Presentation from Steve Zitkovich. How to adapt your online presence.

1. Impact HUB Scaling Program:
Ready To Go International?
How To Adapt Your Online
Presence
presented by Steve Zitkovich
October 2015

2. Introduction
Purpose of this webinar
Inform an early-stage company on how to take first
steps to localizing their online presence and do
online marketing across country borders/languages
Intent is to inform, not overwhelm

3. Introduction
Webinar particulars
– 5 mins introduction
– 50 mins to cover the content
– 25 mins for questions
– 5 mins to wrap up
Presentation outline
– Introduction
– Definitions
– Localization goals
– Localization impacts in your company
– Examples of localization
– Best practices
– UI
– Content
– E-commerce
– Email marketing
– Localization hassles
– Action items

4. About Steve Zitkovich
• Seattle Impact HUB Member since 2012
• Originally from Seattle, have lived 12+ years in Europe: DE,
UK, FR, NL, LU, CZ, SK, now ES
• 20+ years at e-commerce companies
– Getty Images, Microsoft, Ofoto (now Shutterfly) + a number of
startups
– Job titles include International Product-, Program-, Project Manager
• 18+ years focused on localization
– Localization interest from living abroad and studying German
– Inspired by the internet’s ability to distribute information worldwide in
the blink of an eye

5. Pre-Localization + Definitions
• Before localizing you must “internationalize”
– see webinar “How To Prepare for International *Before* Going
International” on the Impact HUB Scaling Program website
• What is the difference between internationalization, translation and
localization?
– Internationalization = the technical infrastructure behind the scenes
– Translation = taking text (marketing) in a source-language (ex. English)
and translating it into another language; it does not necessarily mean
tailoring the messaging for customers in another country
– Localization = the next step beyond translating; tailoring what a
customer reads, sees and interacts with (interface, sales & marketing)
for his/her language and sensibility
• Often legal reasons drive localization

6. Localization Goals
• Your commercial goals – and metrics! – will
inform localization priorities:
– Direct-to-consumer sales?
– Marketing for offline sales relationships?
– Marketing for sales through distributors?
– Customer support?
– Branding?
Align localization efforts with your commercial goals

7. Managing Localization
• Selling internationally is very important for most businesses.
• Localization can be intimidating.
• Localization can get complex.
• Localization can run up costs internally and externally.
Therefore
– Stay focused on ROI
– Keep it as simple as possible
Preparing + launching a localized site(s) is the easy
part – ongoing management is work

8. Localization Touches Your Entire Company
Inside your company
IT
Product
Marketing
Sales
Customer Service
Legal
Finance
BI/Reporting
Customer experience
UI
Content
Payment
Delivery

9. Localization Touches Entire Company
IT Product Marketing Sales Customer
Service
Legal
Databases Different
versions
Content
creation
Pricing Support in
languages
T&C’s
Website
architecture
Shopping
Cart/E-comm
Time to
translate
Channel
conflicts
Local phone
numbers?
Privacy Policy
Website UI Payments Content +
people
coordination
Field offices Chat? Advising all
groups
QA Email
marketing
Emails in/out
Dev schedule Promotions
in-country
Time zones
Timing of
updates
Social Media FAQs
SEO
+
Finance &
Business
Intelligence

10. Basic International Business Decisions
• Do you have different web sites by country or just
by language?
– Hosted all under .com or by country, ex: co.uk, .fr, .de?
• Do you sell directly in-market or have a
distributor?
• Do you create your own packaging/customer-touch-points?
– leaving localization to distribution takes branding out of your
hands
– many times your product is not your distributor’s highest priority

11. Example Of Localization: Starbucks
USA UK
GERMANY SPAIN

12. Example Of Localization: Starbucks
JAPAN

13. Example Of Localization: Starbucks

14. Localization Best-Practices
• Put yourself in the shoes of your customer in the target
country or language
• Make the customer experience complete, not a mish-mash
– Consider micro-sites for other languages/markets
• If a link leads to content in another languages, indicate that change
• Do not use Google Translate for your website
– Some people advocate it for FAQs or other non-critical text
• Do not translate user comments
• Be careful of humor in marketing
• Possibly offer a version of English for pan-Europe or global
• Use a cloud-service for internal collaboration + assets
• Use a translation memory to keep translations in sync

15. Website UI Localization, part 1 of 2
• What does the customer see upon arrival?
– If .com, the English-language site?
– Splash screen to choose language/country?
– Guess language/country and display (and inform of guess)?
• Geolocation services
– Very user-friendly when done well
• Can be annoying if customer cannot override
• Allow customer to change language and/or locale

16. Website UI Localization, part 2 of 2
• Allow for expansion of labels and text on page
• Minimal text in graphics
• Always clear which context the customer is in
– Country versus language
• Pricing
• Shipping physical goods
• Distributor relationships

17. Country Flags
• Country flags are ok if a website is only for a
country
• Do not use country flags to indicate language

18. Content: Translate vs Localize
Translate
• Advantage: simpler, quicker content creation + management
• Disadvantage: customers sense it is not tailored to them
– The marketing tone
– The images
Maybe the disadvantages are fine for your branding and sales increase enough to make it worth it
Localize
• Advantage: customers feel engaged
• Disadvantage: higher cost in money + time
– Keeping content/messaging/branding in alignment
– Images
Technology + processes will enable more localization at lower cost

19. Content: DIY or LSP?
• DIY
– Central
– Field offices
• Distributors/partners
• Other resources (ex. Impact HUB Network)
• Localization Service Provider
– This webinar is for startups; early-stage companies
don’t really have the money to pay for an
Localization Service Provider.

20. Content Process Flow Of Localization
Create
content
Approval Post Edit
Create
content
Approval Translate
Proof (in-
country)
Upload Post Edit
Before localization
With localization

21. E-Commerce
• Set up your bank account to handle international
transactions
• Show prices in local currency or you set prices in
different currencies?
– Exchange rates can be a hassle
• Different countries have different preferred payment
methods
• Varying VAT
– Also your reporting of VAT
• Shipping cost + time (and shipping options)
• Product returns and order cancellations

22. Email Marketing
• Forms
– Capture first name, last name separately
– Capture country
– Capture preferred language
• Database
– Ensure can handle above
– Characters
– Variations by country how to handle
• Privacy Policy
• (Double) Opt-in
• Opt-out / Right To Be Forgotten

23. Which Languages/Countries?
• Align with your commercial goals
• Start nearby geographically and linguistically.
– Consider time zones, support.
– Spanish worldwide (Central/South America + USA)
– French in EU + Africa
– German in EU
– Chinese, but doing business in China is hard; best with a partner
• Consider unique opportunities...
– Strong interest from a particular country
– A very strong partner in a country
– Language skills very strong internally
... but beware of starting something that might fall to the side if
circumstances change.

24. Some Localization Hassles
• As soon as you have a localized presence your in-
country team will have a “unique, incredibly important
marketing opportunity”
– Conversely, stale localized sites are bad internal + external
• Keeping track of the many variations of lead-gen forms
by country
• Keeping track of image and video assets
– Especially embedded text
– Also rights management
• Dynamic pricing from exchange rates
• Content coming from in different formats/systems

25. Action-Items
• Make sure your technical team has internationalized
– Especially online forms that gather customer information
for marketing and for the purchase path
• Make sure your international goals are clear so you can
align your efforts for best ROI
• Assign a point person for localization issues, but make
everyone responsible for their part
• Choose a content management system or process that
handles multiple languages and authors efficiently
• Recommended: a lightweight cloud translation
memory system

26. Closing Notes
• Company leadership must buy into the value of
i18n & l10n; thinking it is easy often leads to
frustration with the time + cost to be international
• l10n is a revenue generator; money spent on i18n
is an investment
• Supporting i18n and l10n early will make it
cheaper in the long-term
• Preparing + launching a localized site(s) is the easy
part – ongoing management is much work

27. Ready To Go International?
How To Adapt Your Online Presence
Q & A
For questions later, contact:
Steve Zitkovich
e: steve@zitkovich.com