The Importance of Localizing Your Social Media Strategy for 2021

There is no doubt that social media has played a dominant role in business marketing during the coronavirus pandemic, with social media translation providing a key avenue for engaging global customers during the crisis. Social media facilitated a large proportion of social and business interactions during worldwide lockdowns, with Statista citing that social media usage increased by 21%, and the consumption of online news rose by 36% around the world in 2020. Companies took 2020 as an opportunity to amplify the volume of creative content on company websites and social media platforms during the year. Consistently, companies around the world increased spending on their social media marketing and social media translation while decreasing their spending on traditional methods of advertising and promotional activity. Digitization of company marketing strategies and strengthening online footprints become a center focus from early in the year. Unexpectedly, companies had to implement historic decisions regarding the direction of their media marketing and allocation of budgetary funds. Strategies such as optimizing SEO and content management, particularly when centrally coordinating multilingual social media translations, become critical marketing goals for companies hoping to maximize their marketing budget ROI in 2020.

In June 2020, The CMO Survey critically analyzed the effect COVID-19 had on company marketing, spending, and performance. According to the Survey, companies reported major losses in sales revenue and saw a heavy decrease in in-person marketing engagement in 2020. In turn however, companies also saw a sharp increase in general customer openness to digital offerings during the pandemic. Additionally, among the 274 companies surveyed across 13 industry sectors, spending targeted towards mobile and social media marketing increased on average by 70%-74%. This trend is a part of a larger shift towards maintaining brand awareness and retaining customers online. Specifically, companies took to expanding their brand awareness through content on LinkedIn, corporate blogs, Instagram, and Facebook, as well as concentrating on using technologies to enhance mobile website optimization and app creation. Clearly, the use of social media technology made a monumental impact on business marketing in 2020.

Learning from 2020, 2021 will further test the efficiency of technologies enabling both social and business communications in the AI and 5G era. Highlighted by HBR, one trend that will go hand in hand with social media in the near future is the ‘gamification’ of media content. Due to the increased dominance of ‘gamers’ on social media, by game-advertising, companies can authentically and creatively launch and promote products that target certain age and social groups. Interestingly, another trend emphasized in a Forbes article is the importance of ‘staying relevant’ yet ‘culling social media’. This approach, paired with the growing demand of gamified content, calls for companies to clearly develop strategic and purposeful plans regarding the management of their content. With numerous social media platforms, it is essential that companies understand their target audiences across the globe and make informed digital marketing decisions with their diverse customers in mind.

Targeted, tailored marketing strategies will enable companies to better create region-specific social media content for optimal ROI and media engagement. CSOFT’s network of in-country linguists can deliver digital marketing solutions in over 250 languages. Through multilingual SEO, website translation, localized content management, as well as translated campaigns and slogan, CSOFT offers effective and efficient media and publishing translations for a full range of industry needs.