Many brands and businesses today have a growing international customer base. Even if your target audience is based geographically in one country, chances are not all of them speak English as their primary language. For example, in the USA alone, there are 42 million native Spanish speakers.
As audiences have become increasingly diverse in terms of language base and cultural context, localisation has become a must-have element of any successful international marketing strategy.
In this guide, we’ll look at what makes a well-localised email marketing campaign.
Contents
- What is localisation?
- 11 tips for localising your email campaigns
-
- Understand your target markets
- Transcreate don’t translate
- Keep it timely
- Be relatable
- Design for different languages
- Consider colour
- Choose local imagery
- Explore device behaviour
- Be aware of regulations
- Pay attention to the details
- Get in the zone
- Case study
- Reach out to experts
What is localisation?
The goal of localisation is to make your content relatable and relevant to your audience, wherever they are in the world. That means adapting your content to suit the varied cultural norms and preferences of customers in each local market.
But what does this mean in practice?
Localising email campaigns: 11 tips
Tip 1: Understand your target markets
The first and most important step is to gain an understanding of your target audience’s preferences, behaviour and motivations. This research will inform how you implement the other tips in this list.
For example, recent market research conducted by LinkedIn suggests that shoppers in Japan respond better to softer, polite CTAs. This sort of insight should shape the choice of language and tone of voice used when writing or transcreating content for a Japanese audience.
Here are a few different ideas for getting to know your international customer bases:
- A/B test your email content to see what drives the most positive engagement. You could test the tone of a subject line, the type of imagery you show, or where a CTA appears. Just remember to try and only test for one variable at a time to ensure you’re getting the right reads.
- Dive into Google Analytics to better understand your customer’s behaviour. For example, you might notice that users in one country tend to spend more time reading and absorbing information before making a purchase decision than others. This might impact the amount of content you choose to include in an email, the CTA you choose, or the landing page you direct them to.
- Conduct SEO keyword research by country to understand the key terms customers use and more importantly, the intent behind them. Look for variations in the search queries from different markets to better understand their priorities and where they are likely to be in the customer journey.
- Explore market and consumer trends on sites like Statistica which give you an insight into consumer attitudes and preferences across a whole range of topics.
Tip 2: Transcreate don’t translate
Your original copy is crafted with care and intent. We know how much thought goes into each word in a winning subject line or click-worthy CTA. Don’t let that effort go to waste on your international mailing list with a basic ‘google translate’. Localised content should receive the same level of diligence.
A straight-up, copy-paste translation of your original copy can mean customers receive emails filled with references they don’t understand, that lack authenticity and that tempt them to unsubscribe.
A professional transcreator adapts your original source copy, taking into account the cultural context and linguistic nuances of your target market, to deliver maximum impact in a particular language.
Tip 3: Keep it relevant
A localised email content calendar should account for the different seasonal holidays, events and celebrations marked wherever your customers are based. Simply replicating your content plans across multiple international markets will lead to missed opportunities for building relationships with your customers and generating revenue.
Take Father’s Day for instance. In Germany, May 29 is his big day. But in the US Dads are celebrated on June 15. This nuance should have implications for when you schedule your gift guides and shipping cut-off reminders to hit your customer’s inboxes.
Localised content calendars keep your content relevant which is more likely to drive engagement and conversion.
Tip 4: Be relatable
Customer case studies and testimonials make excellent email content, particularly as part of a welcome series or early on in the customer journey. Wherever possible, you should showcase examples from a customer’s particular community or country. Consumers value authenticity in the brands they choose to support and celebrating local success stories is an excellent way to demonstrate your credentials.
Tip 5: Design for different languages
When transcreating content, the character counts of each section of text can expand or decrease depending on the language. For example, you are likely to need more space to accommodate a hero headline in German, than in English. Chinese, on the other hand, tends to use less space.
Remember that some languages, like Arabic or Hebrew are also written from right to left, requiring different alignment and layout settings.
Designing intentionally for different languages will ensure your content always renders correctly in your customer’s inboxes.
Tip 6: Consider colour
Colours can trigger a subconscious emotional reaction in human beings. But did you know that different colours are linked with different emotions in different countries?
For example, in Germany, yellow is associated with jealousy and envy, while in Latin America it represents death and mourning. Similarly, in European countries the colour black is often used to convey elegance or formality, but in India, it has negative connotations of anger and intolerance.
Colour is often the first element we notice about or associate with a brand, so as you expand into new markets, consider the impact of your email colour palette and what it might represent to potential customers.
Tip 7: Choose local imagery
As with customer case studies and testimonials, using familiar or relatable imagery of ‘people, places and things’ in your emails helps to build trust and credibility with your audience. It could be as small a tweak as showing the Eiffel Tower instead of the Empire State Building, but details like this can make a big difference.
Tip 8: Explore device behaviour
Optimise your content for the dominant device and email provider in a target region to maximise opportunities for engagement. Your email production partner should be able to provide this information and sites like Statistica can also provide a country-level overview.
Tip 9: Be aware of regulations
Many countries have specific legislation surrounding email marketing communication, particularly around consent and the use of consumer’s personal data. Understanding and adhering to these country-specific regulations will prevent your emails being marked as spam.
Tip 10: Pay attention to the details
As well as transcreating copy, you’ll also need to adapt the formatting of dates, currency and measurements throughout your email content, as this varies depending on location. For example, in the USA dates are written Month/Date/Year while in Europe it’s Date/Month/Year. Again, getting small details like this right helps to build trust with your audience.
Tip 11: Get in the zone
Last but certainly not least–your emails should be scheduled to hit people’s inboxes at the optimal time i.e. when they’re most likely to open, read and (hopefully) engage with them. Be sure to account for different time zones when deciding the best time to hit send.
Case Study
Blurb partners with Scalero and CultureSmith to enhance its global email marketing strategy. Scalero manages the execution of Blurb’s email campaigns and journeys, including copywriting, design, production, and quality assurance. For each email, eight versions are created to accommodate the following languages: English, German, Spanish, North American Spanish, French, Canadian French, Italian, and Dutch with all transcreated content provided by CultureSmith. This meticulous approach has led to higher engagement rates and contributed to the overall success of Blurb’s marketing efforts. Learn more about it here.
Reach out to experts
Email localisation is a must-have element of international marketing strategies. When done right, it will improve your overall customer experience, strengthen your brand and ultimately drive sales and revenue.
Leverage the expertise of Scalero and CultureSmith to bring your international email marketing campaigns to life.
Many brands and businesses today have a growing international customer base. Even if your target audience is based geographically in one country, chances are not all of them speak English as their primary language. For example, in the USA alone, there are 42 million native Spanish speakers.
As audiences have become increasingly diverse in terms of language base and cultural context, localisation has become a must-have element of any successful international marketing strategy.
In this guide, we’ll look at what makes a well-localised email marketing campaign.
Contents
- What is localisation?
- 11 tips for localising your email campaigns
-
- Understand your target markets
- Transcreate don’t translate
- Keep it timely
- Be relatable
- Design for different languages
- Consider colour
- Choose local imagery
- Explore device behaviour
- Be aware of regulations
- Pay attention to the details
- Get in the zone
- Case study
- Reach out to experts
What is localisation?
The goal of localisation is to make your content relatable and relevant to your audience, wherever they are in the world. That means adapting your content to suit the varied cultural norms and preferences of customers in each local market.
But what does this mean in practice?
Localising email campaigns: 11 tips
Tip 1: Understand your target markets
The first and most important step is to gain an understanding of your target audience’s preferences, behaviour and motivations. This research will inform how you implement the other tips in this list.
For example, recent market research conducted by LinkedIn suggests that shoppers in Japan respond better to softer, polite CTAs. This sort of insight should shape the choice of language and tone of voice used when writing or transcreating content for a Japanese audience.
Here are a few different ideas for getting to know your international customer bases:
- A/B test your email content to see what drives the most positive engagement. You could test the tone of a subject line, the type of imagery you show, or where a CTA appears. Just remember to try and only test for one variable at a time to ensure you’re getting the right reads.
- Dive into Google Analytics to better understand your customer’s behaviour. For example, you might notice that users in one country tend to spend more time reading and absorbing information before making a purchase decision than others. This might impact the amount of content you choose to include in an email, the CTA you choose, or the landing page you direct them to.
- Conduct SEO keyword research by country to understand the key terms customers use and more importantly, the intent behind them. Look for variations in the search queries from different markets to better understand their priorities and where they are likely to be in the customer journey.
- Explore market and consumer trends on sites like Statistica which give you an insight into consumer attitudes and preferences across a whole range of topics.
Tip 2: Transcreate don’t translate
Your original copy is crafted with care and intent. We know how much thought goes into each word in a winning subject line or click-worthy CTA. Don’t let that effort go to waste on your international mailing list with a basic ‘google translate’. Localised content should receive the same level of diligence.
A straight-up, copy-paste translation of your original copy can mean customers receive emails filled with references they don’t understand, that lack authenticity and that tempt them to unsubscribe.
A professional transcreator adapts your original source copy, taking into account the cultural context and linguistic nuances of your target market, to deliver maximum impact in a particular language.
Tip 3: Keep it relevant
A localised email content calendar should account for the different seasonal holidays, events and celebrations marked wherever your customers are based. Simply replicating your content plans across multiple international markets will lead to missed opportunities for building relationships with your customers and generating revenue.
Take Father’s Day for instance. In Germany, May 29 is his big day. But in the US Dads are celebrated on June 15. This nuance should have implications for when you schedule your gift guides and shipping cut-off reminders to hit your customer’s inboxes.
Localised content calendars keep your content relevant which is more likely to drive engagement and conversion.
Tip 4: Be relatable
Customer case studies and testimonials make excellent email content, particularly as part of a welcome series or early on in the customer journey. Wherever possible, you should showcase examples from a customer’s particular community or country. Consumers value authenticity in the brands they choose to support and celebrating local success stories is an excellent way to demonstrate your credentials.
Tip 5: Design for different languages
When transcreating content, the character counts of each section of text can expand or decrease depending on the language. For example, you are likely to need more space to accommodate a hero headline in German, than in English. Chinese, on the other hand, tends to use less space.
Remember that some languages, like Arabic or Hebrew are also written from right to left, requiring different alignment and layout settings.
Designing intentionally for different languages will ensure your content always renders correctly in your customer’s inboxes.
Tip 6: Consider colour
Colours can trigger a subconscious emotional reaction in human beings. But did you know that different colours are linked with different emotions in different countries?
For example, in Germany, yellow is associated with jealousy and envy, while in Latin America it represents death and mourning. Similarly, in European countries the colour black is often used to convey elegance or formality, but in India, it has negative connotations of anger and intolerance.
Colour is often the first element we notice about or associate with a brand, so as you expand into new markets, consider the impact of your email colour palette and what it might represent to potential customers.
Tip 7: Choose local imagery
As with customer case studies and testimonials, using familiar or relatable imagery of ‘people, places and things’ in your emails helps to build trust and credibility with your audience. It could be as small a tweak as showing the Eiffel Tower instead of the Empire State Building, but details like this can make a big difference.
Tip 8: Explore device behaviour
Optimise your content for the dominant device and email provider in a target region to maximise opportunities for engagement. Your email production partner should be able to provide this information and sites like Statistica can also provide a country-level overview.
Tip 9: Be aware of regulations
Many countries have specific legislation surrounding email marketing communication, particularly around consent and the use of consumer’s personal data. Understanding and adhering to these country-specific regulations will prevent your emails being marked as spam.
Tip 10: Pay attention to the details
As well as transcreating copy, you’ll also need to adapt the formatting of dates, currency and measurements throughout your email content, as this varies depending on location. For example, in the USA dates are written Month/Date/Year while in Europe it’s Date/Month/Year. Again, getting small details like this right helps to build trust with your audience.
Tip 11: Get in the zone
Last but certainly not least–your emails should be scheduled to hit people’s inboxes at the optimal time i.e. when they’re most likely to open, read and (hopefully) engage with them. Be sure to account for different time zones when deciding the best time to hit send.
Case Study
Blurb partners with Scalero and CultureSmith to enhance its global email marketing strategy. Scalero manages the execution of Blurb’s email campaigns and journeys, including copywriting, design, production, and quality assurance. For each email, eight versions are created to accommodate the following languages: English, German, Spanish, North American Spanish, French, Canadian French, Italian, and Dutch with all transcreated content provided by CultureSmith. This meticulous approach has led to higher engagement rates and contributed to the overall success of Blurb’s marketing efforts. Learn more about it here.
Reach out to experts
Email localisation is a must-have element of international marketing strategies. When done right, it will improve your overall customer experience, strengthen your brand and ultimately drive sales and revenue.
Leverage the expertise of Scalero and CultureSmith to bring your international email marketing campaigns to life.
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