Lost in Translation: It Takes More Than a Currency Converter to Sell Successfully Overseas

By - Julia Hyde
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Given the ease in which technology handles fulfillment and currency conversion between countries, you'd be forgiven for thinking that all it takes is the virtual press of a button and you're able to sell your products or services overseas.

But nothing's ever that simple.

As Nike discovered when it launched its "Air" line of shoes back in 1996, marketing your products to a foreign market, is not only complicated but can land you in big (and potentially expensive) trouble.

The Nike shoes in question sported a logo that was meant to suggest a flame. But, what Muslim consumers saw was a shape that suggested the Arabic-script spelling of Allah. To add insult to injury, the shape was close to the sole of the foot - an area of the body considered unclean in Arabic culture.

Of course, after a brief boycott by Muslims, Nike made amends -- apart from removing the offending logo and apologizing profusely, they donated $50,000 for a playground at an Islamic school. Nike learned the hard way that before you market products or services abroad, you first need to brush up on your knowledge of local customs and cultures.

This is especially true if you're planning to open a website in a foreign market where the temptation may be to duplicate your successful U.S. site and set it up abroad. But a marketing campaign style that works well in the U.S. may be lost in translation overseas and could even cause considerable offense to your intended customers.

So while the Internet may appear to make it easier to tap into international markets, launching a website in a foreign country is fraught with difficulties.

But let's suppose you get it all figured out - culture, logistics, delivery, each country's individual business rules, customs and on...and on...and on.

And let's suppose you're ready to press that button and venture into foreign territory when you start to wonder how consumers will find your website in the search engine results of the geographic area you are targeting?

Huh?

OK. Let's put that another way.

If your company is based in the U.S. and you have a website with a .com domain extension, how can you make sure your website pages show up for relevant keyword searches in the geo-specific search engine results in, say, the U.K, (google.co.uk) Ireland (google.ie) or Canada (google.ca)?

Hmm...

Of course, the logical solution would be to have three different sites with three different country specific domain extensions each targeted to the market they're trying to serve. For example, you'd have your original .mysite.com, then a separate mysite.co.uk, mysite.ie, and mysite.ca.

Sounds simple enough, right?

Ur...well not necessarily. Remember we're dealing with search engines here!

Putting aside the additional costs you'll incur by having three or more websites selling the same products or services, country-specific domain names may not work well for you for the following reasons:

1. IP Address Location.

Google uses the hosting IP address and not the domain extension to determine a website's location (don't ask!) So, unless you host your .co.uk website in the U.K., your .ca website in Canada and your .ie website in Ireland, you don't stand a chance of ranking in Google's country-specific search results.

Google is the only search engine to use IP address location in this way. As far as I know, it is possible to get a .com domain extension associated with a different country in Yahoo and MSN as long as the site has country-specific links pointing to it.

2. Non-country specific .com

Most international companies want a .com domain -- .com domains, along with .org and .net are non-country-specific and stand for commercial, organization and network in that order.

3. Geo-specific domain extensions

It can be difficult to purchase a domain name with a country-specific extension unless your company is incorporated in that country or you are a citizen there. For example, Canada's .ca extension can only be assigned to Canadian companies or Canadian citizens.

4. Duplicate content

And then there's the duplicate content issue. Will your sites be penalized (or filtered) if you have three sites, in three countries, each with identical content? Probably.

So, what do you do?

I'd love to be able to tell you there's some magical workaround that will achieve success in the country-specific search results, (especially Google) but that's not the case.

And while there are things you can do that will help, the only real solution -- until the search engines address the problem -- is to bite the bullet, purchase country-specific domain name extensions if possible, (remember some countries only allow you to purchase their country-specific domain if you are a citizen of that country or your company is incorporated there) and build each site with different content on each targeting cultural and language differences associated with each country. Then host each domain in the country it belongs to and build country-specific incoming links to each site.

That's it.

So given all the difficulties you'll encounter is it really worth trying to market your products and services overseas?

If you have the time (and the money) to manage and develop an international website or two, then the answer is most definitely yes. Just don't expect to press a virtual button, sit back and watch the sales roll in!

About the Author
Julia Hyde is an advertising copywriter and consultant specializing in search engine optimization, search engine marketing, and traditional advertising. She's the founder of Creative Search Media, a full-service advertising and search engine marketing agency. You can contact Julia via her website at http://www.juliahyde.com/