Food for Thought #16: "Foreign" Language Sites

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I've had a thought bouncing around my head for a few days now. Like a lot of you, I do a fair share of site reviews for other members. And I've noticed a trend lately.

There seems to be many new members in which English is not their first language, and sometimes they run into spelling and grammar issues in their writing. While some of this can be overcome with tools like Grammarly, in a sense they are still flying blind a bit.

This got me to thinking...

If we preach niching down a topic as tight as possible, would not the same concept apply to the language the site is written in? How successful could a site be if done in a "foreign" language (I always chuckle at that statement. English is just a foreign to someone who doesn't speak it, and yet no one refers to it that way.)

Sure, many may consider English to be the "best" because so many people in the world speak it, but what if one were to do a site completely in Chinese? That's still a huge audience. Heck, even a site written in, say, Hindi is still a pretty big market. And a site done in Dutch might go on to dominate that audience because there are so few sites out there relatively speaking.

Perhaps, since many of us don't speak these languages, and thus lack the ability to compete in that market, that may even give the site an edge over the competition. In other words, the language becomes a niche unto itself, so to speak.

Not saying I'm right about this. It's just something that's been rolling around in my brain. I'm curious to hear everyone's thoughts on the idea. Let me know your thoughts.

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Recent Comments

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Good idea AJ. Are you thinking of setting up your own site or program to do this?

Hahaha... heavens, no. My wife says I barely speak English properly. lol

It was more of a thought exercise. But if someone is fluent in another language, it could potentially be a gold mine :-)

My thoughts exactly. I will definitely look into this and on using it on my own websites.

That's awesome!

Keep me posted on your progress. I'm really interested in "testing" my theory. And if your efforts prove successful, I will take my finder's fee in chocolate. lol

Good luck :-)

Lol... ok you're on.

Great idea! But how do we know it's not being done? They would not be a part of the community for obvious reasons, but that's not to say they're not out there. What say ye, Kyle? Carson?

Excellent point. I do know that there are sites done in all kinds of languages -- I've seen them -- I just didn't know if anyone here was "experimenting" with doing it from an affiliate marketing point-of-view.

Great idea!
I don't think I can do it in Chinese
but french or german why not.

Have a nice day!
Ingrid

If you do, keep me posted. I would be interested in seeing what you come up with :-)

Yes, of course!

Hi AJ,
Sound good to me. You just may be on to something.

Good luck if you are going to do this,
Donna:)

Hahaha... oh, heavens no; it's definitely not something I can do. I can barely speak English. lol

I just thought it was an interesting idea that non-native English speakers might find useful. :-)

Lol! I know what you mean! I could just see the southern girl in me trying to teach a foreign language!!

How would I say "ya'll" in Chinese? Lol;)

LOL. Exactly :-)

Hey this is an issue I have to think about a lot myself. I live and work in Thailand and English certainly isn’t the first language spoken over here. In fact, it can be a real struggle at times. I manage a small franchise over here and we sell to Chinese, Russian, English, Korean, Indian, Pakistani, and every imaginable ethnicity and of course Thai. My concerns are how much business am I missing locally by only advertising in English and Thai. I live in Pattaya which is a crazy city and is littrally a tourist hot spot. I would say 60 to 70 percent of my trade comes from tourists from all over the world. May be I should experiment on Google My Business to see what response I get locally with other languages? Problem is how would I communicate back hahaha. Google translate is great at times but has its limitations. My concerns are only on a local basis, I completely understand your point when you consider the ramifications when amplified to a global scale. Interesting.

Yes, I can see how communicating with that many languages can definitely pose a challenge. lol.

Your mind is spinning in an interesting direction!

Hi AJ, sorry I am unable to assist you. Everything is Greek here at sometimes. I just read the part where you review sites and I was wondering if you may have the time to take a look at my site and offer me some help, sorry not some help but lot's of help. If I put my Url down here I do not know if it is within WA policy. I could PM my URL though. Thank you

Of course. Shoot me the link and I'll take a look :-)

Thank you so much. I will PM the link to you. Warning: it has a lot of errors;

Interesting question, AJ!

My thought is that a narrow niche isn't the same as a narrow(er) demographic. I'm not multilingual, but it I were, I'd always choose to blog in the language of widest appeal.

-Laurie

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