The power of the Internet has connected each and every one of us with the world at large. Even those countries where civilians don’t have a personal computer often have a huge mobile-user base that can connect to the Internet that way. As such, no matter who you are, or more importantly what your company does or sells, you can find a greater customer base globally. To attract, communicate, and to gain loyal customers abroad, however, you need to follow these tips:
- Find Out Where Your Demographic Is
If you already have a fairly large audience in, for instance, Spain, you already know the first language and country you should invest into marketing towards. If you do not know where to start, and don’t already have the global data to help you choose which countries have your largest demographic, that’s okay. Instead, work down the list in terms of most popular languages. Mandarin, for instance, has over a billion speakers, Spanish has just over 400 million speakers, followed by English. Continue working down this list to help expand your global reach.
- Invest in Professional Translations
Once you know which languages your customers speak, or you want to appeal to the populations that speak the most popular languages, it’s time to get your pages and content translated. You cannot, however, expect that running your page through a service like Google translate will be useful, as language is incredibly nuanced and though Google Translate is excellent to help foreigners navigate through a new country, it shouldn’t be relied on when your business is in question. Instead, use translation services to get the job done right.
- Have Multiple Social Media Accounts
On social media, it can be hard enough to get one account popular. Though English is the lingua franca, it can be incredibly valuable to open up new accounts. You will automatically have less competition, as your new accounts will have a more targeted intention, but more importantly, your customers can follow you, read about you, and so on in their native tongue. Don’t just copy-paste content – make each page feel fresh.
- Hire Multilingual or Dedicated Customer Service Representatives
If your company can afford to have a dedicated call service, hiring multilingual individuals can be more effective both in cost and in productivity. The better you can communicate with your customers, the better, and being able to help them out in their native language can make a world of difference. The more effort you put into being able to communicate and help your customers, the more impressive your business will seem.
Know who your demographic is, and where the largest populations are outside of your home country. That way you can start small in terms of offering a global reach, and you can do it correctly. Relying on poor translations or a one-size-fits-all stance on marketing won’t help you, it will hurt you. Follow these tips, and you will successfully expand your business’s global reach in no time.
