Thinking out of the Anglo-centric box as a success strategy
I've got to admit it, I grew up in an Anglo-centric world. My early world-view (New Zealand) was dominated by either UK or US television shows or their tame local equivalents. Same went for news, magazines or any other key sources of information.
Boy, has that changed. I've spent the 10 of the last 15 years in either French-speaking, Asian or African countries (7 African countries in the last two years alone). And that has knocked some of my early baises out of me (I hope).
But let's face it, Internet Marketing, innovation on the internet, technology innovation etc. seems to be dominated by anglo-centric countries. Or is it?
As taught here at WA, capturing a nice flow of traffic for a micro-niche, delivering good content, dominating very targeted keywords, continuing to release content over time etc. allows you to drive enough traffic for your niche and begin to convert that to sales through affiliate links.
But for those of you who may be multilingual - the world is vastly bigger than the Anglo one we inhabit. While much of the innovation in internet business still originates in our corner - the consumption of data, information, services and products does not. And this is a good thing! It means there are many many more potential customers out there than we are currently targeting - and many of them are rapidly acquiring the wealth necessary to pay for services and products.
Here are a couple of graphs (you probably know by now I like my graphs) ...
There we go - the number of mobile phone subscriptions in India is more than the combined total of the 5-anglo countries (US, UK, Canada, Australia and New Zealand). There were 1.1 billion mobile subscriptions in China in 2012. 1.1 BILLION! And many of those will be smart-phone capable (see my previous blog on the march of Mobile in your future)
Think of the implications of this for a minute. How about another graph - perhaps one that comes closer to home:
This is the percentage of individuals using the internet. OK, we know we are ahead of the curve on this - but by the end of this decade India and China will have played catch-up. But even now. What is 42% of 1.35 billion people .... hmmm how about 500 million people online in China alone.
What does this mean? For those of you who have the privilege of speaking multiple languages (French, Russian, German, Spanish, Mandarin etc.) the online world is suddenly a much larger space!
I'm not suggesting jumping straight into the deep end of looking at this larger space - there is more than enough to keep you (me as well) occupied learning the materials here and building those niche authority sites just in one language. But once those skills are mastered, perhaps the world awaits! A much larger world!
Cheers
Recent Comments
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Excellent post for a global forward community, excaliba! Thank you.
The power of the mobile age is dependent on economic infrastructure and political dynamics enabling certain individuals to play. Yes, yet another set of skills are required including an additional language to spear ahead early connections.
The Web Index has initiated projects providing the status of each region and country in our global world. See http://www.webfoundation.org/projects/mobile-entrepreneurship/.
Nice link there. Thanks for that, I've added it to my mobile research bookmarks and will take a look at it later this week!
Oh, and yes, having purchasing power is of course the big hurdle for mobile services. Then again, with significant percentages of China, India, Brazil, Indonesia etc. populations moving into middle-class lifestyles ... the potential is phenomenal!
Thank you for the effort that you have put in to this blog. Your explanation was easy to understand. You have given us "food for thought"
That is really very interesting! I wonder, though, how often does it happen that we market to a specific audience but hit another one or two anyway because the internet has made the world more accessible?
Yes, that happens within a language, but in particular (from my observations of web traffic on larger sites) when those who can speak ... say English .... as a second language go looking for info but can't find it in their own. Even on one of my micro-niches I am getting 5% of traffic from Saudi Arabia ... no clue why.
But there are large parts of the world that do not speak any English and do not have any info/services in their own language - so there is perhaps a gap there waiting to be filled by those with the language and service skills to address the need.
Food for though anyway. I'll let you know how my partners foray into the Polish speaking online market goes.
It's amazing isn't it! I don't even know how to engage in a different language but my significant other - she speaks 4 languages fluently and understands six. So we're thinking of a Polish Niche at the moment - we found the field wide-open - no competition and lot's of activity - it's going to be her project!
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Intellectually stimulating concepts with clarity of presentation in a knowledgeable blog by a man with deep passions i observe.. charles