The impact of language and culture on perceived website usability

Nantel, J. (2008) The impact of language and culture on perceived website usability, Journal of engineering and technology management. Vol 25, No 1-2, p112


I briefly read the above article today as research for the Digital Marketing assignment I need to complete for after Easter. As part of my assignment I am assessing a website for a local backpacker's hostel. One of the suggestions I want to make it that the website should be available in different languages. The reason for this is that the majority of Kipps customer's, English is not their first language. Therefore my offering the website in their native language, they are more likely to use the website and eventually a book room in the hostel.


The journal article confirms some of the beliefs I already had such as:
 - Translation is expensive and time consuming
 - Any translation carried out must be checked so that consistency is maintained throughout in terms of the information available in a given language. For example, somebody who speaks both French and Spanish and views the website in both languages would not want to see that one of the translations misses key information. 
 - Adapting the website for other languages does not just involve translation but takes into account other cultural dimensions (think of Hofstede's list) and adapted accordingly. For example, colours (and other design features) can have a big effect in certain cultures, which need to be considered


A really interesting paragraph I read was about Hall's findings about high and low context cultures and the effects it could have on website design

"Hall differentiates between low-context cultures (such as the USA, Germany, and Scandinavia) where the message of the written or spoken word is more important than pictures or other types of information, and high-context cultures (such as Japan, China, or Latin America) that rely heavily on contextual clues. In those cultures the overall environment in which the message is delivered (colors, authority and role of the speaker or writer, setting, etc.) provides more substantial meaning than the actual spoken or written word."

An excellent website that demonstrates the changing of design for different languages/cultures is http://www.honka.com It's fascinating to see how each of the country websites differ slightly. 


Overall I think that if businesses can afford to (and that often being the biggest deciding factor) they should not just translate their websites but localise them and adapt with to the specific cultures. This will enhance usability of the websites and therefore lead to higher success in transactions. 

Viral videos

This blog post will assess one viral video that I think worked and was effective and another that I think did not work and was ineffective.

Wikipedia define a viral video as "A viral video is one that becomes popular through the process of Internet sharing, typically through video sharing websites and email". It could be questioned how it is determined to be popular? How many views? How many times is the link forwarded on? How many times it is 'liked' on facebook? It would be interesting to see how company's measure the success of their videos if it can not be truly defined to be viral?

I'll start with the viral video I believe to be very effective.

Brand - Greenpeace - it could be argued that this is not a brand but it is the organisation behind this video.

Message - The video shows an average office worker who stops for a break. Initially the branding colours makes the viewer believe it's an official Kitkat video as the worker opens a Kitkat wrapper but the viewer is shocked on discovering the Kitkat is not chocolate as expected but the finger of an orang-utan with blood spilling across his desk.

Value Offering - Alert people of the sourcing of palm-oil from Indonesian forests which is "pushing orang-utans towards extinction". Further information can be found on Greenpeace's dedicated 'Kitkat' website

Audience  - anyone with an interest in the environment or ethical matters such as sustainable sourcing. Nestle customers and employees may also be interested in watching the video. 

Conclusion - The evidence of the success of this video is clear with over 1.5 million views on YouTube. After two months of campaigning, Nestlé also released an announcement to stop using products that come from rainforest destruction.

Now onto the video I believe to be ineffective.
Sadly it has been removed from YouTube now [don't whatever you do search 'ass cam' on YouTube like I just did!]
Brand - Levi Jeans were behind the making of the video BUT they did it in a sneaky way by
Message - The video shows two very attractive girls walking down the street with lots of people staring at the bum! They had a secret camera to film how many people checked them out.
Value Offering - Despite no obvious brand references or logos to make the watched realise it came from Levis, it was to get people talking about how good your bottom can look wearing a pair of jeans.. Levi jeans in particular!
Audience - Younger guys and girls - anyone interested in a giggle
Conclusion  - Although the video was very successful in terms of being a viral video with 7 million views worldwide, I don't believe the video will have been particularly effective in making people want to buy Levi jeans as it really wasn't made obvious enough. Asher mentioned in class today that a viral marketing campaign should really make an attempt to obtain your email address as by just watching a video, a consumer will not change their buying behaviour. To be more effective, Levi could have released the video under their own You Tube channel and had more reference to their brand.

Amsterdam Hotel Reviews

In our digital marketing class we are looking at two reviews of hotels in Amsterdam and reviewing the reviews!
We are reviewing them against the following criteria and deciding if we trust the sites (and their reviews) or not.
Relevance
Credibility
Ties (if any)
Experience/search
Demographic
Lifestyle
Expert
Consumer

The first hotel review I found was on Web Urbanist.
The website blogs about anything to do with cool and funky designs, whether that is funky album covers or funky furniture. As they blog about such a broad range of things it could be said they are not experts on the hotels but they are on the design of them (if this is something you are considering when staying in a hotel). the demographic is aimed at younger, arty people and from the website looks like it is aimed more at guys. It is definitely a lifestyle website targeting a certain demographic. I don't feel like I have any ties with the website so would not use the reviews to base my decision on. However, the website doesn't just comment on the design of the hotels but also some of the facilities they offer, which is useful.

St. Christopher’s at The Winston, Amsterdam

"every room has its own quirky theme"
"In addition to the hotel’s restaurant and bar, there’s a private beer garden"












The second review site I found was on gay travel net.
This website is primarily for reviewing travel destinations and hotels in these places. They are more of an expert as they do a lot of hotel reviews and they are lifestyle reviews.
The website is aimed at a certain demographic, which is gay people wanting to visit a safe and friendly holiday destination. It is relevant because Amsterdam is one of the gay friendliest cities and due to the amount of reviews the website does it has a certain credibility. This particular review is aimed at people wishing to find a hotel for Amsterdam's gay pride weekend so the location is really considered. Not only does the website give its own opinion and review of the hotels, it also provides short reviews of other 'customers/guests' who have stayed at the hotels. Finally, there is a link to yet more reviews of guests.

Mauro Mansion

 "The property is located in a traditional 16th century canal house"
“The owners welcomed my partner and I on our 16th anniversary with open arms."













Both sites provide good reviews with relevance to their own demographic and lifestyle. However, if i matched the demographic I think I would still seek other reviews to confirm my decision.

Personalisation/Segmentation of email marketing

This post will look at the video "Driving business online: email innovation across leading brands such as Boden and ITV" found here. 


An interesting point I picked up on was that companies are trying to (and managing to) reduce 'unsuscribe' rates by offering customers an option to reduce the frequency they receive the emails rather than a complete opt out. I think this is an excellent idea as there has been times when I personally did not want to receive an email so frequently so unsuscribed but would have been happy to continue receiving the emails but at a reduced frequency. 


Another thing to consider is that although average order value has reduced (from 2008 to 2009) it most likely wasn't actually related to the email marketing but instead to the global recession that the economy was suffering from. 


With so much of sales being taken online now, it is even more important that companies are using their email marketing in a smart and sophisticated way. By not keeping up with technology and not targeting and focusing on customers, customers can easily be put off by generalised mass market emails they receive.


An example of a regular email that I receive that is personalised to me is from Target Jobs. To begin with the email starts with 'Hi Julia'. This is a nice touch and gets your attention. Then I am told I am receiving the email because I had opted in on their website and then it lists the options I chose. The options I chose are the type of graduate jobs that I am looking for. There is also a simple link explaining that I can change these preferences if necessary. The email then lists only the types of jobs I am interested in, which saves me from having to read a whole list of jobs I have no interest in. A simple but effective personalised email.


By targeting customers companies can ensure customers are only receiving relevant information and are therefore more unlikely to delete the email without reading it and even hopefully going on to make transactions. By combining their offline and online data companies can segment their customers. They can then work out what type of offers/products/services the customer may want from previous buying/browsing behaviour. For example, Amazon is very good at customising their emails to customers. They send emails about offers of products that are similar to ones you have already bought or browsed. Not only can the products be specific but also the offers, which Steve Lomax backs up in the video mentioned above.


In the video Lomax als mentions how Boden are now using user reviews. Nowadays with the increase of social networking, customers are more likely to seek other people's opinions on products before buying. These reviews are an excellent way to provide customers the feedback they require. A way to gather these reviews is by sending out 'thank you' notes once the customer has purchased a product and asking them to review the product then. Boden successfully did this and have collected over 43000 reviews using this method. These reviews can really help customers with their buying decisions and customers can also search by the reviews. Bath and Bodyworks used user reviews and put them into the content of the email to inform customers of other consumer's thoughts.


Lomax makes a good point about confirmation emails when a customer has bought a product. Normally companies send a plain text email back but Lomax believes this is a prime opportunity to create another marketing message and ensure brand continuity. HMV used these confirmation emails as an opportunity to Upsell and Cross sell. As these emails have 100% open rates they also have high transaction rates.


Follow up reminders about left baskets to complete the transaction are also useful as over 35% of customers who shop online leave a basket without purchasing. This is not just relevant in retail but also in finance for example someone who does not complete a form applying for a credit card. I think this is a great idea as it helps the customer not forget about the basket and they go back to it. Even better would be if a small incentive can be given e.g. free shipping.


Using social networking, companies can increase their suscriber lists for example with the 'share with your friends' buttons. This enables companies to get to a much bigger audience.


Finally to wrap up this (lengthy!) blog post the video mentions the increase of mobile email marketing. So many people are using their mobiles to check the internet and the email so companies must ensure their email content is able to be read  properly in a mobile. Phones that can read barcodes are now becoming popular and boost transaction rates.


This video is very interesting in providing lots of ideas for companies on how they can personalise their email marketing and how sophisticated email marketing has now become.


Let me know your thoughts on my post!

Example Marketing Message

Below is an example of a marketing message I received in my email inbox. It is from St Christopher Inns who are a company that own hostels in a variety of locations across Europe. I receive the emails because I have stayed in their hostels in Brighton, London and Berlin. I always open these emails because they are bright and colourful and an interesting read. However, as you can see from the image below the emails have a tendency to be very long with a lot of information, which I often don't end up reading due to the excessive length. I think the email should be a shorter length in future to ensure readers do not get bored or bombarded with information.

It is a very colourful, bright and eye catching email marketing message with lots of new information. As the email is received monthly there is also useful information on the monthly events in the cities where the hostels are located.

Although my name is mentioned at the top of the email I think St Christopher Inns is missing a real opportunity to personalise the email more. Firstly my name is in such a small font you can barely see it at the top and also I think they could take advantage of the information they must have about the guests at their hotels. For example I have stayed in the Berlin hostel and took part in a free walking tour they offered and I think it would be useful to know which other hostels offer this facility. Also, when staying in Brighton I was given a 'VIP' card which meant I got good drinks deals in the bar below the hostel. The email could provide information about the hostels which have bars attached as they are a great way to meet other travellers. Or on the other hand, travellers with children or those not wishing to go to a hostel with a loud bar underneath may want to know this information too.

Overall I would say the email is interesting and definitely inspires the reader to want to stay in the hostels but it should have less information, be more personalised and be shorted in length.

(I'm unable to get the picture any bigger so I uploaded it to photobucket here but it's still small but hopefully you can zoom in?!)

Digital helps to feed comeback of offline marketing

After a bit of searching online for interesting news article about digital marketing I found an article, which can be read here.


The article discusses how the increase of spending on digital marketing has helped the increase of spending on offline marketing which has recently been seen.


The article found in a survey that "almost three-quarters (72%) of companies are increasing their digital budgets this year". 


Digital marketing, which is also called 'online marketing' in this article has had a good business case recently because of the ease of measuring digital marketing. TV and radio advertising is not only very expensive in comparison to digital marketing but very hard to measure the effects of.


Three reasons were suggested as to why offline marketing has seen a recent resurgence.
1. Improved economic conditions means that companies are investing more money across the board in marketing and advertising 
2. The efficiency of digital channels in attracting and converting brand interest and leads is giving advertisers the confidence to invest more money, for example, on television and radio advertising
3.  Anecdotal evidence suggests that they are hitting saturation point in how much they can spend on purely digital marketing channels relative to more money-hungry offline media such as TV and radio




I agree with the third point about digital marketing reaching a saturation point and therefore I am a bit sceptic that apparently 72% of companies are increasing their digital budget this year? I did not think it would be this high....

Creston to focus on digital marketing

Creston plans to focus on digital marketing and research after exiting traditional advertising with the sale of its agency DLKW. Click here to read more.


Due to pressure from the way industry advertising was going, Creston decided to sell their traditional advertising agency DKLW in order to move towards digital marketing.