Language support has become an essential service for telecom businesses — as important and expected as offering technical support or a customer service hotline.
Companies that fail to offer language support for customers who have limited English proficiency (LEP) run the risk of missing out on a huge and growing population of potential customers in an ever-growing multilingual marketplace.
By partnering with the right language support partner, you can expand your telecom offerings and increase your monthly recurring revenue potential. Here's how.
A few years ago, we saw a significant shift in the business world toward customer experience (CX). At the heart of this philosophy is putting the customers' needs first and providing a smooth experience whenever they interact with your brand. Then the entire brand-customer interaction was upended in 2020 during COVID-19, forcing companies to take the next step in this evolution to organize businesses around delivering exceptional experiences — the business of experience (BX).
Today's reality for telecom businesses is that your clients have more choices and more information than ever. These clients are also focused on how they can meet the needs of their own end-users and customers.
Companies that invest now in a comprehensive language support solution can meet clients' needs today and respond quickly as the need for more language services increases in the future. Immediate access to qualified language service professionals ensures that their customers are seen, heard, and understood, so their business is prepared to meet and exceed customer expectations (no matter what language they speak).
Offering language support through your telecom platform means clients won't have to patch together their own network of language service providers, saving them time and money and improving their own customers' experiences.
A language support add-on service offering will help you bring in new clients in a marketplace where convenience is no longer just "nice to have" but is an essential service. You can quickly increase your revenue potential by offering clients language support from qualified interpreters. GLOBO offers language services in more than 430 languages with translation services available:
| By telephone | |
| Through video conference | |
| In-person |
Language services must also be prepared to meet customer demand for more virtual interactions, which accelerated during 2020 and is not showing any signs of slowing down.
In a 2018 analysis of Census Bureau data, the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) found there are 67.3 million residents in the U.S. who speak a language other than English at home. That accounts for about one-fifth of the entire population.
In nine states, that number is even higher, with more than one in four residents who speak a foreign language at home (California ranks highest with 45%). States with the fastest-growing rate of people who speak a language other than English at home include:
| Nevada (up 1,088% since 1980) | Washington (432%) | ||
| Georgia (952%) | South Carolina (398%) | ||
| North Carolina (802%) | Florida (393%) | ||
| Virginia (488%) | Utah (383%) | ||
| Tennessee (459%) | Oregon (380%) | ||
| Arkansas (445%) |
The number of households where people primarily speak a language besides English has tripled since 1980 and more than doubled since 1990. That rapid increase is unlikely to change anytime soon — rather, it's more likely that the number of LEP individuals in the U.S. will keep going up.
For telecom companies, these shifting demographic trends are either an opportunity to expand your business with the right language support or a potential pitfall that could make it harder to attract new customers if you don't offer services in their preferred language.
As the population in the U.S. becomes more diverse, the number of people speaking languages other than English as their preferred language will grow. Telecom businesses with a partner that provides high-quality language services are the ones that will be best positioned to take advantage of the new opportunities that come with it.