Expedia recently surveyed 4,500 hotels all over the world, asking them to rank tourists based on their behavior.  French tourists were found to be cheap, rude, and "terrible at languages". 

Expedia's marketing director, Timothee de Roux, attributes their rudeness to the stress of travel, including the challenge of trying to communicate in another language.  The solution seems obvious for the tourism industry: ease their pain and provide them information in French.  Hotels, restaurants, museums and other tourist attractions frequented by European tourists should have key pages of their websites translated  so that guests can have a certain comfort level and familiarity before they arrive.

The winner of this year's survey?  The Japanese, for the third year in a row.

Image courtesy of manuel/MC.  Licensed by Creative Commons.

Foreign-born Hispanics are not as affected by the economic downturn as other people.  In fact, the Selig Center for Economic Growth is forecasting a growth in Hispanic buying power this year.

How can this group of consumers actually have more money - rather than less - to spend this year?   The reasons are simple:

• Lower use of credit cards than the general market means they are not affected by rising interest rates.  They don't have large balances to pay off so they have money to buy your product now.
• Their net worth hasn't been affected by slumping stock prices because they didn't invest in the market.
• Foreign-born Hispanics are more likely to rent than own a home so they haven't felt the impact of the mortgage crisis.

Translations can help your business grow and be an important point of differentiation between your product and your competitors'.  Make sure you target this economically vibrant market first.

Image courtesy of travelinknu  from Creative Commons.

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Technically, all Spanish speakers in the United States speak the same language but, just like in English, there are regional variations.  Languages evolve differently in different countries, and slang and other vocabulary reflect the differences.  If you are marketing your product in Texas, most of your Hispanic clients or consumers will be of Mexican origin.  If your message needs to reach Hispanics all over the country, you would want neutral Spanish to be used in your translations.

Neutral Spanish is nothing more than Spanish that can be understood easily by U.S. Hispanics.  It usually steers clear of humor, slang, and word play.  It may not be the ideal if you are targeting urban youth in Los Angeles, but most products and services will benefit from reaching the largest number of Spanish-speakers without offending any of them. 

If you're not sure if neutral Spanish is what you need, give us a call and we'll help you: 615.460.9119.

http://www.pandltranslations.com

Image courtesy of Georgie Sharp fromCreative Commons.

If you are trying to make the case for your organization to begin targeting the Hispanic market, here is some data from the U.S. Census Bureau which may help you:

• The average size of households defined as Mexican is 4.1.  There are 3.2 members in all households surveyed by the Census.  If you sell packaged goods, this means Hispanic households will need to buy more of your product.
• Half of Mexican households own the home where they live.  If you're in real estate, the other 50% represent a big opportunity for you.
• The Hispanic population skews younger than the rest of the population.  The media age of Latinos in the U.S. is 27.6, compared to 36.6 for the total population.  As a marketer, reaching out to these consumers will help develop long-term relationships with your brand.
• Hispanic-owned businesses grew by 31% between 1997 and 2002.  This is triple the national average.  Don't forget these entrepreneurs when marketing your business services.

How will the increase in the Hispanic population affect your business?

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Image courtesy of khawkins04

A hot topic of discussion among translators right now is LinkedIn's request for translators to voluntarily translate their website.  So, a networking service for professionals that runs paid advertising on the site and charges a fee for premium membership wants linguists to provide their skills for free.  Needless to say, this has offended some translators who ask if LinkedIn also requests other professional services like accounting or legal advice for free.

Almost every translator I've had contact with on the subject does pro-bono work for non-profits they support.  We do the same, focusing on the non-profits here in Nashville.  But - and this is a big but - it just isn't right when a for-profit organization is trying to make money and is denying skilled professionals the opportunity to do the same.

If you'd like to read other people's reactions, Matthew Bennett asks 10 questions about the perils of free translation, and Jill Sommer suggests that LinkedIn is treating translators as non-professionals.

If you're a translator on LinkedIn, you may want to join the group Translators Against Crowdsourcing by Commercial Businesses.

Photo by slideshow bob

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