Online Marketing in Korea

Online Marketing in Korea

Running a Google Adwords campaign in English is hard enough. Regardless of what Google says, the odds are stacked heavily against new and novice advertisers. This is not just because the tools are complicated (and getting more so every day) but the underlying algorithms are secret and the materials for beginners are both misleading and incomplete.

There are a lot of people who say they know how to run Google Adwords campaigns, but if you’re marketing successfully online, you are probably employing the support of a search engine marketing (SEM) professional who knows what he or she is doing.

Korean Language and Cultural Optimization is Required

But even with an advanced level of online marketing expertise, you still aren’t ready to present your products to a Korean market. Why? First of all, there’s the language barrier.. you must prepare your advertising in Korean. But the online marketing field is way too competitive to just get some ads translated somewhere and throw them up online…. To reach your prospects, your message must also be culturally optimized and that requires special perspectives and skills.

Google Will Get You to Just 9% of the Korean Online Market

Let’s say though that you do get your online marketing program going effectively on Google in Korean for Korean consumers. You’ll then be able to reach… just 9% of the market! That’s because roughly 80% of Koreans don’t even use Google; they’re on Naver and Daum (with the other 11% or so on Yahoo! and some others).

And these native Korean portals also run their own proprietary marketing tools and their entire interfaces are in Korean, with complicated Korean government-mandated requirements just to register as an advertiser.

Our Korea-Specialized Approach Takes All of These Challenges into Account

First, we’ll work with your English-language SEM professional to adapt your online campaigns to the Korean language and market on Google. Through this initial process (it usually takes 2-4 months), we’ll optimize and report to you with data you can view and understand.

Then, once we’ve got a strong campaign going for you on Google, we’ll take what’s been working there and move it over to one or both of the major Korean search engines to reach the other 80% of the market. We’ll make up for the lack of real-time access for you by benchmarking the results on the Korean engines with what we’re doing on Google through regular reporting, which means you’ll still know exactly what’s going on and can stay involved.

If you’re ready to attack the Korean online market, we’re here to make your efforts a success. Contact us today!

Steven Bammel

Steven S. Bammel is president and chief translator/consultant at Korean Consulting & Translation Service, Inc. A graduate of the University of Texas at Arlington (B.B.A. Economics) and Hanyang University (M.S. Management Strategy), Steven has worked for over twenty years in Korean business and translation. | more about Steven

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