Newsletter ArchiveSUBJECT: Multilingual Web Sites; Reprint It's Friday. That means its time for the The Internet 800 Directory newsletter. Last week, we announced the opening of the Spanish version of the directory. This week, we received several requests from major Spanish language sites asking to add our directory to their site. It's our opinion that the expansion into international markets using the Internet is one of the best opportunities for increasing revenues on the Internet today. Several weeks ago, I was sent an article that covered the growing prospects of gaining international markets by using the Internet. It was my feeling that it covered the subject much better than I ever could. My thanks to Myriam Telles who wrote the article and has given me permission to reprint it in our newsletter. --------------------------------------------------- GLOBALIZATION TREND DRIVES NEED FOR MULTILINGUAL WEB SITES When the world wide web was originated, English was the commanding language and other countries grudgingly accepted this because there were no other alternatives. Today countries around the world are using thousands of web sites and Internet users are actively choosing to visit web sites that are written in their own languages. Companies who accept and cater to this globalization trend will zoom past those who choose to ignore it. Here are some statistics to back up our conclusions regarding the globalization of Internet usage. Today's Internet Users and Their Languages: English-speaking Internet users account for 51.3% and Non-English speakers account for 48.7% of the world's 302-million online population. On a dollar basis, English speakers account for 32% of the world's $33.7 trillion economy, while Non-English speakers account for a larger slice of the economic pie, coming in at a whopping 68% (Global Reach, March 2000). Among the world's Internet surfers, 31.8% speak European languages and 16.9% speak Asian languages. On a world wide basis, the percentage breakdown of the major languages spoken by online users is: English 51.3%, Japanese 7.2%, German 6.7%, Spanish 6.5%, Chinese 5.2%, French 4.4%, Korean 3.6%, Italian 3.3%, and Dutch 2.0% (Global Reach, March 2000). Projection of Foreign-Language Speakers on the Internet by 2001: And what does the near future hold? The number of Internet users who speak languages other than English is expected to grow dramatically during this year and next year. By the end of this year, the number of Internet users is expected to grow to 14.57 million in the Asia/Pacific Rim, to 18.45 million in Europe, and to 6.70 million in Latin America (Cowles/Simba Information). By the end of 2001, these numbers are expected to grow by 20.1% in the Asia/Pacific Rim to 17.50 million, by 24% in Europe to 22.87 million, and by 51.6% in Latin America to 10.16 million (Cowles/Simba Information). Conclusion: Companies who want to succeed must tailor their domestic and international web sites, to match the language, culture, traditions, customs and monetary units to those of their target customers or risk crashing and burning in the new economy. CALIENTE! INTERNET SITES CATERING TO HISPANICS ARE HOT! While surfing the Web lately we noticed that there are many web sites geared to Hispanics who speak English, Spanish or who are bilingual. The most popular sites are Internet portals that provide entertainment, news, chat, shopping, and a sense of "neustra comunidad" or "our community". Four of these portals are: Starmedia.com, Terra.com, Elsitio.com, and Quepasa.com. Starmedia.com is in Spanish and Portuguese, while quepasa.com is available in English and Spanish, and both terra.com and elsitio.com are in Spanish only. Other Internet sites specialize in providing specific information or target a particular group within the Hispanic community. For example, if you speak both English and Spanish and are looking for a job, saludos.com is the web site you'll want to visit for information on jobs, company profiles, and a great magazine for the bilingual professional. Want to share family news and photos? Then go to superfamilia.com where you can set up a private web site for your family. Expecting a baby? Visit todobebe.com for the latest baby products and advice. Why all the interest in creating Hispanic-oriented web sites? Because they target a growing domestic and international population which, if approached properly, can buy your company's or web site's products or services. So you don't believe us? Here are some figures that may convince you. Star Media, who owns starmedia.com which trades on the NASDAQ, reported in March, 2000 that its web site had 1.7 billion page views and $8.1 million in advertising revenues during the fourth quarter of 1999. During that same quarter Star Media estimates that its NASDAQ-listed competitors had the following numbers: terra.com had 1.2 billion page views and $4.1 million in ad revenues; elsitio.com had 0.3 billion page views and $2.7 million in ad revenues; and quepasa.com had 0.03 billion page views and $0.4 million in ad revenues. The total, for these four Hispanic-oriented web sites is: 3.23 billion page views and $15.3 million in ad revenues in only one quarter. This is amazing, considering that quepasa.com recently came online. Can you say, "mucho dinero"? Looks like the big boys are also recognizing the dollar/peso importance of the growing Spanish-language market. Bill Gates of Microsoft, the world's richest man, and Carlos Slim Helu, the wealthiest entrepreneur in Mexico, recently signed a deal estimated to be worth $100 million to launch a new Spanish-language Internet portal, t1msn.com. ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Myriam Telles (mdtelles@ix.netcom.com) owns Aim for Success, a multilingual public relations, marketing and journalism firm. She is also head writer of Global Communicator, an e-newsletter published by Global Language Solutions http://wwwgloballanguages.com, a premier web site translation, localization and marketing company. All Contents Copyright ©1995-2001 The Internet 800 Directory Subscribe To The Newsletter: |