Unlike bricks-and-mortar retailers, online merchants can reach just about any consumer with a PC and an Internet connection. Except, that is, if a consumer can’t understand the web site. As more retailers turn to the web to reach a broader audience, an increasing number are realizing they also need to offer sites in more languages.
1800Flowers, No. 36 in the Internet Retailer Top 500 Guide, translated its web site late last year into Canadian French in a bid to enter the Canadian market. The translated site is available at http://fr.1800flowers.ca/. Bidz.com, No. 74, last year created an Arabic site for consumers in the Middle East as well as Spanish and German versions of its site.
“It took the better part of last year to translate the content and prepare the site for multi-language capabilities,” says Leon Kuperman president of Bidz.com. Both Bidz.com and 1800Flowers used web site translation company Motion Point to help with the launches.
“The reason we decided on these languages and geographies is based on our current demographics. We have a strong customer base in Arabic-speaking countries and we viewed Spanish as a first natural extension. Germany is the first country that we are going into where we don’t have a particularly strong presence. We believe that people in Germany have a strong affinity to web sites in their native language and this new German version of Bidz.com will help with our marketing efforts,” Kuperman says.
Spanish seems to be the first foreign language chosen by many large U.S.-based e-retailers. The Home Depot launched a Spanish-language site this fall at Espanol.homedepot.com, offering shoppers access and descriptions for the full line of the more than 40,000 products the retailer offers on its English-language site. Cosmetics manufacturer Avon Products Inc. launched a Spanish version of its e-commerce site in October and electronics chain Best Buy Co. introduced a Spanish-language site in 2007. 1800Flowers also offers a Spanish retail site.
Steve Rowen, managing partner at Retail Systems Research says the most successful e-retailers his firm sees tend to work to drive sales in new markets. In a recent study by the consultancy, 37% of e-commerce Winners, defined as those retailers out-performing their peers, invested in e-commerce projects that would further help them expand into untapped geographic markets. That’s compared to only 17% of Laggards—those merchants that lag behind their competitors. Laggards, he says, tend to invest more in projects to help keep consumers on their web site. 50% of Laggards invest in technology to help them do that compared to just 19% of winners.
Overall the trend, analysts say is for retailers to use the web to go as global as possible. “Our research shows more and more retailers with global presence,” says Paula Rosenblum, managing director of Retail Systems Research. “We now ask retailers both where corporate headquarters are located and where they do business. The number of countries where they do business continues to rise. It's only natural for a retailer to communicate in the customer's language of choice - especially if that same customer has other options.”
The Home Depot is No.42 in the Internet Retailer Top 500 Guide, Avon is No. 31 and Best Buy is No. 12.
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