Comment vous sentez-vous aujourd'hui? (Marketing in other languages than English)

by Ryan Sorensen

Posted: 16 years ago 9 replies

INTERNET MARKETING

Bienvenue! In case you hadn't guessed it that's French.

I speak it almost fluently and have thought about doing some IM on French speaking sites but have resisted until I feel more comfortable marketing in good ol' English.

I know that the main language of the internet is English, but there are still multi-millions of people that still go online in their native language.

Has anyone experimented with internet marketing in other languages? Seen some success?

#aujourdhui #comment #language #marketing #other countries #sentezvous #vous

Ben Holmes 16 years ago

I'm willing to bet that it would be tremendously profitable! Just think, you've avoided all the English sites hyping a particular product, and even your domain name might be easier to get. So the competition simply won't be there as ferociously as it can be in English.

Alas, I'm not bilingual, but I've often wished I were just for this reason...
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Mohammad Afaq 16 years ago

I never really tried it because I only know English and Urdu (well Hindi too as they are almost the same) and I doubt that Pakistan (Urdu) or India (Hindi) are worth the extra effort.

Online shopping isn't really as common in those countries as it is in western world. I also don't feel like going the extra mile is because english is also real common in these nations so I can make the sale even if I am speaking english.

EDIT: I will actually be taking a foreign language class (it's a must in college) so I plan on testing a little bit.
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- Waller Jamison 16 years ago
  
  Interesting idea. I studied German and Chinese at university and also French at school/evening class and have just started Italian. I'm starting a site about language learning but haven't really thought about marketing in other languages.
  
  Would be interesting to see if other people have tried it and to hear how it's going.
  
  Waller
  
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Prisqua 16 years ago

Well I am French but no, never thought about doing a blog in French but that's probably because I don't live in France and barely have the need to speak French. Though my mentor was mentioning the other day about having mirrored sites in other countries.
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I.M.Retired 16 years ago

Comment vous sentez-vous aujourd'hui?

I'm feeling fine today. Et vous?

I haven't tried marketing in another language simply because I'm not familiar with many of the subtle nuances of other cultures. Language is one thing; cultural familiarity is another.
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Istvan Horvath 16 years ago

Every month we have a newbie "discovering" there are other languages than English

Just because you are 'almost' fluent in a language... don't think you'll be able to do IM in other languages.

Do a search for Spanish or Russian or Chinese etc. here in the forum and you will learn a lot.
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LauraJames 16 years ago

My company has offices in Canada and the USA. In Canada, especially when we deal with someone from the province of Quebec or New Brunswick, it is not uncommon for us to deal with a French speaking customer. (Please note that French Canadian has some differences from the French that is spoken in France). The rest of Canada, for the most part, is English speaking, although French and English are both recognized as official languages. We have designed products in French, when requested by customers.

Within the USA, our workers there have helped Spanish speaking customers with their projects as well, when needed. Most of the customers are English speaking, however. It has helped my company's workers to have the knowledge, and ability, to work within other languages depending on the needs and preferences of the customers.

Joyeux Noel.
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- Fazal Mayar 16 years ago
  
  i speak french very well and fluently since im from quebec, i never thought about doing a blog in french but i would have no problem so since i write and speak it well!!
  
  Bonsoir a tous, je vous souhaite une bonne journee.
  
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markowe 16 years ago

I doubt many English IMers are tapping the markets for languages other than their own (other than 'translating' their sites with Google Translate, which I personally couldn't bring myself to do). You would need to pay for proper translation and localisation services, and/or preferably have someone on your team who is a native speaker of the language in question to run proper campaigns. For a language like Serbian (where I could easily supply translation), the market just isn't that interesting. But for French, or whatever western language I might think about doing some keyword research for 'acheter xyz' if I was a native speaker, to see if there were potential customers I was missing.

As things stand, what I have started doing is geotargetting my affiliate links, since I do get non-English visitors to my niche sites etc. But the content is still in English. I just figure they still might click through, though I haven't deployed that widely enough yet to be sure it increases my earnings by any significant amount.
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