Global by Design

Nextel recently launched a Spanish-language site to better market to Hispanic customers.

Here is the site: www.nextel.com/espanol.

This is good first step. But Nextel still has a long way to go. In all, less than 20 Web pages (by my count) have yet to be translated, putting it well behind competitors Verizon Wireless and Cingular, who both offer a great deal more Spanish content. But Nextel is still ahead of Sprint PCS, currently without any Spanish-language site.

One a picky but important note, notice how the URL ends with “espanol” not “español.” URLs currently don’t support accented characters, though this should change over the next two years. Nextel would have made things easier for itself and its users if it simply used the “es” suffix. See www.hrblock.com/es. Of course, it could be worse. Bellsouth offers no link at all on its home page to its Spanish-language site: www.miportal.bellsouth.net. And Verizon Wireless uses this cryptic URL: http://espanol.vzwshop.com/gw/.

Overall, Nextel is off to a good start. Now when is Sprint PCS going to catch up?

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