Demand for Multilingual Products and Services On The Rise
While the US dollar is down many larger US firms are seeing an increasingly large demand of exports for their goods and services. Consumers are seeing smaller dollar signs for US exports and multinationals trying to see their way in to untapped or smaller markets. In fact, many international firms are seeing the weakened dollar as a major opportunity to become more internationally focused. Providing the international consumer with accessibility to what you have and what you’re about as a business is more important than ever. Now let’s get to the point.
The Common Sense Advisory’s ‘Cant’ Read, Won’t Buy’ report found that 85% of all consumers require information in their native language before making a purchase. Would I buy a guitar from Russian website? Absolutely not. Why? Because I don’t speak Russian. As the English language only counts for 31% of online usage, imagine this same Russian guitar situation happening with 69% of your customers. Translation services can facilitate just what market demands.
Companies are slowly learning that the biggest markets don’t carry US passports anymore. Who, then is the international consumer? Where do they live? And what language do they speak? There doesn’t seem to be a clear answer for these questions, but here are a few ideas according to Econsultancy.com
- Between 2000 and 2008, available online content increased in:
- Chinese by 755%
- Portuguese by 668%
- Arabic by 2064%
- English 204%.
- E-commerce in Western Europe is expected to reach €114 billion by 2014.
- Over half of all Google searches are in languages other than English.
The weakened Dollar and the sluggish recovery of the US economy points out that showing your face to the world not only will be necessary, but is necessary. The precedent has been set, we are a global world and we’re going to have to get to know each other be that by way of websites, products on a shelf or a contract.