International Marketing Effectiveness and local knowledge

Online marketing is great. It can be effectively done from everywhere around the globe. But local (language) knowledge gets more and more important. When you are active in bigger organisations with branches around the globe or when you want to start exporting to other countries, it is important to know how effective your campaigns will be and how much local knowledge you need.

I created this graph to give more information. However realize that the graphic below it is not valid for every branch. Especially the effectiveness depends on your KPI's.

International digital marketing effectiveness (central vs decentral)

Online Banner campaigns: саn реrfесtƖу bе done without specific local knowledge οr offices abroad. It іѕ simple tο bυу ad space nowadays, аnԁ уου саn rυn a perfect effective campaign using banners іn a country abroad frοm уουr οwn office.

Email Marketing: E-mail marketing service providers have great tools nowadays that can be setup from one spot and then can be perfectly used by local offices or persons. Testing and learning is very easy with email marketing and therefore it is placed at the side with less local knowledge. Of course the e-mails should be in the local language, but I have seen many examples (Ryanair, Wizzair etc) where they just translate the text (at least it looks like that) with Google Translate. Keep a very close eye on deliverability if you are e-mailing abroad.

Affiliate Marketing: Depending on the products or services you sell, this can be done from a central location. But the further away, the more local knowledge you need, for choosing a company but also for keeping contact with your publishers. Keep in mind that you might be able to get cheaper contracts with the affiliate companies when you sign company wide contracts.

SEO technical: Technical SEO means the structure of your website. This can be perfectly done from one location, since it is the same for the whole world. Make sure you site is SEO friendly in technical terms. 

Cross and Upselling: Depends how you look at it, but usually this can be done perfectly from a central location with automatic learning cross and upselling systems, like Unica, Prudsys etc.

Online PR: іѕ nοt possible without local knowledge, whеn уου аrе generating (free PR), уου need nοt οnƖу tο know thе local language реrfесtƖу, bυt аƖѕο уου need tο hаνе local contacts tο generate ехсеƖƖеnt PR. 

Youtube: Running a youtube channel can be perfectly done from a central location, only sometimes you might need to change subtitles. And it is effective to. Remember youtube is still the number 2 search engine on the web!

Reputation Management tools: There are nowadays tools for reputation management that work internationally. Altough rather expensive. But also free tools can be found everywhere. Local knowledge for language and interpretation is important to do an effective job.

Social Networks: Your own social network sites, can be maintained and analysed by tools that work globally. Some kind of extended CMS software packages. Remember facebook already started with auto-translation of comments and posts. 

SEO content: SEO content is the content at your website. First start with the SEO technical. If you do not have your technical SEO in good order, don't start with content SEO. Good content SEO can only be done from someone with good local knowledge. SEO is all about content. Don't auto translate , use unique content.

SEA: Search Engine Advertising is a little different, but most effective with local knowledge, since it is also about writing advertisements. However, since the texts change less regularly it can be done from a greater distance and it is also (but not preferable) possible to work with translators.

Linkbuilding: Linkbuilding is very important for a good search engine position and can be setup in various ways. In any case you need links. If you take a look at local websites, they are often the best. But you got to have direct contact with them. Therefore local knowledge is important. Of course there are other ways to do  linkbuilding with less local knowledge.