As the non-US markets pose significant revenue opportunities, e-commerce and trade regulations have led more brands to expand operations to an increasing number of countries.
A thriving global marketing strategy gives your team the playbook they need to drive more traffic, leads, and sales wherever they are in the world. Whether your organization has one global marketing team or works with multiple smaller local experts for your marketing efforts, here is what you should know to build a global marketing strategy that works for your business.
1. KNOW YOUR GLOBAL AUDIENCE
You need to know why your products or services matter to your customers and what will resonate with them. Even as you expand into multiple international markets, you should know who is purchasing from you and why you would matter to them through extensive market research.
You need to know your audience’s demographics beyond their location, age, gender, relationship status, job title, and language, which are the basic essential information to have as you think about your audience. Even if your audiences in various markets seem to have the same basic demographics, make sure to know the different nuances between countries, regions, or locales.
2. THINK LOCAL, ACT GLOBAL
A significant piece of any global marketing strategy is your localization strategy. The classic adage, “Think local, act global,” applies here too. It is no news that consumers prefer to walk their buyer’s journey in their native language.
But localization goes beyond the act of translation. Localization done right makes your content feel like it was made for your local audience rather than in some corporate office far away. Understanding the nuances of each market (see #1) is just the beginning. Global marketing may seem complicated, but it’s a question of repeating your local strategy across multiple markets while adapting along the way for their demographics, interests, and pain points.
Check out this webinar “Commerce Leaders Must Pivot from Global to Multi-Local Experiences” by Contenstack and Constructor on how to move from global to multi-local experiences for future success.
3. MESSAGING THAT MATTERS
Can you explain what your organization does in one sentence? Three words? One word?
How about in multiple languages?
Creating a solid brand requires clarity of purpose. Why does your business exist, and who do you serve? Consolidating multiple product lines, services, and audiences into one tagline may seem impossible, but it’s essential as you expand globally to distill your value down to a single universal idea.
People don’t buy “what” you do, but they buy “why” you do it. From your local event managers to email marketers, your entire marketing team should know why your business matters and the key messaging that resonates with your audience.
4. DESIGN WITH TRANSLATION IN MIND
A marketing campaign often has several moving parts, from nurture emails to TikTok to webinars and more. Your marketing mix may stay the same for each campaign you execute while tailoring your brand assets for the local market.
As your designers work on these campaigns, think about how images and colors look and are perceived differently in your target market. Your global brand needs to include this as well — for example, avoiding symbols like a thumb’s up, which is a sign of acceptance and means “Great!” in the US but means something offensive in some parts of the Middle East.
Your typical design process might also need a change — with translation, you want to get ahead of any localization challenges, such as text expansion messing up the layout or right-to-left languages throwing off symmetry.
Keep your global marketing team running smoothly by considering the design from the beginning of the translation process through technology integrations with design tools or engaging in pseudo-translation to help understand how your translations will change your overall design.
5. AUTOMATE, AUTOMATE, AUTOMATE
What differentiates a good global marketing strategy from a great one? Scale.
The days of manually updating spreadsheets and back-and-forth emails are long gone. The only way to achieve that scale is through standardization and automation, especially with multiple markets with different localization requirements, personas, channels, or messaging.
Explore what kind of ROI you will have from adapting a translation technology. One of the best benefits of automating your process is being able to use the saved time and resources on what really matters — improving your products, customer service, and global user experience.
Here is a perfect example of how online brand management companies such as Yext achieved a 25% reduction in cost per word and continues to break into new international markets, supported by Smartling.
Build a successful global marketing strategy with Smartling
If you’re looking to expand your business globally to find new revenue opportunities, you will need a global marketing strategy that includes plans for content marketing, PR, and events.
Implementing a global strategy to find new revenue opportunities requires a deep understanding of local markets and the ability to offer localized content at scale. Smartling takes from you the burden of finding top-notch local translators, automating your entire localization workflow.
Are your customers’ local offline and online experiences in sync? Here is a discussion on how to close the global digital marketing gap and streamline customer experience with your brand — wherever they are and whichever language they speak. Watch now.
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