Less than five years ago many businesses were skeptical about social media. Nowadays, the question What doors would a Twitter account open for my business? Seems awfully old-fashioned. We’ve learned a valuable lesson: It’s always a good idea to get somewhere before your customers do. Time to move on to the next question:
What doors would translating content into other languages open for my business?
You never know whether you’ve missed out on business because your content was only available in English.
The first step is to determine which languages make sense for your business. There is no need to translate your website or marketing campaigns into Danish if there isn’t any link between your brand and Denmark. Read our blog about the most important online languages. Even if you end up translating into Spanish only, you’ve opened up your content to more than 400 million native speakers.
Second, make sure that you get it right. There is nothing more humiliating than a terrible translation of the text that you took so much time and effort to create. Enlist a translation agency with marketing, advertising, social media and online content expertise. Choose an agency that translates to and from any language, so that it’s easier if you should decide to add more languages later. Pick a translation agency that knows how to make SEO-friendly translations. Read our tips about localizing your content.
Finally, don’t worry about the consequences. Yes, people may assume that since your website is in German, you offer fulltime German-speaking customer service – although you don’t. But translating your content isn’t about that. It’s about trust and respect. People will get to know your brand better by reading about it in their mother tongue. People will spread the word about you more easily; they will appreciate your efforts to reach out to them.