Are you a global company or a company looking to spread its wings internationally? Then you’re probably wondering how to promote yourself abroad. One way is through video. Maybe you already have an explainer video in English and you need to translate it or maybe you want to jump on the process of making a business video in all the languages your product is in. Whatever the case, having a company video in many languages is a sure way to promote your product around the globe.
So what do you need to know when making multilingual explainer videos?
First off, always remember that scripts are incredibly important. All scripts must be checked by a native speaker of that language? Why? Because the last thing you want to do is sound uninformed or grammatically incorrect – that will detract from your credibility as a company.
Second, accents do matter! Always try to hire a voiceover artist with a neutral accent. For example, in the US, if you hire a voiceover artist with a heavy southern accent, but your target market is in New York, you’ll be wasting your time. A neutral accent can appeal to all types of viewers, so that is typically best practice.
Third, timing maybe different on your videos. For example, we made a total of 18 videos in English, French, and German for our client, Glamorise. While each video was about 30 seconds, the German videos were a few seconds longer. While this was not a huge problem, we simply had to make sure the video itself ran longer to accommodate that ie: we had enough visual footage. You don’t want any versions to cut off at the end or sound awkward.
So now if you want to try your language skills, check out the video in English:
And then in German:
