4 Reasons You Should Localize Your Content with Subtitles
Media is an adaptive industry; it knows how to change. And that’s good, because the information landscape is shifting rapidly.
And content is more plentiful than it’s ever been before, which means it’s important to stand out.
One way broadcasters and media producers can thrive in the ever-evolving media landscape – and get great results out of it, in fact – is by localizing content for new regions.
Localizing your broadcast and streamed content with subtitles allows you to reach wider audiences in different regional markets. And not only that, it also improves viewing experiences for the user, and drives down costs (it’s much cheaper than dubbing).
Localizing your content with subtitles also makes it accessible to people who are deaf and those that have significant hearing loss, which is more than five per cent of the global population.
Here’s how localizing with subtitles maximizes your success in the changing media environment.
1. Increase your reach
It goes without saying that making your content available in different languages will significantly increase your audience numbers. It can open up entire countries if not continents of people, who may have just been waiting for your kind of content to show up in their native language.
Research by Common Sense Advisory Research has found that, in order to reach 97% of the online market, businesses need to have content available in 31 languages. By 2027, this will rise to 37 languages. As you can see, as content consumption becomes more global, so must your content. (Ai-Media localization services support 99 languages!)
Even if you are only looking to make your content available for a specific regional audience, localizing your content for them will make all the difference.
2. Improve the viewing experience
Localizing your content with subtitles makes the viewing experience so much better for your audience, even bringing in new people and encouraging them to stay for longer.
This is because subtitles not only translate your content, but they deliver that translation to your audience in text that appears at the bottom of their screen.
Like captions, subtitles make your content more flexible for your user to view content no matter where they are (for example, a noisy train or a quiet library where they can’t use sound) because they can read them on the screen instead of relying on sound. Subtitles also achieve longer viewing times for your content, with audiences staying up to 12% longer. And they get better engagement from your audience, including more shares and greater ease remembering information they have seen.
Study after study has shown that captions and subtitles are excellent learning tools and a preferred way for most people to consume content.
3. Drive down costs
If you’ve decided to localize your broadcast or streamed content, you will have the option of dubbing or subtitles.
Subtitles will cost about 10% of the price of dubbing, driving your content acquisition cost down by a huge amount. And this is done without losing out on quality.
In fact, subtitles have the added benefit of accessibility for people who are deaf and hard-of-hearing, and those who are learning another language. As we discuss in the next section…
4. Make your content accessible
In addition to being good for business, localizing your content with subtitles also makes your content much more accessible for people with disabilities and those learning new languages.
Once you add subtitles, people who are deaf and hard-of-hearing will have access to your content, as will those learning a new language (whether it is the spoken or subtitled language). Subtitles are also great for people learning to read.
This makes your content more inclusive and also opens it up to a huge audience that you would have otherwise missed out on.
Why choose Ai-Media for your content localization?
Quality is everything. That’s why it’s front and centre of Ai-Media’s content localization services.
We have great expertise in the broadcast and media industry, and deliver to some of the world’s largest broadcasters including NBC Universal, the BBC, the Discovery Channel, Channel 9 and iQIYI.
We support 99 languages around the world, with native speakers working in each location. And we perform 100% quality assurance on all our subtitles. Our QA team has more than 10 years of localization experience in the media and broadcast industry.
Ai-Media also does retiming (so subtitles appear at the precise time that the words are spoken), and we’re fast! Our combination of automated and human workflows lets us satisfy your need quickly.
We provide both open subtitles (which are ‘burned on’ to your content) and closed subtitles (which can be toggled on or off), and not only that – we can also translate your website or any document you wish!
And of course, we comply with the Trusted Partner Network (TPN). The TPN is a global, industry-wide file and television content protection initiative; a joint venture between the Motion Picture Association (MPA) and Content Delivery and Security Association (CDSA) industry standards to protect your content.
If you want to know more about Ai-Media’s subtitles or services for the broadcast industry or live streaming, find more information on our website, or just get in touch!
