Which variety of English should you use when targeting international audiences?

Many of the clients I work with target English-speakers in various different countries around the world. A question that often comes up time and again is ‘what variety of English should we use in our copy?’

And when it comes to websites, these are actually two questions hidden in one:

• Which variety of English should we use in the copy?

• Which audience filters should we apply when carrying out SEO keyword research?

Let’s answer these questions with an example from a recent client project I’ve been working on.

My client offers high-end, bespoke luxury services to an international client list. Her clients are primarily based in the Middle East and the US, with additional target markets in Europe. She wasn’t actively targeting Brits, although she was, of course, open to working with them.

The first step was to establish which of these locations was most important, and it quickly became clear that the Middle East was key. And, although the official language of the countries she was targeting was Arabic, English is also widely spoken, particularly in marketing. It’s also home to many English-speaking expats (including many who speak it as a second language).

Should I use British or American English when targeting international audiences?

Since I didn’t have experience writing for this particular audience, I spoke to a colleague who did. She told me that British English is often preferred because there are so many expat Brits living there, and that many high-income families send their kids to the UK to study.

But I’d also received conflicting advice from another colleague who routinely used US English when writing for the same group of countries. So who was right?

The answer came from my client’s positioning. She was offering a highly bespoke, service-based luxury experience, working one-to-one with clients. For this kind of brand, British English was a great fit. Along with an intentional brand voice, it would help us convey elegance, restraint and heritage. She was also based in Europe, where British English is often the preferred variant – it’s the version Europeans usually learn at school.

Interestingly, a lot of my European clients have either stated a personal preference for British English (even if it’s not strategic!). Or else,  the nature of their service-based business works well with British English spellings and punctuation. And yep, that’s even the case post-Brexit.

But… were we ignoring her US client base?

This was a bit of a challenge and I did go back and forth several times, considering whether US English might be more appropriate.

In the end, I decided that the audience’s slight preferences and my client’s luxury positioning meant that British English made sense.

Writing in US English wouldn’t have necessarily been wrong - as long as it was consistent in tone, spelling and punctuation. If I had decided to write in US English, I would have recruited an American proofreader instead of my trusty British one.

SEO for international audiences

But when you’re writing website copy, you also need to choose SEO keywords. And for that, you need to decide which country’s data to look at before making your decision.  Since my client’s audience was global, I began keyword research using international English data rather than filtering by country. This allowed me to identify terms that resonated globally.

Once I had selected the main keywords, I sense-checked them against data from the two main markets to ensure there were no major regional discrepancies.

If I’d been working with a mass-market brand then I’d have taken a different approach. For example, if it was an ecommerce or mass tourism business then I would probably have recommended a stronger US English focus, or even advised the client to create localised versions for each target region.

Because I’m a British copywriter, I’d have either collaborated with an American copywriter based in the US or written in clear international English, supported by an American proofreader.

What’s ‘International English’?

More often than not, I’m writing copy for non-native English speaker – people who speak English well but aren’t located in any one specific country. International English doesn’t mean avoiding personality or creativity. It means prioritising clarity and neutrality, because many readers are non-native English speakers who may have learned English through British, American or other global teachers.

That said, there’s no escaping the fact that you still have to choose either British or US spelling, grammar and punctuation conventions. Mixing the two is confusing and undermines credibility.

When in-market experience matters

I don’t write in US English unless there’s a clear strategic reason. That’s because, when it comes to other cultures, you don’t know what you don’t know. Although I have quite a few extended family members over the pond, I just don’t know the US market well enough to write US English unchecked.

A few years ago we thought we might be moving to New York (spoiler: it never happened!). I started researching housing options and suddenly I was bombarded with terms I’d never heard of like ‘walk-up apartments’ and ‘elevator buildings’. These phrases would never have occurred to me as a British English speaker, and I would never naturally use them in my copy. But using a British version would have instantly marked the copy out as having been written by an outsider.

In the rare cases that I do write for US audiences, I work with a local proofreader or copywriter to catch anything out of place.

Audience matters more than geography

What if you’re writing for a dispersed audience which doesn’t centre around any geographic location? Tourists or expats, perhaps. Or those lucky enough to commission bespoke? In these cases, we need to work out what the audience has in common. For example, yacht owners from different countries likely have more in common with each other than low-income earners from the same country. Use the audience’s similarities to guide copy and SEO decisions.  

For the luxury market, British English can lend a certain prestige internationally. (Biased, moi?). Heritage brands that value craftsmanship often develop elegant, understated brand voices for this reason, using  British English to support their positioning.

US English, on the other hand, often dominates mass market tech marketing, with bolder, more ‘in your face’ copy that is unignorable.

Reach international audiences

Having a hard time deciding which variety of English to use for an international audience? I’ve worked with clients across Europe and in Asia since 2017, many of them communicating with an international audience. Let’s chat and see how I can help you.