A topic that came up in two recent consultancy calls with Mastermind Program Members was using the correct spelling and language for your target market – and then directing them to the appropriate affiliate website to make their purchase.
Let’s look at a physical product that can be marketed through a Hub and Mini-site strategy – for instance ‘Media Centres’ (but don’t ask me what they do!).
First question… Who is my target market?
Second question… Where are they?
Third Question… What style of language do they use – ie how do I need to ‘speak’ to get their interest?
The Center of The Matter
Let’s look at media centres – or is it centers…? ‘Media Centre’ is the British English spelling… The Americans would refer to a ‘Media Center’.
To see what I’m talking about, do a Google search on the term ‘samsung media center’… When I did this, the first result was for ‘Samsung United States’, using the spelling ‘Center’, and so on down the list. When I spelled it ‘centre’, some UK suppliers appeared in the top few listings who did not appear for the other spelling (along with Samsung USA again!).
Now Google’s search algorithms are clever enough to get round the spelling question, so ‘center’ comes up even when I type in ‘centre’ – particularly as that is the spelling used by the manufacturer. And Google directs me to search using Google.co.uk anyway, whereas in the USA, they’ll be using Google.com with it’s algorithms set to focus on US-based searches.
What The Domain…?
But all this becomes more important when you’re selecting your Domain name for a Mini-site, doesn’t it?
If you choose ‘SamsungYH-999GSMediaCentre.com’ as your domain name, and use this spelling on your web pages, you’ll get British-oriented (UK) traffic – if indeed you get any, as Samsung don’t call it this (they use Center). If you want to target American traffic, you’d need to use the ‘Center’ spelling.
You can check on sites like Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk that focus separately on the US and UK markets and see what comes up for ‘Samsung YH-999GS Media Centre’. For my search, Amazon.com returned ads while Amazon.co.uk didn’t.
Now, if I live in the USA and I’m looking for a ‘media center’, I’ll expect it to be sold, and delivered within, the USA. I don’t know what these British pound thingies are (and the price converted into dollars is higher) and I don’t want to wait three weeks (or pay for) my purchase to be shipped across ‘the Pond’.
And vice-versa. If I buy on-line in the UK, I want it to be delivered tomorrow from a UK supplier (but see ‘Side Note’ below).
So make sure your supplier/portal matches your market… and your target product.
Side Note – Arbitrage: It’s sometimes cheaper to buy in US$ and get it shipped from the USA – subject to taxes, duties, warranties, servicing requirements, etc… So there can be opportunities for ‘arbitrage’ for uncomplicated products, by sourcing/shipping them cheaper from the US than consumers can buy them in the UK… but let’s save that for another blog post!
Divided By A Common Language
And don’t forget to use the appropriate words that your target market uses. Terminology can change between countries, states and even counties. An example I came across recently was the terminology used by different State administrations for corrective driving courses for speeding offenders in the USA. Nearly every state calls it something different (I don’t have space here to list them all!) – so you’d need state-specific web pages if you were marketing this product…!
The Moral Of The Story: So, when you’re selecting your domain name, make sure that you’re targeting your market correctly, using the right spellings for the market – and as used by the product supplier – and that you’re directing your prospects to the most appropriate seller.
This isn’t really complicated – but I hope the above will help you focus on getting things right rather faster than if you have to find out for yourself… the hard way!
PS: See my blog post “The Anatomy of Great Copy ” on how to find some of the answers posed above…
Happy marketing!
John Thornely
Internet Tycoons