Connecting with Local Markets: Tips for Successful PR Localisation
When expanding a business into new territories, understanding the unique demands of the local market is vital for success. The landscape for PR and marketing varies significantly across different regions – driving the need for tailored campaigns to make a significant impact. This is especially true for a complex sector like cybersecurity, where economic climates and industry maturity can vary greatly.
At Code Red, we specialise in creating customised strategies that resonate across different geographies. We ensure your business achieves optimal results and makes a strong impression on local media.
How to best localise PR?
Localisation helps us create more engaging and meaningful experiences, building brand loyalty, trust, and credibility with local consumers. This can be achieved by:
Building contacts on the ground
Creating effective strategies for specific markets requires an in-depth understanding of local customs, traditions, language, and consumer behaviour. This is where having local contacts becomes crucial. Leveraging our extensive Code Red network all over the globe, we can tap into local insights and expertise.
This helps us understand the most relevant journalists, bloggers, and influencers in the region. Our regional network members have deep knowledge of the security decision makers and how their needs differ from other regions.
Also, recognising local holidays, festivals, and customs helps with crafting timely and relevant marketing campaigns that resonate with consumers. For example, to help team Veridas in Spain penetrate the American market, we produced Superbowl-themed content. By integrating local celebrations into marketing efforts, businesses can demonstrate cultural support and foster stronger customer relationships.
Localising for relevance
When localising PR content, it’s crucial to ensure the message resonates with the local audience by understanding their culture and current issues. For example, while promoting Rapid7’s partnership with CSIT at Queen’s University Belfast, we emphasised Northern Ireland’s growing status as a cybersecurity hub and the partnership’s relevance to the local community. Highlighting the benefits and value of your PR content is essential.
Likewise, when BlackFog announced a new office in Northern Ireland, we showcased Belfast’s skilled workforce and culture. There was a strong focus on how the new office would create jobs, boost the economy, and support the local community. Always using relatable examples will help connect with your audience effectively. This was also critical in reaching local press outside of the typical cybersecurity industry publications.
Considering culture and buying habits
Understanding cross-cultural consumer behaviour is crucial for recognising how individuals from diverse cultural backgrounds perceive and consume products and services. This insight is essential for appreciating the cultural significance of decision-making processes.
By localising marketing efforts, businesses can identify, and segment potential customers based on cultural traits, needs, and preferences. This enables them to create tailored strategies for product design, pricing, distribution, promotion, and branding that align with specific market expectations.
Such localisation also helps avoid cultural missteps that could damage reputation and customer relationships, such as inappropriate use of colours, symbols, slogans, or gestures.
Moreover, embracing cultural diversity allows businesses to innovate and differentiate themselves by incorporating successful practices and trends from various cultures. This not only enhances competitive advantage but also fosters creativity and unique market offerings.
Adapting the right language and statistics
A key aspect of localisation is adapting language and style to fit the target audience and region. This includes considering tone, style, and translation needs, and using region-specific statistics when discussing issues like monetary impacts or ransomware attacks. Turn of phrases are also vital; analogies that work in one region may not resonate in another.
For example, we often find American clients use turns of phrase that won’t resonate with UK audiences, and vice versa. We are then tasked to create content that appeals the specific audiences, ensuring our messages and analogies are relevant and understandable. This careful adaptation helps us effectively communicate with diverse markets and enhance our PR efforts.
The solution for a successful international expansion lies in effective localisation of PR and marketing strategies. At Code Red we deeply understand the unique cultural nuances, behaviours, and preferences of each market due to our comprehensive and widespread contacts and our global partner network.
Our global team also plays a critical role in helping us localise content, and provides insights into the differing needs of cybersecurity decision makers in other regions. This helps us provide the best for our clients and ensure the growth of their company.
Here at Code Red, we work exclusively with cybersecurity companies, so we know what works when it comes to PR and marketing in this industry. If you’d like to discuss how we can help you localise your next campaign, please book in a call with our CEO, Robin Campbell-Burt.