We live in a digital world. It’s become the biggest propeller of revenue for many different industries. Digital media revenue growth is projected to be over $414 billion by 2025. Because of this, a website means more than it did ten years ago. It’s become the central place people use to find your company and buy your product – especially in new markets. The best way to successfully do this is for new markets is to incorporate digital marketing processes in each market’s native language. Luckily, we can guide you through what is involved in implementing a successful digital marketing localization strategy.
What is Digital Marketing Localization?
Digital marketing localization is preparing digital marketing assets for specific target audiences that speak languages other than English. These digital marketing assets include:
- Website content
- Emails
- Blog posts
- Videos
- Images
- Audio
- Social media profiles
- Consumer engagement data
- E-books or brochures
Why is it important for these assets to be localized for new markets? As stated before, it’s the best way to attract a broader consumer base in that market. Having content in a consumer’s native language is incredibly important for ensuring your content resounds with your target audience enough to convert them to your brand and drive a profit.
The How-To Strategy Guide for Digital Marketing Localization
If you’re wondering how technical you need to get with your digital marketing localization strategy? The answer is: extremely technical. It begins as a platform-driven initiative based on your content management system and how well it allows you to implement localization. The framework for a successful and sustainable strategy includes the following:
Determine your localization goal.
Think deeply about what you want from the localization process: increased sales, increased content awareness, greater brand recognition, etc.
Decide which assets will be included in the project.
Do you want to include ongoing email campaigns, blog posts, social media posts, or just the website content?
Assess your CMS framework.
Each CMS platform (I.e., WordPress, Adobe Experience Manager, etc.) works differently, and some have built-in avenues for localization, and others can make it considerably more difficult. Determine if your CMS will support your localization goals without requiring excessive engineering.
Plan a specific localization process for each asset/language.
Each form of content requires a different translation process, and this also varies from language to language. This planning includes determining how active local agencies will be in creating or reviewing content.
Ensure tools cooperate with each other.
From connectors to translation memories and more, each tool and feature should seamlessly integrate into the workflow without excessive engineering for increased sustainability.
Begin localizing content.
Implement the localization plans and adjust the framework or strategy as needed for each asset if problems arise.
Plan a localization process for each asset/language.
This varies from language to language. This includes determining how active local agencies will be in creating or reviewing content.
Ensure tools cooperate with each other.
From connectors to translation memories and more, each tool and feature should be able to seamlessly integrate into the workflow without excessive engineering for increased sustainability.
Begin localizing content.
Implement the localization plans and adjust the framework or strategy as needed for each asset if problems arise.While the process may have varying nuances for different companies, this overall strategy creates a guide for making the process as easy as possible.
Why Localization Starts with Framework
Localization will always be more complex than you originally imagine. Your website architecture and CMS platform for your content are the most important thing for creating a sustainable localization process.
You should review your current platform with your localization goals in mind to assess if it can handle the process efficiently. Your current CMS may work very well for English, but it can become exponentially more complex when localizing to another language and doubling the content. The complications will only grow with each additional language and each new content addition or update. If you don’t have a CMS that is structured to support localization, it can create issues with managing the project efficiently and even lead to a waste of resources.
Even when using the best translation agency, the localization process will be terrible if the architectural framework isn’t good enough. The following are common CMS platforms for digital marketing assets:
Websites
Blogging
Social Media
- Constant contact
- Hubspot marketing hub
- Salesforce marketing cloud
- Sendinblue
- Mailchimp
- Oracle Eloqua
- Mapp Cloud
- Hubspot CMS hub
- Wordpress
- Pantheon
- Duda
- Adobe experience manager
- Drupal
- Sitecore
- Wordpress
- Blogger
- Squarespace
- Tumblr
- Movable Type
- Ghost
- Wix
- Gator
- Sprout social
- Hootsuite
- Loomly
- MeetEdgar
- Sendible
- Social Pilot
- Buffer
The Platform Advantage
Partnering with a localization management platform will give you access to proven strategy tactics for digital marketing localization – from assessing basic architecture to deploying localized content.
At Bureau Works, we understand the importance of treating localization as an important marketing opportunity that deserves executive visibility from the get-go. We’ve enhanced our platform tools and localization strategies to help you optimize consumer expansion, ROI, expenses, and time to market. And we believe in doing so with a transparent workflow process, so you understand what’s happening every step of the way and are as involved as you want to be in the process.