I Meet Hotel Webinar with Matthijs Kooijman

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Building credibility with customers online 

In the spirit of our Do’s and Don’ts series, our Commercial Director, Matthijs Kooijman, was invited by I Meet Hotel to present a webinar about the challenges surrounding online localization in the hospitality industry. His message, however, applies to a much broader range of industries. After all, the common denominator across all sectors is building credibility with your customers – and localization is the direct route.  

Matthijs presents some data from CSA Research that shows the effectiveness of a winning localization plan. In short: companies that offer localized websites are simply more successful and create more customer confidence. If a website is only offered in English, you are undercutting your potential buyers by at least half.  

Conversely, poorly executed localization can have major repercussions for your customers, for example by sending them to the completely wrong destination! This does not help when you are trying to build a good reputation.

Bali… or is it Paris?

Getting the most out of localization 

Matthijs takes it even one step further by presenting examples of search term fails and how the benefits of doing good SEO and keyword research in other languages can majorly pay off.  

Hence, he covers a lot in just 17 minutes. A few other topics include: 

  • Cultural and emotional aspects of localization, or the Cultural Iceberg
  • The importance of a frictionless customer experience 
  • How investment in localization increases customer engagement and drives sales

And as Matthijs says, involving a localization professional from the beginning can save a lot of time and money in the process. If you are interested in knowing more about any of these topics, just get in touch with us.
We’d be happy to help! 

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A localization thriller

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The American film director Stanley Kubrick still receives praise for his incredible attention to detail. His movies are noted for their unique cinematography, extensive set designs and evocative use of music. Kubrick’s 1980 screen adaptation of Stephen King’s horror novel The Shining contains one memorable scene that is fascinating from a localization point of view as well.

That scene is when Wendy finds page after page filled with the phrase All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy, and she realises that her husband Jack lost his mind. Kubrick made sure to film five versions of this typewriter scene – with English, German, French, Italian and Spanish copy.

Interestingly, Kubrick didn’t opt for translating this phrase. Instead, he used well-known sayings of the respective target audiences to induce spine-chilling impact in the context of the scene:

German:

Was du heute kannst besorgen, das verschiebe nicht auf morgen
Never put off until tomorrow what can be done today

French:

Un tiens vaut mieux que deux tu l’auras
What you have is worth much more than what you will have

Italian:

Il mattino ha l’oro in bocca
The morning has gold in its mouth

Spanish:

No por mucho madrugar amanece más temprano
No matter how early you get up, you can’t make the sun rise any sooner

Why all this effort to type these sentences out hundreds of times, restage, direct, film and edit this one image when it is only visible a few seconds? Well, Kubrick reasoned that it would take away from the shock value if the audience had to read the translation in a subtitle at the bottom of the screen instead. Hence the choice to localize.

Be like Stanley

Key to Stanley Kubrick’s localization approach is that he managed his audiences’ expectations and kept them forefront in his mind when designing his movie’s experience. This wasn’t done at the end of the process or as an afterthought but planned from the very outset. This attention to detail is what has made The Shining legendary worldwide.

Why do we relate this story to you? It’s because this is something that you can also do when creating your own stories and marketing strategy. The level of localization your target audience expects and how that matches your expectations in terms of gains can be built into your approach. In other words, what impact do you want to make on your audience? What’s your “shock value”? For the best results, don’t make localization the tailpiece of your communication strategy.

Do you want to optimize your localization strategy, but you don’t know where to start?
Contact us! Localization is in our DNA and we’d love to help you out.

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e-book localization