The secret to outreaching to non-English-speaking audiences

When it comes to digital PR, there are no limits to where we can reach with our content – purely due to the widespread nature of the internet, allowing us to access publications across the globe at the click of a button. While we’re often able to seamlessly promote campaigns that are written in English to an international audience, this isn’t always the case. 

 

Of course, there is an abundance of languages out there – and English is just one of them – so it’s only natural that publications targeting their local audience may not want to publish in a language that isn’t commonly spoken there. 

 

So, what do we do? We naturally still want our relevant clients’ campaigns to be published overseas – but how can we still grab the attention of audiences that may not share the same language or culture? 

 

In this article, we’ll share the top tips we use ourselves, here at Shout Bravo, to captivate a global audience and secure coverage and links for our clients from all over the planet.

 

Translating your content for your target audience

 

As we mentioned previously, planet Earth is home to a massive range of languages – both spoken and written. In total, there are 7,117 languages currently being used in the world, and while you’re unlikely to be translating your content into all of them, it can certainly be beneficial to translate it into a couple of key target languages that your clients focus on.

 

Here at Shout Bravo, we regularly produce content for our clients which is then outreached globally. So far, we have found great success translating our campaigns into Portuguese, German, Spanish, French, Italian, and even Swedish, to name a few! 

 

We have our campaign on-site copy and visuals, press releases, and even our pitch emails and follow-up emails professionally translated, which allows us to reach international audiences in their native tongue, wherever they may be in the world. 

 

Additionally, we will even curate our translated on-site copy and outreach materials to be even more relevant to our target audiences – including data that is specific to that country and using cultural and geographical research to make our outreach materials feel more authentic and localised to each country’s media.

 

Research your target audience’s PR practices

 

While PR is a global industry, different countries have varying approaches and styles to their PR endeavours. Because of this, it’s important to understand the ways in which British PR differs from PR in the country you are targeting.

 

Doing your research into the market you are trying to break into can massively increase your chances of achieving coverage there. For example, in the US, there are significant state-rivalries between states that share a border – so it’s highly advised to avoid sending rival news to states and to be mindful of which side of the state line your target publication falls.

 

Certain countries may have a specific time of day in which they receive PR, or perhaps a specific day of the week. It’s also worth noting that – even if you are sending outreach in English – there are key grammar and spelling differences between English-speaking countries, such as the UK and Australia using British English, while the US and Canada use American English.

 

Additionally, there may be different practices regarding link inclusions and the use of your content – which could potentially lead to your client’s content being published without sourcing back to them, if you’re not careful! For this reason, it is crucial to research the PR and media industry within your chosen country thoroughly.

 

Build media lists manually

 

Of course, when it comes to outreaching content, media lists are a must – regardless of whether you’re outreaching to local or international audiences. While many of us in digital PR often use media databases when we outreach content to local press, there is actually a different approach that tends to work better when PR’ing content globally.

 

In our own experience, we have seen better success manually building media lists by individually searching for publications on Google or other search engines. This is largely because media databases tend can be outdated when it comes to international publications and jouranlists, and may not have current information regarding a full list of publications in smaller countries. 

 

Our top tip is to use the country-specific site ending to locate publications that you can outreach your client campaigns to. For example: “site:*.fr” for French websites, “site:*.it” for Italian sites, and “site:*.pt” for Portuguese press.

 

Certain publications often have local branches in different countries, which can be found by simply replacing the ‘.com’ or ‘.co.uk’ with the relevant country’s ending, so we also recommend giving this a try for yourself. 

 

Connect with international journalists via LinkedIn

 

If you have been able to successfully secure some coverage in an international publication, it’s always a good idea to start building a professional relationship with the journalist that put the piece together. While this is common practice, and we typically tend to connect with UK and US journalists via Twitter, we have found that LinkedIn tends to be a more popular choice to journalists overseas.

 

Taking the time to reach out and connect with them through LinkedIn can be a great way to make connections and can help your name to stand out in their mind when your next international campaign comes around.

 

To conclude

 

Global outreach can be an extremely effective way to build links for your client, with a massive plethora of press publications available at the tip of our fingertips online. By utilising the right strategies, we can efficiently convert this powerful resource into coverage for our ongoing campaigns. 

 

By making some small adjustments to the way in which we outreach, alongside taking the time to prepare materials in languages other than English, we have been able to successfully generate links for our clients all over the world – something we are very proud of.

 

We hope that you have found these tips insightful in your own international PR endeavours, and that they are able to help you build brand awareness on a global scale for your clients.