The other day at work, while chatting our break away at noon, our team realized something that felt quite surprising at the moment: our native countries had a completely different take on some holidays and celebrations. That’s one of the pearls of working with a culturally diverse staff – you get to realize firsthand just how disparate celebrations are from one country to another.
We mainly came to this realization not by discussing events that we celebrated differently, but by talking about ones that our countries didn’t use to commemorate until it got influenced by another culture. This newfound interest in some holidays from other countries is more often than not due to brands wanting to commercialize the event. Halloween, for instance, has gained a massive popularity in the UK over the last few years because of the influence of American culture. Even though trick-or-treating and pumpkin carving was around for a long time, the considerable commercial focus of this holiday is fairly recent and shed a new, shinier light onto the holiday.
Nowadays brands have a lot to do with the popularity of holidays depending on if they’re marketable enough or not, however in order to profit off these events, brands need to be in touch with localization. They cannot commercialize an event correctly if they are not acutely aware of a country’s culture and how said event is perceived and celebrated there.
In a way, analyzing holidays and how they are affected by different cultures in each country is the gateway to understanding the need for localization in marketing.
Take Valentine’s Day, for example. When thinking of this holiday, the first thing to usually come in mind is usually romance and couples, and yet, in many other countries, the 14th of February doesn’t necessarily have the same relevance. Using this holiday as a marketing strategy world-wide without an ounce of localization would be a mistake for a brand because of how much Valentine’s traditions vary from one country to another.
For example, Argentinians do not celebrate love in February but rather in July with “the week of sweetness”. Additionally, in Ghana the 14th of February represents the “National Chocolate Day”, in Romania love is celebrated on the 24th, in Estonia it’s a festival called Sobrapaev mainly centered around friendships, in the Czech Republic couples celebrate on the 1st of May, and last but not least in Japan tradition has it that women are supposed to offer the gift and chocolates to their significant other on Valentine’s Day – gifts that cannot be returned until exactly a month later on what is called the ”white day”.
If a brand tried to commercialize Valentine’s Day in these countries the same way they would do it in France or in the UK, then their marketing strategy would simply miss the mark. Valentine’s Day is not always about couples, neither is it always on the same date. Traditions require localization.
In the same way, a company that wants to benefit from the holiday season to promote their business in the whole world has to be in touch with the culture of these overseas markets. Doing so would be a great opportunity to learn that Thanksgiving isn’t solely celebrated in America and a marketing campaign based on it can therefore be adapted to a few other countries. Canada, Germany, and Liberia have their own Thanksgiving scattered over different dates between October and November.
As a company, these varying holidays that never seem to align in a convenient manner can quickly come in the way of your intent to commercialize international holidays, which is why hiring our localization team might be the best solution for you.
We can help you to efficiently benefit from the vast amount of consumer activity during international holidays without misinterpreting some events or missing out on special days you didn’t know existed. Hiring a localization team ensures you to an adjusted marketing strategy scheduled to accommodate all the varying international holidays. Your business will never miss out on the annual leaps in the percentage of shopping done during holidays all over the world ever again.
Even without planning on benefiting from all the leaps stemming from international holidays, you might find yourself in need of a localization team just in order to make some Christmas-related content. Even the holiday considered as the most celebrated one by Americans is not recognized the same way all around the world. Marketing it in India the same way you would in a Western country would be a waste of money since it wouldn’t make much sense, it’d be more profitable to focus on Diwali. In the same fashion, parts of Italy consider that Saint Lucy brings the gifts, not Santa Claus. Using the old bearded man as a marketing strategy would still be understood, but it would miss the point of personalized campaigns since it just wouldn’t feel familiar to the customers and compel them to buy.
All in all, the international holidays can be a pretty tricky subject that might require a few helping hands. By reaching out to our professionals, you can make sure not to miss out on the Friendship Day in India, the Click Frenzy in Australia, the Single’s Day in China, the White Day in Japan, or even the Noche de Rabanos in Mexico!
