What are the best practices in creating messaging that works across geographies?

These are the top 3 best practices I recommend:

1. Include

Include the regional marketing leaders or regional general managers (depending on the size of your company) early in the development of the go-to-market strategy and team. These leaders are a great sounding board for the countries in the regions that they manage and can help you identify potential pitfalls and opportunities as you develop your marketing plans.

 
2. Research

I cannot stress this enough, marketing research is key to a successful narrative. Avoid using only market reports or industry stats to substantiate your narrative, as these are often US or Western society centric. Work with your regional teams to identify the core markets that would need research to inform your messaging. 

3. Test

Experimentation is critical to success. Think of products you likely use daily, your car, your phone, the elevator. It would be unthinkable that these would be released into the market without proper testing and validation. As a marketer, your message is your product, you need to test it and validate it before globally releasing it. A/B testing in certain markets for a specific period of time will go a long way to proving you have a robust narrative. Use your channels, whether these are online channels that are typical with B2C or sales teams that are typical with B2B.

At my previous company, Sojern, we had this very problem! We wanted to translate all of our sales decks and materials but every time we tried we found that it took more effort, time, and money than it seemed to be worth - that is, the translations would always come back and be considered poor by the folks who would use them. 

So, we did a few things to make revamp our messaging and it had to start at the foundation. I explained to our VP of Sales - garbage in, garbage out. 

The first thing we did was sit with folks of the major languages we were going to translate and create a glossary of industry terms and their translations. We found that this was the area that was the hardest for our translators since they were such niche terms. AND we found out that there was disagreement within in our team on what the correct translated term should be. So getting their agreement early on with these glossaries, meant we would be better set up for success. 

We then went through our pitch deck itself and started to simplify as much as possible. There's some great text books out there about simplified English & selecting English words that work better for translation. So with that in hand, I went through everything to ensure it was as straightforward as possible. 

We also employed a new translation technology that used 'translation memories.' In theory, anything that we had translated before, it would lock in and reuse that phrase over and over again. This ensured we were consistent with our terms and saved on our translation costs (as they didn't need to be translated). 

Then it was more than just translation - it is ensuring your examples are relevant to the region as well as the photos. 

I won’t sugar coat it: localization is hard. While I’d love to give you some magic advice that will ensure your messaging resonates globally, the reality is that geographic segmentation and market insights are as important as any other work you may be doing to personalize your messaging and GTM strategy if you want to be successful. We’re actually working on refreshing our global GTM strategy now at Momentive.

That being said, it’s unlikely you’ll need to stand your messaging completely on its head to resonate with target buyers across geos. You do need to be in tune with local buyer preferences and the competition.

There are a couple pieces of research that might help your messaging development. First, conduct some buyer research across the geos you play in or are considering playing in (a usage and attitude or similar study, or if prohibitive, get super close to your sales channels) so that you can understand any significant differences in purchase drivers or buying behavior and reflect that in your localized messaging. For example, you might find that having a local data center is a big purchase driver in certain geos — if you have one, you’d want to amplify that in any messaging targeting that part of the world.

Also, conduct geo-specific competitive analyses for your top-tier target geos. I’ve found a number of smaller, local competitors this way who are unknown here in the US but nonetheless successful at capturing significant market share by deeply tailoring their messaging — and in some cases injecting a little F.U.D. when it comes to the international/multinational competition. It usually goes something like, “we’re local, therefore we understand you better.” You need to be able to combat that by demonstrating your understanding of local buyers with value statements and proof points that combat those ideas, in addition to your typical competitive approach. One of the projects I’ve undertaken to this end is gathering customer case studies and social proof from top-tier markets so that we’ve got local insights and customers backing us up.

Lastly, the world is a big place. Make sure you understand where your biggest opportunities are, and choose carefully which geographies to prioritize in your GTM motion, as resources aren’t limitless. If you don’t have a tiered and prioritized list of target geos that’s adopted throughout the organization (including when it comes to product support), champion this project so that all teams are aligned on where in the world you want to gain marketshare.

Hope that’s helpful!

You can do so in the following ways

1. Conduct market research and understand the cultural, social, and economic factors of the different geographies.
2. Use language that is clear and easy to understand across all geographies.
3. Avoid using colloquialisms, slang, or local references that may not be universally understood.
4. Focus on the common benefits and value of the product, rather than specific features that may not be relevant across all geographies.
5. Utilize visuals and images that are universally appealing and understood, rather than using local symbols or icons.
6. Use customer testimonials and case studies from various geographies to show the product's effectiveness across different locations.
7. Offer local support and resources to help customers in each geography understand and use the product.