MarketingVOX: While corporate America expands its Web presence overseas, it often looks right past minority audiences here at home, reports BusinessWeek.
The findings come from a report from the Common Sense Advisory, which looked at the sites of 102 of the top US retail outlets. Only 18 of those sites, it found, contain Spanish-language content – and only half of those responded to customer service issues in Spanish.
27 of the retailers prompted the customer to contact Spanish language customer-support, but only one-third of those were actually able to provide that support.
The report advises retailers go beyond just translating existing website into Spanish. Sites must be made more culturally relevant to succeed.
Companies can also go a long way by simply setting expectations about how the site is set up and making it clear which languages are available online.
Related stories:
- Ford Brands AOL Latino Fashion Reality Series
- Spanish Networks Struggle to Woo Ad Interest
- Latino Ad Spend Rises 14.4%
- Yahoo Study: Online Hispanics Super Multitaskers
- Montgomery Ward Launches Site in Spanish
- U.S. Hispanics Not a One-Size-Fits-All Market
