To take your company to another level and direct your business abroad online, you must first of all focus on the translation of the website and its localization. Because your goal is to communicate, and communicate well.
The good old offline marketing strategy undertaken by companies has been supported for some time now – and almost predominantly – by an online marketing strategy. The potential customer can learn about your brand or your product by going directly to your store or more easily by scrolling on their phone screen.
The online site allows you to overcome the inevitable geographical barriers and virtually reach customers who are kilometers away from you.
But what if your target customer comes from a country where a different language is spoken than yours?
First of all, it is necessary to identify the country to target according to precise market analyzes and very precise segmentation assessments. Certain variables of the target customer carefully chosen by the marketing sector must be known to satisfy the company objectives. Among these, the geographical position, the socio-cultural and economic factor, the lifestyle and consumption habits.
This information is a sine qua non to ensure that the translation of your website is adapted to the destination country, without risking offending or being misunderstood by the overseas customer beyond the screen.
Adopting an internationalization process for the site is essential to allow access and navigation to foreign customers: you cannot limit yourself to a mere translation of digital contents, but rather you need to contextualize the translation of your e-commerce site. Words, like images or colors, have a value that is not always the same and universal for all countries and cultures in the world.
It is a priority to convey a positive and coherent message through the online channel, thus taking into account the cultural differences that characterize us.
The naming phenomenon in China
Many foreign companies that want to enter the Chinese market pay particular attention to the translation of their brand. The still widespread practice of naming serves to positively involve Chinese customers – especially the older ones, not yet fully accustomed to Western languages.
The choice of Chinese ideograms for the translation of a logo is a powerful means of loyalty and brand identity. In China, the winning ace in logo translation is either to respect the original name on a semantic and phonetic level or to combine together a series of positive meanings that can reflect the brand. All while taking care to choose sounds or characters appreciated by the Chinese audience.
A successful case of naming is that of the multinational giant in the food & beverage sector: the Chinese name of the Coca Cola brand is 可口可乐 (Kěkǒukělè), literally “delicious and makes you happy”. Not as positive was the translation of the English Best Buy logo 百思买 (Bǎisīmǎi), often interpreted by the Chinese as “think a hundred times before you buy” – which clearly did not contribute to a good positioning in the market.
For this reason, it is absolutely necessary to consult professionals and expert linguists, who can rely on their cultural knowledge and direct experiences to guarantee an effective and persuasive translation of the website, with all the necessary care. Only an expert in Chinese culture and civilization will be able to advise against “total white” for the advertising campaign of a foreign company that wants to expand in China.
Agencies like LingoYou provide a multilingual marketing service to find the most relevant translation of your business website. This solution together with an in-depth study of web graphics from an SEO perspective will only pave the way for you towards success abroad.
LingoYou Press Office
