Translating your FBA Listings is one thing. Localising your listings is another. Know the difference and why it's important.
There is no question that if you are planning to sell in Europe, it is best practice to list your products in all 5 EU Marketplaces.
Sellers who only list in the UK are missing out on nearly 70% of the European market. Germany remains Amazon’s largest EU marketplace, while France, Italy and Spain are quickly growing and offer over 170 million more potential customers.
On average, sellers who expand into a second marketplace increase their profits by 40%. That figure jumps to 61% when they sell in three or more marketplaces (source).
However, to be a competitive brand in your market, it is absolutely critical that your listings are well written in the local language, follow Amazon guidelines and most importantly – convert Browsers to Buyers.
Translation involves taking the existing text and converting it to its closest equivalence in another language.
When it comes to your Amazon listing, this can be helpful especially for technical content about the product that needs to be precise in nature.
Localisation, on the other hand, involves adapting the existing text and incorporating the regional specificity and sociocultural context of a marketplace.
Your Amazon listing should already include a lot of great sales copy in your bullets and product description, and it is this content that will benefit most from localization.
Having listings that convey localized keywords is important, but the best international listings are translated by native speakers that combine knowledge of localized copywriting & SEO. This allows listings, “…to convert customers using a familiar voice they understand and trust,” as EcomDNA’s John Cavendish puts it.
The sales copy in your listings cannot cross the language barrier without some degree of transformation in message and meaning. The degree of this transformation will depend on the connotative nuances of your original copy.
When you only get a direct translation of your listing, marketing copy often gets ‘lost in translation’, as certain words and phrases cannot be translated to evoke the same feelings in a different culture.
This is why localizing your Amazon listing personalises your message to potential customers, and this is particularly important when you’re trying to cultivate an emotional connection with your audience.
Personalising your content is the first step to creating trust, showing authenticity and building a relationship with your customers.
As your customer base grows, it is also recommended that you localize all aspects of your product offering such as ebooks, brochures, instruction manuals and product packaging as this adds more value for your customers.
If your customers can read instructions and product information in their own language, this will not only reduce customer questions, but it can also mitigate potential negative reviews.
Thus, when you’re looking to translate your listings for other EU markets, look for a team with a balanced approach that combines translation with localization, along with the added experience and knowledge of Amazon FBA.
