Startup Buddy Media, a company that provides social media management tools to brands, is adding a new feature, called +Global, to its Facebook management system to allow marketers to publish customized fan pages in multiple languages on Facebook.
Previously, marketers managing Facebook pages for brands would have to create separate pages for each country, making the process more fragmented and the design inconsistent. The new feature allows administrators to serves unified Facebook content based on user country and language settings. So a user in Germany would see the same content of a Facebook page as a user in the U.S., but the content would be in German. Brands can also customize content, promotions and social applets to various countries within one system.
Starwood Hotels and Resorts are one of the first brands to implement the new feature, and is now serving customized language and content on its Starwood Preferred Guest (SPG) Facebook page to guests from the U.S., Spain, Germany and China.
The feature seems like a useful tool for brands and marketers to save time and money to be able to engage international users more efficiently. As more brands look to Facebook to engage with consumers, Buddy Media is seeing considerable growth. The startup finished 2009 with 150 clients, and has already added 45 more in 2010 alone. In addition to Starwoods, other well-known brands that use Buddy Media’s platform include Budweiser, NBC’s iVillage, designer Tory Burch, and the NHL. And the startup is was profitable at the end of 2009, and is on track to make $20 million in sales this year.
