E-ging Solutions is a world-leading Shanghai translation company with specialties in website translation.
Did you know that each second, three people in India experience the Internet for the first time? (This is according to The Economist.)
Earlier this month, the Financial Times published an article highlighting the growth of ecommerce in India. The name of the article really caught our eye for obvious reasons: India ecommerce growth found in translation. As a result, we wanted to examine this further.
eCommerce in India is growing for the following reasons:
The world’s second largest population with over 1.2 million people
The world’s largest population of millennials (under 35)
Only 40 percent of India’s population is online today (up from 1 percent in 1995)
The statistic provided in #3 means there is room for growth
Entrepreneurs such as Jeff Bezos have made expansion into India a priority
LANGUAGE USAGE IN INDIA
India has the second largest population of English speakers in the world, but don’t let that fool you. Statistics can be misleading. While India may have a large number of English speakers, this is small relative to the total population. From there, few Indians consider it a first language.
There is no national language in India. The Eighth Schedule to the Indian Constitution recognizes a list of 22 languages. Hindi is the official language of India’s central government. English is still used in government and higher education. Of these languages, Hindi along with Bengali, Telugu, Marathi, Tamil, Urdu, Gujarati, Kannada, Malayalam, Odia and Punjabi are spoken by over 25 million people.
As the Financial Times article points out, mobile apps are looking to localize into Indian languages to better connect with the population. The lower income population in India struggles with English, so localization becomes increasingly important.
YOUR SOLUTION: WEBSITE TRANSLATION
Twenty-two languages may seem like a daunting task! But you will find that translating content for Indians in their own language will increase online sales. After all, most people prefer website content in their native language.
At Eging Solution, we offer website localization solutions in over 200 languages! And, if you would like to simplify website localization, take a look at our website translation proxy solution.
