Member Article

Localise websites for international audience in time for Tour de France

The countdown to Le Grand Depart of the Tour de France is underway with businesses being urged to invest in multilingual websites to increase their revenue during the three day event.

The world’s largest sporting event is likely to see two to five million people from all over the world line the streets of Yorkshire, Derbyshire, Cambridgeshire and Essex as the competition’s 200 cyclists make their way to London between July 5th- 6th.

Media from Belgium, Luxembourg and The Netherlands are expected to arrive in their droves and hotel accommodation throughout Yorkshire is now few and far between with cricket clubs and schools opening up their grounds as campsites.

With online customers four times more likely to buy from a website in their own language, now is the time for companies in the travel, tourism and hospitality sectors to target overseas markets, particularly as it is expected that the competition will generate income worth more than £100 million.

Leading translating firm, Web-Translations, localises websites for particular markets by translating content into relevant languages.

With English accounting for less than 27% of website content, an English-only website misses out on targeting more than 73% of global internet users. In the travel and tourism sector, Japanese, Simplified Chinese, Russian, German and French are most in demand.

Cassandra Oliver, marketing director of Web-Translations, explained: “Localisation can power a businesses’ export drive to new heights and outpace those rivals who are failing to communicate internationally. While the internet is a boon in international trade, many companies in English-speaking countries are missing opportunities to successfully reach and penetrate overseas markets.

“By communicating with customers in multiple languages there are more chances of both short and long term ‘wins’. In addition to the immediate boost to sales, a multilingual website is excellent for testing new markets and opening new doors to international trade that can sustain business growth in the long run.”

Key tips and tactics to achieve success

Website localisation – welcoming international visitors to a website with multilingual content will create a great impression and build trust in target markets.

Always use a professional translation service – don’t be tempted to use a free machine translation for translating marketing copy, which needs to be carefully crafted to stimulate interest and sell to readers – this is not what machine translation tools are intended for and the results could be catastrophic!

Focus on core products and services – launching a selection of bestselling products or services increases the chances of success in a new market.

Conduct multilingual keyword research – identifying what customers are actually searching for online then adapting both a website and advertising accordingly is critical to ensuring that a site is targeted.

Measure results – visitor statistics are invaluable in evaluating return on investment and deciding where to concentrate further resources.

For queries and help in creating a multilingual website, contact Cassandra Oliver at Web-Translations via co@web-translations.com or call +44 (0) 113 815 0460. For further information, visit www.web-translations.com

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Web Translations .