Truth #4: English-based
email campaigns are only half the picture
There are 580 million Internet users in the
world, and virtually all of them (94%) use email.
To put this into perspective, the number of Internet
users in the world is more than twice the entire
population of the United States.
This comes as a surprise to many people in the
U.S., but the majority of Internet users live
OUTSIDE the United States. In fact, the U.S.
represents less than 30% of the total Internet
population.
Yet too many marketers focus their efforts exclusively
on North America (U.S. and Canada). As a result,
they're missing out on potentially 70 percent
of the entire market.
And when they decide to finally go multilingual,
the first language most U.S. companies choose
is Spanish -- because they think Spanish is the
second most common language used on the Internet.
Here's
the shock: it's not Spanish
But here's the little-known "shocking" truth
about the global use of the Internet: the second-most
frequently used language isn't Spanish, it's
Chinese.
It's not hard to understand why: China has over
a billion people. And they're increasingly buying
computers and activating email accounts. In a
decade, Chinese might very well be the No.1 language
used on the Internet. If you have a product,
service or technology that can be marketed to
Chinese-speaking 'netizens, you have tremendous
market potential that's worth exploring.
Enter
Asian markets
Depending on what kind of product, service or
technology you're offering, investing in an Asian
marketing strategy could quite easily be one
of the most successful business decisions you'll
make this year.
But it's not just about THIS YEAR. Eventually,
nearly every successful marketing firm will need
to tackle the Asian markets. You can't argue
with a billion people, and why would you want
to anyway? Those folks have credit cards that
work just the same as U.S.-issued credit cards.
Money knows no borders.
But how do you take advantage of this? After
all, you probably don't speak Chinese, right?
On this
point, I'm going to simultaneously make a recommendation
and plug a company I've been involved with
for several years. My recommendation? Hook up
with a translations firm and start translating
your email campaigns and website landing pages
into multiple languages.
My plug? Arial Global, Inc. (http://www.ArialGlobalReach.com)
It's a high-tech translations firm specializing
in Asian languages. They can take your email
marketing and web marketing campaigns and rework
them for the Asian markets, allowing you to tap
into a whole new global market.
They've handled projects for Intel, HP, and
dozens of other major firms, and they were recently
awarded a GSA contract from the U.S. government.
They even received the "Localization Vendor
of the Year" award from Intel. Arial Global
handled all the translations of my own company's
site, and as a result, we've seen our Asian sales
increase substantially.
Even if an Asian marketing strategy isn't right
for you today, keep an eye on this. The Chinese
language will continue to gain share in the years
ahead, eventually emerging as the most common
language on the 'net. The time to start thinking
global, if you're not already, is right now.
Limiting yourself to English-speaking customers
is simply TOO limiting in this global marketplace.
Conduct
your email marketing campaigns in multiple languages
Whether
you use Arial Global or another firm is beside
the point. The important thing here is to consider
the untapped revenue potential in conducted your
permission email campaigns in multiple languages.
With a bit of investment, you could be emailing
your permission campaigns in Spanish, Chinese,
Japanese, French, German or any other language.
Your recipients would be reading your messages
in their native language instead of their
second language (English, usually).
Suddenly, your credibility takes a leap.
Watch out for this trap, however: if you send
emails in another language, make sure you can
handle email replies in that language. Otherwise,
your customer will soon realize they're talking
to a brick wall. Also, if you have clickable
links in your multilingual email campaigns, make
sure they point to web pages written in each
appropriate language.
NEXT: THE REAL REASON PEOPLE OPEN YOUR EMAIL
Ever wondered what causes people to actually open and
read your email? Some people think it's the email
subject. Other are convinced it's the opening
paragraph of the email content. In fact, it's
neither. There's something else that's the No.
1 factor in determining whether your email gets
opened. And the combination that works is different
for men than women.
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