Internet has been a great equalize for many business owners, particularly the small businesses that do not have resources to reach customers globally. By creating a website you can sell your products and services to anyone regardless of which country he resides in. Many small business owners have taken advantage of this and grown their business successfully. The warehouse and logistics services offered by companies such as Amazon and UPS and payment processing offered by companies such as Paypal has enabled them to cover all the processes without having to spend much on the backend infrastructure.
Now, while it is true that you can create a decent website with the click of a button and even have e-commerce engine to sell you products and services there are several aspects you need to take care of before you can sell globally.
- You need to ensure the website can be accessed by people in different countries and not blocked by government authorities as some business owners have found out in countries such as China.
- You also need to ensure you are able to process the payment in local currency.
- If your products are taxable you need to find a way to collect the international taxes and pay to the government
- The content of your website needs to be localized and customized for people in other countries.
The last point is perhaps the most important one. While English is the universal language, not everyone in all the countries understand it. If your targets customers are not able to read your content in their language or listen to your audio and video in the local language you are not going to be able to do much business. You have to make sure your content is readable and understandable by the target customers you are trying to reach. That’s why you need to translate your content in the local language.
Now, some business owners can translate the content themselves or even hire a local intern to do it for them. But if you are looking to grow your business and work with locals you have to work with professionals who not only know the two languages, but also understand the nuances of the language. This is something that only international translation services providers can do. Failure to take into account the local customs and nuances of the language can create major issues for businesses. You also need to get website localization services to ensure your website is can be accessed by locals.
While Internet provides great opportunity to grow your business internationally you still need to take into consideration the nuances of local language and customs and ensure your content is translated properly.
