|
Jenny Hultman The Need for Multiple Languages in Online Marketing.
The Internet is a global communication network. Today English is the dominant language of the Internet but it’s just a matter of time before non-English language will catch up. The face of the Internet has changed and the expansion of it has sky-rocked all over the world. Since the Internet breaks down borders and more non-English speaking users access the Internet, it’s important that businesses marketing themselves online to become multilingual, The economy has become global.
How many non-English speaking people actually access the Internet? Companies might wonder if there really is a market outside U.S. and if it’s significant to them. You can actually miss a huge market by staying monolingual. The International Online Marketing from Global Reach states; 68% of the world’s purchasing power and 92% of the potential customers don’t speak English as their native language. They also estimate that by 2002, 66% of Internet use will come from outside the U.S. Languages with significant increase online are; Spanish, Portuguese, German, Japanese, Chinese and Scandinavian languages. According to Emarketer, the fastest growing Internet markets are China and India, with a combined population of a third of the world’s 6 Billion people. "Speakers with a first language other than English are the fastest-growing group of new Internet users; the total number of people on line is about 107 million" (Michel Marriott).
Europe is one of the largest trading-partners with the U.S. and as an example, only 15% speaks English as a first language, 28% speak English at all, and 32% of Web-surfers seek information in English. Therefore, the importance of acknowledge non-English speakers on the Internet is obvious.
Why should a company still use foreign languages, doesn’t everyone know English? The World is 25 times larger than America, yet many people believe that most people in the world speak English. Marketing should always take place in the language of a country. Bill Dunlap points out in an article from Global Reach using people in Sweden and Holland as examples, most of these populations read and speak English but the majority surf the Internet in their native languages. He also states; "The Web is a media and people access media in their own language". You actually don’t see that many American Web-sites in foreign languages, besides the largest most progressive companies. On the other hand most European Web-sites use several languages. Because of their geographic location, European countries have dealt with other countries and languages for centuries. American companies never had to worry about that since their home-market was so huge and everyone spoke English. The Internet has changed the traditional style and to stay on top of their business they can’t afford not to market themselves internationally and also going multilingual. The Web-site of a company has to grab a buyer’s attention and convince them to spend time on the site. The most important thing to do so is to speak their language. Global Reach states at their home page that if people are not speaking English at home and they read news-papers in their own languages, most likely they want to access the Internet in their own languages too. As a matter of fact, many Americans access the Web in two languages. In 1999 US Census stated that there were 32 Million people online who do not speak English at home in America.
Now if a company decides to translate their web-site where should they go and what should they look out for? According to Robert Richardson from the article "Sell Globally, Speak Locally", Language Force actually controls about 72% of the language translation software through its Universal Translator Product Line. http.//www.languageforce.com (92). Language Force translates web-pages, email, documents and more in 33 languages, using a Universal Translator Deluxe. An online store is found on their web-site where you can order different software. Altavista also has a translation feature called Babelfish which can be accessed at: http://babelfish.altavista.com/ Altavista present only five languages that can be translated and those are; French, German, Italian, Portuguese and Spanish. They can be translated to and from English. I tried to put in simple phrases in German and when the translation came back in English the sentence structure stayed the same as in German. That isn’t good since it should have changed. Language Force definitely controls the machine-translation but nothing can still compare to hiring a professional translator. A software can get close in the translation but there will always be errors and those errors can cost a company millions. To hire someone and get a professional translation is probably worth the couple of thousands when it comes down to it. A Pepsi-slogan in America read as "Come Alive With Pepsi", while in China the translation read "Pepsi brings your ancestors back from the grave" (Gary P. Ferrraro 8). This is an example of how a simple mistake can hurt your credibility and reputation. It’s important to understand that there’s a close relationship between language and culture and if you can understand this you have a great advantage of your competitors. "Whatever languages you adopt, and however you get your translations, don’t neglect to market your site in your targeted foreign markets" (Robert Richardson 1). Every language is unique and therefore we have to acknowledge that a word can be perceived in different ways. This is another reason why the translation software might not be the best solution for a company. A software can still get you fairly close to the original text, though, and it makes it easier on the translator.
In conclusion, the Internet has been dominated by the English language and the North American culture but as the Internet has become a global business tool, the trade language is not only English anymore. The market is very competitive and for U.S. companies to avoid falling behind while waiting for the market to come to them, I see no choice for them other than going multilingual. This is very important which the statistics shown prove and there is a huge market opportunity for them who actualize this. |