Business

Ask AI the Same Question in Another Language and Watch Your Brand Vanish

Reading in data-saving mode. Read full article from Entrepreneur website.

Published 10/16/2026 1:00:00 PM

The Language You Use With AI Decides Which Brands Exist

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

Key Takeaways

The language a buyer types in determines which brands appear in an AI answer, with local tools dominating local-language queries and global brands dominating English queries.
Checking AI visibility only in English measures a market most non-US companies don’t compete in.

Asked in Norwegian, ChatGPT named three Norwegian tools and no American ones. Asked in English from the same desk, it did the reverse. The language of a question now decides which companies exist in the answer.

Someone in Oslo asked ChatGPT, in Norwegian, to recommend accounting software for a freelancer. It named Fiken, Tripletex and Conta, three Norwegian products, and no American one. Minutes later, from the same connection, the same person asked the same question in English. The list now read FreshBooks, QuickBooks and Wave, and the Norwegian tools had gone.

Nothing about the buyer had changed. Same city, same category, same machine. The language of the question had selected the market, which is the finding of a controlled study posted to arXiv by a researcher in Tallinn who ran 234 such tests across four countries and six languages.

I run ESBO Ltd, a link building and brand mentions agency with a publisher network in 53 languages, so the result surprised me less than it should have. Clients find out the same way every time: a company that shows up reliably in English answers asks why German buyers never see it, and the honest reply is that German buyers are not asking in English. We started placing Spanish-language mentions of our own agency this year for the same reason.

The language of the question picks the market

The counts are lopsided. Where the question was asked in the official language of the country, a global brand appeared in one of 24 runs. Asked in English from Istanbul and from Tallinn, a local supplier appeared in none of 12.

The model was not short of knowledge. In two of the six English answers on the Estonian connection, it noted that the user was in Estonia and that local tax rules argued for a local system, then named five foreign products anyway. It knew. It did not say.

Earlier work by the same researcher put a size on the effect. Across 12,933 answers, the language of the question explained 26.5% of the variation in responses, and the brand identity explained 1.5%. The study has limits worth stating: one model, six runs per test, and an author who sells AI visibility measurement for a living and says so in the paper. Read it as a loud signal rather than settled law.

English behaves like a market of its own

These systems assemble answers from what they have read, which is sorted by language. An English question pulls from the English web, where the global brands have spent two decades accumulating coverage. A Norwegian question pulls from Norwegian pages, where the local tools are the ones being reviewed and compared.

English does not even act as a neutral default. Regarding the Turkish connection, it returned 0 Turkish suppliers, while every other language tested returned local results. A separate paper comparing Chinese and Western models gave the pattern a name, the existence gap: a brand documented in one language exists for the models that read that language and barely registers for the rest.

The visibility report is measuring the wrong country

For an American company that sells only to English speakers, none of this matters. For everyone else it changes what the monthly visibility report is counting. The study’s author put it plainly: a company selling into Germany or Norway that checks its AI visibility in English is checking a market it does not compete in, and its real rivals are invisible to its own instrument.

The reverse holds for local champions. They own the local-language answer and disappear the moment a buyer types in English, which is how procurement teams and international buyers tend to type. One answer per language, and your brand is in some of them. Most companies have never checked which.

Get named in the buyer’s language, then measure in it

The repair is the work I keep describing in these pages, done in a second language. Translating your website helps less than you hope, because what you publish about yourself is the weakest signal AI has, and the Estonian suppliers in the study already publish English documentation without that moving the English answer. What moves it is other people naming you in the buyer’s language: the local press, the local roundups, the local review platforms and the local podcasts whose transcripts the models read.

That sounds expensive and often is not. Our pricing data across 16,625 publishers puts the median sponsored article at $655 in Spanish across 1,642 sites, $480 in Polish and about $490 across Central and Eastern Europe, close to the $452 an American-audience English site charges and well under the $1,040 for a British one. The Nordic languages and German are the exception, with Swedish, Norwegian, Finnish and German sites all at $1,230 or more, and in our experience far fewer brands compete for any of these placements than for the English ones.

Then measure where you sell. Take the five questions a buyer would ask about your category, have them translated (machine translation will do for a first pass, and a native speaker should do the second) and run each one several times in each language. Several times matters: the study found the top recommendation changed across identical runs on four of six prompts, so one screenshot is one draw from a distribution. Log which brands appear in each language and which sources get cited, and you have a map of where your name needs to be printed next.

The person in Oslo got a competent answer in both languages. The difference was which companies were allowed to exist, decided by a choice nobody made deliberately: the language the question happened to be typed in. Your customers make that choice every day. If you only ever check in English, you have no idea what they see.

Key Takeaways

The language a buyer types in determines which brands appear in an AI answer, with local tools dominating local-language queries and global brands dominating English queries.
Checking AI visibility only in English measures a market most non-US companies don’t compete in.

Effective product pages help online shoppers decide whether an item fits their needs and what buying it involves. A beautiful photograph gets attention. Product details such as dimensions, available sizes, delivery details, and a clear price help turn that attention into a purchase.

Even established retailers miss these basics. In its benchmark of leading U.S. and European retailers, updated in March 2026, Baymard Institute rated 52% of desktop sites and 62% of mobile sites “mediocre or worse” for product-page usability¹.

Product-page changes can affect revenue, too. In a 27-day test for Life Pro Fitness, agency Media Contour made product images, key details, and buying buttons visible without needing to scroll. Testing vendor Wingify reported that the revised page generated $0.67 more revenue per visitor than the original².

If you are building a new store, follow the five tips below as you create your product pages. Have those pages ready before running ads that send shoppers to them.

If you already have an online store, choose one product page to improve. Reference these steps to check whether it answers shoppers’ questions and lets them add the right item to their cart.

1. Answer shoppers’ questions in the product description

Identify the main question a shopper needs answered before buying. Look for questions customers ask repeatedly or misunderstandings behind returns. For a new product, start with fit, compatibility, or what is included. Confirm the answer against your product specifications, then put it near the start of the description.

For example, consider a pet-supply retailer selling a dog harness. Someone choosing their first harness needs measurements and adjustment details to judge the fit. Someone replacing a harness they already own needs to recognize the same model and size. The page should make both tasks straightforward.

Also, use consistent labels and units across similar products to make comparisons easier. Include limitations, such as incompatible models or items sold separately, so shoppers can rule out an unsuitable purchase.

In e-commerce platform BigCommerce, for instance, online sellers can use the product description and custom fields—additional facts such as material or compatibility—to present these details. Preview the product page to check that shoppers can find the information they need.

Then, use those same facts to help shoppers recognize the item in search results. In BigCommerce’s page title field, use the product name and a relevant detail, such as its model or material. Avoid repeating keywords or giving every product the same title.

2. Give every product image a question to answer

Plan your gallery around what someone needs to inspect. Show the whole product, a useful detail, and the product in use. For example, a lighting retailer could photograph a lamp beside a chair to show its scale and how it lights a reading space. A close-up of the switch shows how someone would operate it. Together, these images help shoppers picture using the lamp at home. Keep written dimensions available as well.

The same Baymard overview describes how shoppers use images to judge size and can struggle when photographs lack a familiar reference.

If you sell a bundle, make clear which pictured items are included. For products that need assembly or demonstration, you might even consider creating a short video. Add alt text: a short description of the useful information in an image. Screen-reader software can read that description aloud or present it in braille. Keep essential instructions available as text as well.

BigCommerce supports product images, images for variants such as different colors, and YouTube-hosted product videos. Check that your gallery presents the right item as shoppers change their selection.

3. Make choices, prices, and recurring charges clear

Keep size, color, quantity, and purchase options close to the buying button. Label them plainly, show the current selection, and make unavailable choices recognizable. If the size options fit on the screen, show them as labeled buttons, such as S, M, and L. This lets shoppers see which sizes are available without opening a menu, as the Baymard overview explains.

Place helpful links beside the choice it explains. For the dog harness, for example, consider putting a measurement guide beside the size selector so shoppers can check the fit before choosing. Keep it visible or provide a clearly labeled link that works by touch and keyboard.

In BigCommerce, online sellers can configure choices such as size and color through product variants and options. Then check that the displayed price and availability match the shopper’s selection. For multipacks, show both the pack total and the unit price. Make the full pack price easy to find so shoppers know what they will be charged.

If you offer subscriptions, let shoppers explicitly choose between a one-time purchase and a recurring order. Put the recurring charge, delivery frequency, and change or cancellation terms beside that choice so shoppers can compare the commitments before selecting. Confirm that these terms match how your subscription service works. Select a subscription yourself and verify that checkout shows the plan, price, and frequency you chose.

4. Make sure delivery, returns, and reviews are easy to find

A shopper who needs an item by a particular date wants to know whether it will arrive in time. Show a delivery estimate for their destination. Put a short explanation of shipping and returns near add to cart, with links to the full policies.

Show shipping fees or explain how they will be calculated. Clearly describe return windows, fees, and exclusions that matter for the item. If pickup is offered, distinguish stock at the selected location from stock elsewhere. Avoid presenting an estimate as a confirmed promise.

Also consider making reassurances that are specific to the purchase. Using the dog harness as an example again, you’d want to explain whether a shopper can exchange it if the fit is wrong and which conditions apply. That answers the practical concerns that a badge saying “Shop with Confidence” leaves unresolved. Use only promises your business can honor.

Customer reviews provide another way to assess the product. Show the review rating, text, reviewer’s display name, and date on the relevant product page. If reviews come from another service, name that service. These details help shoppers understand whose experience they are reading and how recent it is.

5. Test the path from product page to cart

Shoppers need to know that the page has registered their choices and whether adding an item succeeded. Open your chosen product page on your phone. If a required option starts unselected, try adding the item before choosing it. The page should tell you what to select or explain why “Add to cart” is unavailable.

If the product has options, choose them, then change one selection. Check that the price, availability, and any option-specific images match. Add the item. While the request is processing, the page should make that clear. Once it succeeds, a confirmation or the cart itself should show what was added. If an error occurs, it should explain how to continue without losing other selections.

From there, make sure to check the item’s quantity, options, and price in the cart. If you chose a size or color, return to the product page and check whether it still shows that selection. These checks help catch a wrong selection or an uncertain result before a shopper encounters it.

Shoppers who cannot use a mouse need to select options and add products using a keyboard. To check that they can, repeat the steps above on a computer without the mouse. Use Tab to move forward between controls and Shift+Tab to move back. A visible outline or other marker should show which control you are about to use. Press Enter to activate links and Enter or Space for buttons. In a drop-down list, such as a size selector, use the arrow keys to move through the options.

Shoppers who need larger text must still be able to read product details and reach Add to cart. Use the browser’s Zoom control to enlarge the page to 200% and try the same steps again. Check for overlapping text or controls that disappear. Across all these checks, record anything that prevents choosing the product, adding it, or correcting a mistake.

Keep improving one page at a time

Clear facts and images help shoppers judge the product; clear choices, terms, and working controls help them act on that decision. Choose one issue from your review to fix first. Give priority to a problem that prevents adding the correct item to the cart. If shoppers can add the correct item, address an unanswered question that could lead someone to buy the wrong product.

Record what you changed and when. If you have sales reports, compare purchases and revenue for the product over equal periods before and after the change. Note any promotions or changes in visitor numbers that could also explain the results. Customer questions, order corrections, and return reasons can help you check whether the same misunderstanding persists.

For more examples, explore BigCommerce’s product-page guide, then apply the same review to the next product page.

¹^{Product Page UX 2026: 10 Pitfalls and Best Practices}^{(Baymard Institute)
2}^{Media Contour uses split URL testing to improve the revenue from product pages}^(Wingify)