A big part of online marketing is all about understanding your target audience. And hence many times, the same product needs to be marketed differently in different geographic regions due to the inherent differences in culture, traditions, linguistics, and more.
Sometimes, an innocent marketing message or a symbol could be perceived differently than intended depending on the local slang and traditions. So, it is always a mandatory step to understand your target audience first before planning your marketing campaigns.
Thus, when you prepare a marketing campaign targeted towards a specific region like the Middle East, you have to do your research. Middle eastern countries have about 64% internet penetration and present great growth opportunities. The right marketing strategy from the best digital marketing company can help you make the best out of the opportunities. So, let us help you get started.
In this article, we will show you how to impress your middle east audience and make an appealing marketing message.
Go Bilingual
While some hello hello Arab countries do have a wide population who knows English, it is common knowledge that people tend to feel more comfortable with Arabic. Arabic content helps you reach people better and will improve your brand loyalty and sales.
It has been observed that about 75% of online shoppers tend to buy items when they are available in local languages.
Providing bilingual content, both in English and Arabic, also lets you implement personalization in your marketing campaign and appeal to your audience better.
Here are some more reasons why you should pay attention to creating Arabic content, according to the best PPC advertising company like us:
- It helps you get new cross-border opportunities.
- Bilingual content helps improve your website SEO as about 9 out of 10 people like to visit websites in their local languages
- Arabic content lets you get closer to older audiences and perform better at location-based search results.
The benefits of having Arabic content on your website are many, but you can only reap them if you do it properly. A poor translation can cause more harm than good.
- Hire professional translators instead of Google-based or similar AI tools. Human translations can provide better context and deliver the messages accurately. Also, while Arab speakers are concentrated in the middle east and north Africa, it is a widely spoken language across the world with several dialects. So hiring a professional with knowledge of the local dialect of your target audience is the best idea for any translation task.
- As you develop your website, make sure it is translation ready
- Use simple URLs that are easy to maintain and use one common language for URLs to avoid confusion and cluttering.
- Understand how searches are made in Arabic and try to make your content conform to the right formats for currencies, dates, times, money, and so on as used by your target audience.
Understand The Cultural Implications
Arabic culture has its own unique customs, values, and things that are considered essential. For instance, while individualism is valued the most in many western audiences, Arabs mainly prioritize family, tribes, and community.
One way to customize your existing content to suit Arabic audiences is to use local agencies specializing in localizing content.
But if you do have to create content from scratch or customize yourself, you need to do your research first. And here are some tips and pointers you should always keep in mind:
- Respect the local laws, religious and community sentiments. Be very cautious of the wordings and symbols you use and make it the topmost priority.
- Arabs are usually collectivists in nature. So you can focus on community and family in the marketing imagery you use and the messaging. They tend to honor authority and the elderly as well as their traditions and cultural norms. Make sure your marketing messages are in alignment with their values or at least are not implying any offending messages.
- As already mentioned, the Arab world is quite a large one with several countries and different cultural factors. For instance, Saudis are more inclined to indulge in shopping, whereas Egyptians can come off as quite thrifty. Try to personalize your content, keeping in mind the different cultural factors of your actual target audience. But small businesses can usually get away with such a need for nuanced messaging as most of the Arab countries do overlap in their culture. When you grow as a business and need highly targeted marketing for better opportunities, you should take care of every little detail.
- Luxury brands have performed exceptionally well with Arabs, so many companies tend to sell their products with luxurious imagery when targeting Arab audiences.
- Avoid any vague or uncertain messaging in your content. Make concise points and use imagery that is relevant only.
- If you are running an e-commerce store, make sure to make the check-out process easy with no room for confusion on the pricing, guarantee, and returns policies.
Use Diverse Marketing Channels
Arab audiences tend to use multiple marketing channels besides the most popular platforms like Facebook, Google, Youtube, and such. Even the most popular platforms have experienced restrictions and short-term suspensions when they fail to conform to local regulations and standards.
So, keep your marketing efforts diversified to reach a wider Arab audience. Look into local social media platforms, popular local Web blogs, microblogging sites, and popular channels like Facebook, and LinkedIn.
Build Trusting Customer Relationships
Arabs tend to value forming relationships before forming a business deal. While online marketing offers few opportunities to have a physical coffee chat with your customers, it does provide multiple ways to keep your customers engaged and feel valued.
Do good use of email marketing, social media channels, webinars to help reach out to your customers and solve their queries as soon as possible.
Be highly responsive in your live chat and customer support, and be ready to include explanations and demonstrative content to help them have a better user experience.
It is also a common expectation that you must have a live chat feature to enable your customers to get firsthand and quick information on any products from a human operator to let them know there are real people behind the website.
So, are you all set to appeal to Arabic speaking customers? We recommend hiring the services of a digital marketing agency for the best results. Contact us today to learn more.
