Moreover, both OLX and Quikr online marketplaces support Hindi (Quikr supports seven Indian languages in all), but these websites do not handle the transactions, and the listings are not translated, gadgets.ndtv.com reports.
Amit Khanna, Senior Vice President Product Development at Snapdeal, believes that there is a definite preference for people to use Indian languages over English. He says that in INdia people prefer reading in their local languages. According to him, Snapdeal is not reaching entirely new audiences with Hindi content, but serving existing users better. However, payments are finalised by banks, so those pages remain in English, but Khanna says that this is not a problem because the pages are very standardised and familiar.
The ecommerce websites rely heavily on content from third-party sellers. Travel websites like MakeMyTrip also rely heavily on their partners for information, so even in this case, theres a lot of information coming in that wont already be in Hindi. Unlike a media website which can manually translate the content it requires, ecommerce has to use live translation.
Presently, as the audience moves steadily towards mobiles and apps, companies like Snapdeal and MakeMyTrip are ensuring that new customers who prefer Indian languages will install their apps, something that is only going to keep getting more important over time.
Every day we send out a free e-mail with the most important headlines of the last 24 hours.
Subscribe now