It's All About "U"

A basic concept of localization is to use the language of your audience.
I guess some brands (especially those from the US) forget this point when marketing to others who speak the same language.

I just received an e-mail newsletter from Disney, featuring a dining offer at their Florida resorts. It's clearly an office targeted at Canadians (like me), and makes a few obvious references to this point such as being clear that the price is in US dollars and that the Disney Canada privacy policy applies to the newsletter's database.

This is good. You wouldn't expect a major marketer like Disney to screw up those types of things.

What I really like, though, is the less-obvious fact that the copy was written with Canadians in mind: the subject line was "A Walt Disney World offer you'll savour."

Sure, it's a tiny detail. But using the Canadian spelling of "savour" is a nice touch.

Not every brand bothers to make these little adjustments or to write something new for different audiences. For example, we recently received a brochure for a local pizza place in the mail. It's a franchisee in a large chain (Dominoes, I think) that I'm sure just orders brochures from the head office that are simply shells customized with the franchisee's address, phone number, map, etc. It's a food provider, so of course they use words like "flavor" throughout the brochure. Unfortunately, here the word "flavour" would be more appropriate.

Would it really be that difficult for the company to provide "Canadian versions" of their marketing materials? Do the franchisees have any input into the contents and copywriting of those marketing materials? I would assume that the company has a Canadian head office - why didn't they "translate" these materials?

I wonder if it's an oversight, laziness, or a lack of caring.

How big does a difference between target audiences need to be before it's worthwhile to address those differences?