The "First Mover" Advantage: Why Website Translation's Time Is Now

March 3, 2008

Regardless of what industry you're in, multi-lingual websites are the next logical step companies are taking to connect with new markets, improve internal company communication, raise brand awareness and loyalty … and increase profits. Now is the time for your company to gain the coveted "first mover" advantage in your industry with a multi-lingual website.

Ten years ago, company leaders could afford to disregard the notion of launching a site in an alternate language. But now it's not a matter of "if" a company's site should go multi-lingual, but when.

Here are the most compelling reasons to add multiple languages to your website now, regardless of your company's industry.

#1: Two trends are colliding
MotionPoint has been leading the website translation space for seven years, and sees two compelling trends converging: Web 2.0, and what MotionPoint calls "Global 2.0."

Web 2.0 refers not to new technologies powering the Internet, but an ever-growing suite of sites and software products whose goal is online collaboration and communication. Companies embrace this through corporate blogs, customer reviews and other progressive consumer-centric site features. In addition, more and more companies are using these web-based tools in their internal Intranet systems, to effectively manage and educate their employees.

Global 2.0 refers to the interconnectedness of the global economy. With the advent of the European Union, the economic development of Asia, outsourcing/offshoring, the Internet, immigration and other trends, a company can ignore that which is occurring on the other side of the world, but only at great risk. The Global 2.0 phenomenon manifests itself in many ways:

• Selling globally yields multi-lingual customer-facing internet needs
• Sourcing globally yields multi-lingual extranet needs in purchasing
• Hiring globally yields multi-lingual employee support/training intranet needs

#2: MotionPoint's technology fundamentally alters the cost-side of the equation
MotionPoint is the world leader in website translation; the company has been behind hundreds of "first mover" success stories during the past seven years. MotionPoint's website translation technology powers 300+ multi-lingual websites, including dozens of Fortune 500 company sites and several Fortune 100 companies.

MotionPoint uses breakthrough technologies to deliver multi-lingual sites faster, better and more affordably than other approaches.

Why MotionPoint is faster: Thanks to its technology-fueled solution, MotionPoint can translate and deploy any website, regardless of size and complexity, in 90 days or less. Further, ongoing maintenance is handled through MotionPoint's elegant-but-powerful Website Language Management system, which uses web-based technologies to detect and upload changes to a client's multi-lingual site. If your company updates its English site, MotionPoint's translated content appears hours later. With other approaches, this usually takes days, and sometimes weeks.

Why MotionPoint is better: MotionPoint's groundbreaking -- and platform-neutral -- system allows clients to deliver websites in any language and translate changes in real-time. Whereas all other solutions require expensive IT integration, MotionPoint's solution eliminates all IT integration. Not only is integration eliminated, so is re-integration when (as will surely happen) a company changes its back-end infrastructure. MotionPoint's army of world-class translators currently support 36 different languages. The service is truly an effortless "turn-key" solution.

Why MotionPoint is more affordable: MotionPoint's service streamlines the production process, reducing person hours and enhancing workflow.

• Repetition: Clients don't pay for repetitive segments of text that appear multiple times throughout a site. The text is translated once, and that text is served where it appears. You are never billed again for that phrase, no matter how many times it appears on the translated site.
• No consulting fees: Since MotionPoint delivers a turn-key solution, no consulting is required. You maintain your company's English site as usual, and MotionPoint handles the rest. It is that effortless.
• No IT: 75% of the effort of translating a website using an alternate approach requires a lot of client-side IT effort. MotionPoint's solution eliminates all of this work and cost.

#3 You're going to do it; why not get the most out of it by doing it first?
Every company wants to identify and cultivate new markets. Under- and unserved alternate-language customer segments offer such an opportunity.

Multi-lingual websites empower multi-cultural audiences to experience a company's website in their language of choice. Market research indicates this "in language" online experience enhances a company's brand, creates loyalty, increases direct online sales -- and for multi-channel businesses, increases cross-channel sales. For companies wise enough to launch multi-lingual websites, that "first mover" leadership position can be an enduring competitive advantage.