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Please consider this free-reprint article written by:
Deepak Dutta
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Article Title: What Is Your Asia Strategy For The Global
Customer Base?
Author: Deepak Dutta
Word Count: 989
Article URL: http://www.isnare.com/?aid=80177&ca=Marketing
Format: 64cpl
Author's Email Address: onerab[at]gmail.com (replace [at] with
@)
Easy Publish Tool: http://www.isnare.com/html.php?aid=80177
================== ARTICLE START ==================
Something new happened in mid-2006 � five out of the top ten
websites listed by Alexa (based on traffic for the previous
three months) were Asian. Four of those were Chinese.
This is hardly surprising, given roughly half the world�s
population lives on the planet�s largest continent. By
percentage, however, they remain a relatively new force, one
whose online presence will only continue to grow as more people
gain Web access.
One interesting side note is that most of the Chinese sites
also are available in English; some have even enabled phonetic
search entries using English letters rather than Chinese
characters. This could be recognition of English as the lingua
franca of the Internet � or perhaps those webmasters are simply
taking the lead in website internationalization.
While the dominance of Internet English has encouraged millions
to learn or enhance their knowledge of it, anyone truly seeking
a global customer base must find a way to provide their sites �
whatever the original language � in at least two and perhaps
five of the most common languages.
Today that is largely done with machine translation, which is
far from perfect and can lead to serious misunderstandings. But
the vast majority of netrepreneurs are small shops without the
resources to hire human translators; without a multilingual
site, however, they are leaving money on the table and millions
of potential customers in the dark.
According to various industry sources:
� Web users are four times more likely to purchase from a site
that communicates in the customer's language
(http://www.idc.com)
� More than 100 million people access the Internet in a
language other than English
� More than half of all Web users speak a native language other
than English (http://www.glreach.com)
� Visitors stay twice as long if a website is in their own
language (Forrester Research)
While there are a lot of claims made for the accuracy and
efficiency of machine translation, most experts agree the
current state-of-the-art � at least, for public use on websites
at affordable rates � is about 70 percent. That means nearly
one-third of everything on a website will be mistranslated,
with a fairly predictable result.
Which is not to say webmasters should completely reject machine
translation. If an accurate human translation is beyond the
budget, finding and applying the best machine translation
available still puts that site well ahead of one that is
available only in a single language.
For one thing, someone seeing it in his or her native language
can probably figure out most of what is intended; perhaps more
important, it demonstrates the owner of that site cares enough
to make the effort. And appreciation for that could well
translate into customers and subscribers who otherwise might
never have seen the site, much less stayed.
Webmasters should not assume that a human translation, no
matter how expensive, is going to be a perfect solution,
either. Many companies offering these services are based in
countries where labor is cheap and the translator almost
certainly is not fully fluent in both languages involved.
Which is not to say that person does not, in fact, have a good
command of the non-native language in question, just that it
requires years of reading, writing and interacting with native
speakers to fully understand the intricacies of any language.
This is perhaps most obvious in observing the difficulties
natives from different Spanish-speaking nations often have in
understanding each other. For that matter, the same can be said
of those who speak English as their native tongue, but with
cultural, national or regional differences. Americans from the
Deep South and from the New York Bronx have been known to stare
at each other in complete lack of understanding as local slang
and accents make the other�s English practically a foreign
language.
The obvious source for translation services � human and machine
� is the search engine. What a search engine will not provide,
however, is any indication of how accurate either service may
be. The only proof there will be to request a sample
translation � then take it to someone who is fluent in that
language � and ask for a list of other sites using their
service (then e-mail those webmasters for feedback).
With the rise of the global Internet, the world has truly
become decidedly smaller in little more than a decade, to a far
greater extent than the previous changes brought on by aircraft,
radio and television. And due to the dominance of
English-speaking nations in those areas � as well as movies and
the Internet itself � there has been a tendency, even among
those who pride themselves on being at least bilingual, to
assume everyone online understands English. And, more often
than not, American colloquial English.
While that is truer today than at any other time in history �
more true than with any previous language in history � those
truly seeking to reach the world with their message or product
need to take a wider view. In many cases, perhaps most, that
does not mean providing for a host of translations; two or even
three carefully chosen languages, may be enough to reach more
than 90 percent of the target audience. Each webmaster or site
owner will need to make that judgment.
Nor does this apply only to the majority of sites now displayed
only in English. It also is true for those written in Chinese,
Spanish, Russian, Arabic, Swahili, French, Italian, German � or
Outback Aussie.
As the Internet continues to expand into more and more homes
and businesses around the world, the need for multi-lingual
websites will become more and more prominent. And the
opportunities for companies providing solid translation
services � and for individuals with true multi-lingual fluency
�will grow along with it.
About The Author: Dr. Deepak Dutta is the creator of
http://www.semanticbay.com - an interactive social network
website based on user shared text and picture contents on any
topics. His other website http://www.classifiedsforfree.com -
is one of the oldest online classifieds site where users can
post ads in more than 600 US cities and 60 countries.
Please use the HTML version of this article at:
http://www.isnare.com/html.php?aid=80177
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