - try to use as many variables as you can, linking to customer's social media profiles, mentioning that they were looking for something you can offer, etc.
Well-known fact: customers tend to respond more often and positively to catchy emails that relate to their needs and preferences.
Blog Posts for Relevant Narratives
Blogging is extremely popular today, and for a good reason: it allows companies of all sizes to appear in top search results and provide value to the target audience without wasting too much.
Proper blog posts help to demonstrate your expertise in your domain, build trust, and grow engagement. Aside from translation, you should also consider creating blog posts that share stories and knowledge that tie back to a locally relevant narrative.
Simply put, a blog helps you grow authority. So, you should provide insights into industry-specific or locale-specific topics in a relevant and engaging way. This will require understanding your new clients, their needs, and the marketing content types they prefer the most.
Localizing Ads
Ads are a great way to quickly enter the needed market. Though they require more investments, they tend to offer quicker and more tangible results compared to SEO. Therefore, including them in your marketing localization strategy is always a worthy decision.
However, your ad copies should also be localized so they resonate with your international customers. For example, this may include using appropriate culture-specific images and target language. This way, you will be able to increase the chances of your potential customers to open websites and consider your business for their future purchases.
Fine-tuning ad copies also allows companies to meet the changing needs of different audiences, creating a strong marketing message. We also recommend using translation services or hiring native speakers experienced in transcreation so you can develop your brand book and relevantly present your brand across various locales.
Marketing Materials You May Include in Localization Strategy
Each company has its own set of marketing materials, though these are the most common things you may include in the marketing localization strategy when using digital marketing translation services:
- The product portfolio: You will need to choose whether you want to create a list of products for each locale or go with a one-size-fits-all approach.
- The marketing message: Define marketing messaging for all clients, covering cultural differences and customer needs. For that, you need to perform detailed research on competitors, exploring how they position themselves and what their unique selling proposition is.
- The business model: What taxes and local regulations you may need to know and how they can affect your business in different countries.
- Types of marketing materials: What channels and materials are better to use in a specific country? Are they acceptable in the chosen locale? What types of marketing content may your international customers like the most?
- The pricing structure: Different countries have different salaries. You can't expect people living in Europe to spend as much as American residents would. Therefore, you will also need to decide whether you want just to convert the currency or adjust prices to account for income levels.
- SEO: Trying to optimize your localized website with the same approach as with an original site is a poor practice. Instead, choose keywords that are most used within the specific locale and focus on them when creating marketing content for all new websites and channels.
While all the aspects described above are crucial elements of localizing marketing materials, the process also covers two categories:
The experience: It isn't enough to implement all the tactics that ensure your localization will be successful. You should also invest time and resources in establishing a quality user experience in new localized websites or channels. Make sure your customers understand how to use the site and how to interact with you. They always get a personalized experience, and your customer support works within local hours to provide effective help.
The copy: Adapting the actual text in your marketing materials is what is known as digital marketing translation. Read further to explore more on marketing translation services you may want to use for marketing localization.
What Are Marketing Translation Services and Why Should You Use Them?
Marketing translation means translating your marketing materials and campaigns into one target language or multiple ones. While digital marketing translation could be a separate process, it is often a part of marketing localization. Marketing translation services often involve:
- Website marketing copy;
- Social media posts;
- Marketing presentations;
- Email marketing pieces;
- Press releases;
- Product packaging;
- Product descriptions;
- Marketing documents (including public relations documents);
- Marketing brochures;
- Press releases;
- Any other marketing-related material.
Benefits of Digital Marketing Translation Services
Allows Companies to Reach a Wider Audience
Making your marketing materials understandable and available in different languages allows companies to establish their name in foreign markets and grow an international customer base.
Grow Brand Awareness
As more people will be able to interact with your business, they may want to suggest your products and services to other people, offering you a free promotion method in the form of word of mouth. In addition, they may want to share your brand in their special media posts, letting you grow as a brand and boosting awareness.
Increase Customer Satisfaction
Digital marketing translation services allow your international customers to get a clear marketing message and brand proposition. When clients know what you have to offer and can quickly find the thing they came for - the chances of a successful sale are growing, allowing you to both grow sales and overall customer satisfaction (which is an essential factor in boosted ROI).
Prepare Your Content for Go-To-Market Easily with the Help of AI Tools
Marketing translation services have long been here, though performed by certified translators. However, the growth of AI, ML, and NLP and their use cases within different domains made it possible for these technologies to enter the marketing translation industry as cost-effective marketing solutions for businesses of all sizes.
The most popular reason for choosing AI for marketing translation services is its ability to increase the speed and efficiency of target language translation.
Translation has long been time-consuming and costly since it requires human specialists and, often, more than one if you need to translate marketing content to multiple languages. Human specialists translate marketing materials manually and word-by-word, slowing down the localization speed. AI marketing translation services can translate marketing content within minutes, requiring less investment and without sacrificing the quality.
Another reason for modern businesses to use marketing translation services is their ability to translate a wide range of languages accurately. Human translators are often native speakers, and they tend to provide high-quality results.
However, AI tools operate based on large databases, capturing minor differences in dialects, tone of voice, speaking patterns, and other crucial factors that allow for highly accurate results.
Whether you need to translate tutorials, onboardings, promote your product, do marketing, AI tools allow you to easily shoot into different markets, create a stable marketing funnel in foreign languages, test all your hypotheses for product growth - AI tools are the way to go.
Just film one video and let AI create numerous Shorts and other types of content with automatically generated subtitles - all within minutes.
How does AI-Powered Marketing Translation Work?
AI marketing translation services can cover different use cases. Some of the most well-known ones are:
Help Identify Text
AI is often used to identify which marketing materials and text could be translated using marketing translation services and which ones require human specialists or an entire marketing translation company. AI can identify a large volume of "fuzzy" phrases, providing businesses with useful insights regarding text clarity and the resources required.
Assistance for Human Translators
AI isn't always about replacing human work. In contrast to the popular belief that AI will soon replace human specialists in the field of marketing and advertising, AI digital marketing translation services are often used as a handy assistance to humans.
While AI tools can cover all these processes with the same quality results, human imagination, and creativity are still crucial to ensure personalization and localization success.
Streamline Localization
One of the most popular cases of AI tools is localization. Depending on the tools you choose, AI marketing translation services can also help generate the marketing and website content, edit it, proofread it, automate marketing content publishing, or just be used for brainstorming.
Advertising Translation of Complex Educational Content
Just imagine the advertising translation of educational digital content with lots of complex terms. For that, you will want not only native speakers but also experienced ones, at least, a basic understanding of the domain and terms.
In that case, AI marketing translation services are the perfect solution. AI is learning on a large volume of data from various resources, meaning it can handle different languages and terms regardless of the industry and provide reliable results.
Cover Customer Service Functions
As we mentioned above, chatbots are popular, and they are one of the most common AI use cases. For example, some companies have already implemented Microsoft's LUIS tools to provide localized assistance to international customers without the involvement of many human employees.
Edits And Quality Assurance Tasks
AI marketing translation services are helpful in editing. AI marketing translation services are one of the main components in a vast range of edits and quality assurance tasks. Even if you are not keen on using AI for translation, you can include it as a part of checking the translated version of the text and your localization efforts.
AI Video Creation and Translation
Lastly, AI is a powerful tool in video creation and editing. It is often used by creators and companies to generate subtitles, captions, and voiceovers. Not every AI tool is capable of translating the video. You can consider using Rask AI as the leader in video editing, advertising translation, and localization.
How to Organize Digital Marketing Translation and Localization
Step 1: Market Research
Market research is essential. This is the only way to identify your target audience and get to know their preferences, needs, buying patterns, and pain points. Market research is also useful to find competitors, their weak spots to avoid, and strengths you can consider for your business.
Localization requires investments, so you would want to waste money on inaccurate information or try to establish a business in a specific region where there are too many competitors with a much stronger brand.
Therefore, make sure you have detailed market research in your hands before moving to the next step.
Step 2: Adapt Marketing Materials to the New Market
As might be expected, the next step is the actual advertising translations and localization of marketing materials. These include everything from brand books to marketing documents, press releases, video marketing and marketing brochures. When we talk about text content, you will have two options: hiring human translators or using marketing translation services powered by AI and ML.
Localizing video marketing is a more challenging task. Videos are an excellent and cost-effective way to grow our brand awareness. Luckily, there are AI tools that can help you save money on video creation, dubbing, and localization.
For example, Rask AI allows creators to translate their videos into over 130 languages. In addition, Rask's Shorts feature lets users upload a 2-h long video so AI can automatically identify the most engaging parts and generate numerous Shorts for easy marketing content creation and distribution.
Step 3: Localize the website and social media channels
Localizing a website is the last step in the marketing localization process. It is essential to localize your website and social media pages so your international customers can find products or services you have to offer after they see your marketing materials, like emails or marketing brochures.
Giving personalized experiences is a must-have. These are the crucial things to consider for your marketing translation and advertising:
- Change the product pricing structure to display local currency;
- Localize all crucial web pages;
- Adapt technical website elements, including web page layout, font size, and graphic design.
Last Thoughts on Advertising Translation Services
Marketing translation services and localization are growing in popularity as a part of full-scale business localization and expansion. It allows you to successfully enter new markets, reaching a global market and growing sales.
However, it is also vital to choose cost-effective marketing solutions to localize your marketing materials and other parts of the business. While you can hire human specialists to do all the work, advertising translations and localization services powered by AI are an excellent solution today. They offer the same accuracy as humans (when choosing trusted services like Rask AI) and require fewer investments.
