What if we could show you how to put your content out in front of hundreds of millions of viewers with little or even no competition? The strategic translation and localization of your content can provide you with all of the tools you need to begin attracting tens or even hundreds of millions of potential new customers or clients who are hungry for your products and your services.
The only question left now is how to make that happen.
Translation and Localization by the Numbers
What the introductory illustration from W3Techs shows, is the current listing of languages on the internet, as a percentage of all content online. What this demonstrates is the amount of competition both direct and indirect when writing in any language.
At the time of this writing, 59.8% of all the content online is in English. Whether directly or indirectly, you are going to have to compete with almost 60% of the content online when writing in English.
Some research will be necessary, but any single translation of your marketing content can eliminate anywhere from 90% to more than 99% of both direct and indirect competition (and content) online. Looking at the information given, it becomes easier to formulate a viable international content marketing strategy.
How to Develop an International Content Marketing Strategy
In order to determine the best way to develop an international marketing content strategy, you need to determine which are the best foreign markets in order to gain a larger, more lucrative international audience. By using these content marketing strategies, you really can introduce your products and services to large and hungry audiences, ready to purchase your products and services.
Using translation services to translate your content to any language other than English will immediately reduce your competition to single digits in regards to web content and the many languages of the internet. Would it be easier to rank well on the search engines if you reduced your competition down to single percentage points of internet content?
Determine which countries and which languages can be used to determine where there are international markets that are under-represented on the internet. Use translation services in order to translate your website content into the basic languages, and use translation and localization services to focus your marketing efforts more precisely to the foreign markets.
Understanding Translation and Localization for Content Marketing
The content translation will put your materials into a language that people can understand, but is it going to speak to them on a personal level? Localization is the means by which you can speak to your audience on a more personal and direct level, increasing the ability for the content to sway them and elicit the desired reaction from the target market.
For the content translation services, any local expressions or other more specific vernacular can also be changed using localization services. For example, content targeted to big-city residents would likely be written differently than content written for small rural communities. Now just imagine how large the difference is between different countries that speak the same language.
There are many phrases or expressions of speech that can change the entire meaning of a translation, so these should be addressed using localization. These expressions can be replaced by similar expressions in the language being used for the translation in order to keep the same meaning, but make it more personal for the target audience.
Image source: Boredpanda.com
Are there any geographical locations mentioned in the content? If there are, is it possible that they can be exchanged in the content translation to focus instead of similar geographic areas within the new target market?
The localization strategies for successful content marketing will extend beyond just language translation services as well. In a location where cattle are considered sacred, a picture of people barbecuing a steak may not be an ideal photograph to include with your content.
Translation and Localization for Social Media Marketing
Social media is an important part of an overall content marketing campaign, and yet again, translation and localization can help to greatly increase the ability to get content out in front of a vastly under-represented target market.
Facebook supports roughly 111 languages (including Pirate believe it or not) while Google supports about 100. YouTube supports more than eighty languages, but will be looked at separately later on.
Whether or not you should focus on translating your content into pirate language is debatable, but there is still a very large and untapped market for translated content on social media platforms.
The content that is distributed on social media sites is far more likely to be shared, especially among people who already enjoy very little content on these platforms. The content translation services that you have already utilized should allow you to begin actively posting content rather than just advertising on the social media platforms around the world.
There are also a great many social media platforms that are more specific to markets where localization can be a factor. Many countries that are under-represented on the primarily English language social media platforms have their own variations as HootSuite has pointed out in this article.
The content translation has already given the marketer the basis for building a more local and direct audience in addition to their other content marketing strategies. This is true with all of the social media platforms, but as was noted, YouTube also offers some global and international benefits using translation and localization to increase your reach and influence with online content.
Video Content Marketing with Translation and Localization
It is always preferable to use closed captioning SRT files instead of subtitles for video content marketing. The reason, quite simply, is that you can generate any number of SRT language files using video translation services, and these SRT files will be fully indexed by all of the search engines.
The YouTube search engines routinely compete and exchange places with Amazon to be the second or third most popular search engine online. The inclusion of the SRT files increases the number of keywords and the rank on all of the search engines.
Add in the reduction of competition in the foreign language translations and this greatly increases the possibility of the video showing up in the recommended videos on YouTube. The use of video translation services to generate SRT files also greatly increases the ranking of the website on the SERP in the native language and on the foreign languages results pages.
Translation, Localization and SEO for Content Marketing
You should now have all of the necessary tools you need to begin doing research and seeking out potentially lucrative foreign markets and greatly reducing your level of competition for your content marketing online.
Translation and localization services are not restricted, so after you have successfully penetrated one new market, shoot for a second, then a third.
Rinse and repeat and properly implemented translation and localization services can help you to build a successful international content marketing strategy leaving your competition completely lost for words and struggling to catch up.
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