Should Small Business Owners Think About Building A Digital Sales Strategy In Spanish Within The U.S.?
The U.S. is the world’s second largest Spanish speaking country.
There are an estimated 57.5 million Spanish speakers in the United States, about 41 million of whom are native speakers.
Knowing this is about 18.2% of the overall population, and estimated to be 30% of the populations of California and Texas, business owners who are looking to capture part of this market need to be more effective with building business online in Spanish.
As a business, we have been doing training in almost every country from Mexico to Argentina and over to the Caribbean. In the past 4 years, we have begun to deliver training in Spanish right here in the USA.
Your sales and marketing has to be able to deliver in Spanish
One great place to start would be to recreate your website in a Spanish language version.
If you are doubting me, you must know that even sites like McDonald’s, Amazon, and Walmart allow you to change your language settings into Spanish right here in the USA. If they are doing it, I think you might want to take a look at it for your own business.
Then, the next step would be to have staff that could support an online conversation in Spanish.
So, what to do to get started selling in Spanish?
1.Do some research to determine what kind of potential business increase you might get by doing this.
Imagine the competitive advantage, you might be able to gain if you could start capturing this market.
2. Do not just Google Translate you site to turn it into Spanish.
Take the time and make the investment to have it done professionally. I have spoken with many business owners that take their site and have a staff member translate parts of it, resulting in a site in Spanglish (half Spanish, half English), and it really fails to protect their brands.
Find a true professional who cannot just translate your site, but reformate it as the site will take up more space.
3. Consider creating Social Media pages in Spanish.
Hispanos use Social Media as much as any other group in America, so you also want to find ways to drive business from this important group.
4 . Remember it is not just about the language as it is also important to take care of the customer when targeting this segment of the market place.
Latinos in general when provided with great service and follow-up can be extremely loyal.
5. When and if they arrive to your business, be prepared to also have materials in Spanish for them to view.
I was recently at my local Wells Fargo with the newly renovated look, and on the flat screens delivering marketing messages, they were delivered in both Spanish and English.
If you want to create business success in the United States, you can no longer ignore this.
I can remember people telling me around the turn of the century that the internet was only for customers in big cities, and I heard corporate executives claim, “the internet is just a fad” or “the internet doesn’t apply to what we sell”.
Be a leader in your industry or in your market place.
I recently spoke to a business who told me they were able to increase their local business in San Diego by 35% by focusing specific marketing efforts in Spanish to local customers. Take the time to step back and look at what opportunities you may be missing out of by not offering information about what you do or sell on the web in Spanish.
There are some thought leaders who will tell you that your business is too small to worry about this; however, do you really want to exclude almost 20% of the marketplace in your marketing efforts?
I remember in my first job in Canada, one of the biggest advantages in a tourist town where I lived in, was the fact that I could speak a second language, and that was back in the 80s. In 2015 approximately 97 million tourists visited the USA from Latin America, spending just over $17 billion (according to Statistica.com).
I know when they come visit me, many will order items on the web and then have them delivered to my home or business so they can take them back with them.
If I were you, I would not ignore this opportunity. And if you would like help in this area, please feel free to reach out and we will help you get introduced to the right people who can provide you with the right solution, and a reasonable rate to do so. jhernandez@sbinc.info
Related articles:
Turn Your Latino Culture Into a Selling Advantage…Not Just Because You Speak Spanish
Utilizing Cultura and 5 Values for Small Business Success
Bilingual Latinos A Distinct Business Advantage
