In the rapidly expanding U.S. Hispanic and Latin American markets, communicating effectively in neutral Spanish becomes a key asset for any company looking to position its brand, introduce a product or service and gain a reputation.
The Hispanic market embraces more than 45 million potential buyers, so it is no surprise that so many businesses are looking to reach this audience and corner their share of the market. To put things in perspective, we are talking here about the fifth largest Spanish-speaking community in the world, after Mexico, Colombia, Spain and Argentina.
In order to target this appealing minority, your company must first understand their culture, preferences and habits. Once you have a good insight, it is time to speak their language. For the first, you must hire a marketing research agency that will furnish you hard facts, which will allow your company to identify potential opportunities, select target markets, implement marketing programs and, particularly, to define the approach and strategy. For the latter, you require the assistance of a seasoned Spanish Translator, preferably with marketing experience, to translate or "transcreate" your texts and materials. "Transcreation" is the creative, technical and/or cultural adaptation of a translation so it reads like an original on its own and conveys exactly the intended message.
If you want to go further and take your marketing efforts and campaigns to the next level, you may consider relying on a Spanish Copywriter to write your messages from scratch in a creative and persuasive fashion. A copywriter will pay full attention to your needs and goals, study your product, service and organization, relate the whole to its corresponding target, and build the most adequate message possible to meet your objective. As a result, this approach will make your advertising dollars count and ensure that your copy is attractive to your target audience while remaining faithful to your original idea and meaning... keeping you in control from beginning to end!
Hiring a professional Spanish translator or a Spanish copywriter, whether for in-house or outsourced work, it's not an expense but a wise investment. Avoid, by all means, making a selection based exclusively on rates. Focus on quality and experience and always ask for samples and references. Otherwise, you will harm your corporate image and ultimately have to redo what was unacceptable in the first place.
The bottom line: If you need to say it in Spanish, do it right and hire a professional Spanish Translator or Spanish Copywriter. Your brand, product sales and customers will be thankful!
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Rodrigo Ortiz-Monasterio - the author - is a professional Spanish Translator and Spanish Copywriter with over 25 years of experience in the marketing, advertising, business and corporate communications fields.
