Localization is how your business wins 💸

Localization is how your business wins.

Especially in terms of marketing.

When KFC opens a branch in a new country, the branding remains the same but how they communicate to customer’s changes. Sometimes even some of the meals and drinks offered change.

Why?

Because what Americans find funny is not the same thing that will tickle the Japanese. The phrases and lingo that Americans relate to may not be what resonates with Nigerians, the portions and sizes at a KFC in New York may surprise a person from Kenya. People are different, cultures are different.

To get customers in the door, you have to speak to them in the language that they understand best.

Supa Strikas is one brand that managed to do this really well.

Growing up and reading that comic book, I always thought it was Kenyan and only available in Kenya because the characters were very relatable. Some had even been nicknamed to represent some of the players in the Kenyan national team at the time.

I only realized about two years ago after reading a post on LinkedIn that it was actually a worldwide franchise and they localized their content to fit every country that they were in. Every child who read Supa Strikas, felt like it had been written for them specifically.

This is a Kiwi Ad that made us love that product as kids, it was in Swahili. That same Ad run in South Africa but in English. It’s not that Kenyans don’t understand English, but as kids we spoke Kiswahili most of the time even in school while at play and that Ad captured that really well.

For a lot of startups and products in Africa the goal is always to be Pan-African and in some cases grow to serve customers across the globe.

It is commendable to think big picture like that but how it gets done is where a lot of us fail.

You may not have the budget to extra localize your product or sometimes you have built an online tool that you hope anybody anywhere can use. You can still localize your marketing and how you communicate with customers because often they are from one location or of a similar demographic.

The problems that software developers in Kenya face could definitely be the same problems that those in Ukraine face as far as technicalities are concerned. But, they could also be different, their cultures and ways of life are definitely different. The way that you communicate and market to them should also be different.

The first thing that big business and big tech does when they move in to another country is to localize their content and marketing to be relatable to people in that country.

It is not by chance; it is by design.

Be relatable.