Great Products Deserve Great English

As online Usenet advertising goes, my poster  was catchy, off-the-wall . . . different--and it got at something far overlooked in the world of Internet-based international commerce involving the English speaking markets of the world: language standards.  At its heart, the standards issue is less about grammar and the many poetic and rhetorical devices available when communicating in English than about cultural identifications across international boundaries and parochial evaluations of the worth of companies and their goods and services. 

Because cultures are very much their languages--i.e., the human process of  inventing sounds peculiar to shared perceptions and maintaining the resulting inventory of symbols is naturally boundary creating, evolutionary, and unique--language serves to distinguish among individuals within and across cultures.  Within cultures, of course, language mannerisms partially define social class: there is never confusion about what constitutes civil and educated speech--and who owns it as well as who owns one of the principle qualities of leadership--nor the characteristics of vulgar speech (and those who either indulge in it or lack the wherewithal to do better); across cultures, the first utterance from a stranger always tells an astute listener what a stranger may not wish to reveal, starting with the stranger's identity defined in its negative term: i.e., is the stranger one of my own kind or not?  From that simple litmus, cultures have developed complex, extensive, fast, and systematic analyses of the value of those standing at their gates.  Considering the rude global history of the English themselves and the less savory aspects of American politics, one might expect their language to rank among the least favored on the global palette, but from a functional point of view in a far less than ideal world, it is extraordinarily widespread, its native users are frequently powerful in global business, finance, and politics, and those who use it well in speaking for themselves, their customers, and their products essentially remove one of the key obstacles in acquiring power and wealth in their own interest.

Looks Make the First Impression--Language Makes the Lasting One

Precisely what is at stake when using English to sell one's goods?  The answer is simple: nothing less than the perceived credibility, likeability, and integrity of the seller.

Even though the system of language-based cultural evaluation works in both directions, vendors in English speaking countries have frequently enjoyed three distinct competitive advantages when operating in other language markets: for some players in the advanced industrial nations, being able to be the sole source of a variety of essential economy developing technologies and services has somewhat canceled out their language disadvantage; having the political favor of U.S. generated international aid supporting the acquisition of U.S. manufactured goods certainly discounts the role of language in the relatively locked-in sale of such goods; and for many international firms, open market success may also be ascribed to the employment of a virtual army of willing and well paid translators in other cultures.  For sellers approaching U.S. and other markets from other than established multinational corporate bases, the disadvantages are mirror--sole source advantages are rare; economy-funding political loops remain most often in English speaking hands; and even in English speaking countries, translator talents tend to top out at the literal level--the preponderance of talented English speaking writers find their homes in national advertising, entertainment, journalism, and publishing as opposed to international business and trade.  For the world's manufacturers, obtaining a presence in English that matches the progressive nature of their firms and the quality of their goods can be tough.

For many companies, merely meeting the technical challenge of getting on the Internet has been the focus of the online communications effort: web site development tasks have been assigned to technical staff with marketing department oversight; online commerce has been supported by the development of virtual "shopping carts" and data gathering forms supporting other store counter functions.  As time goes on, the corporate focus will naturally shift back to creating value for the goods sold and then winning that price--and with it, profit--in highly competitive markets.  For many industrial firms, simple diagrams, pictures, and product specifications accompanied by pricing information and applicable baseline terms and conditions will support the sale of specific items--perceived same quality, equal delivery, and low price will win the business; however, for most, the value of the goods will soon be bound to their presentation--and the vendor's presentation--in English, for the good use of the language may also convey the impression of good business practices and ethics, high quality in the goods themselves, and, in its gentility, a laudable concern for labor that makes the purchase of goods of all kinds easy on the buyer's conscience.

This has been a philosophical and perhaps portentous (but blessedly short) column, but in my next I promise we'll take a look together at the relevance of English language grammar in business branding and marketing.

With best regards,

J. S. Oppenheim