"Which language should our Belgian video be in?"
It is the first question every brand asks about this market, and it has no answer. Not a difficult answer, not a nuanced answer: no answer. Asking it is like asking which language a Swiss video should be in, and the fact that so many briefs still contain the question is why so many Belgian campaigns reach half a country.
Belgium is one country and two consumer markets
The north speaks Dutch, the south speaks French, a smaller German speaking community sits in the east, and Brussels is officially bilingual and practically international. Those are not accents or regional flavours, they are separate media landscapes with separate creators, separate references and separate buying habits.
The Dutch speaking north is the larger of the two consumer markets and it is also, generally, the wealthier one. That single fact reorders most brand plans, because the instinctive move for a French speaking marketing team in Brussels is to produce in French first and translate later, which puts the smaller market first and the larger one in subtitles.
What the split does to a budget
One video per language, not one video subtitled
Subtitles solve comprehension. They do not solve belonging, and creator content is bought entirely for belonging. A Dutch speaking viewer watching a French video with Dutch subtitles knows exactly what happened: this was made for somebody else and forwarded to them.
The practical consequence is that a Belgian campaign costs roughly twice a comparable single language campaign, and a brand that has not planned for that will quietly cut the second version.
The creator has to be from the right side
This is not about accent alone. A creator from Antwerp and a creator from Liege reference different shops, different habits, different weekends. Hiring one bilingual person to do both usually produces two videos that each sound slightly translated, which is worse than two videos by two people.
The second version costs less than the first
The concept, the script and the framing decisions happen once. The second shoot reuses all of it and pays only for filming and editing. Budget Belgium as one and a half campaigns rather than two, and the internal argument becomes much easier to win.
Brussels is a third case, not a compromise
Brussels is not the average of the two. It is bilingual, heavily international, and full of institutions and companies working in English. A Brussels campaign often needs English, which surprises brands who budgeted for two languages and discover they need three.
What actually changes between the versions
| Where the audience is | The language the video is made in | What else changes besides words |
|---|---|---|
| Flanders | Dutch, made by a Flemish creator | Retail references, humour, the pace of speech |
| Wallonia | French, made by a Walloon creator | Shops named, media habits, weekend rhythms |
| Brussels | French and Dutch, often English too | An international audience with no shared local reference |
| The German speaking east | German | Small, rarely served, and almost never contested |
Look at the third column. If only the words change and every other element stays identical, you have produced a translation and paid for two videos. The reason to shoot twice is what sits in that column.
What Belgian brands already understand
Here is the good news, and it is genuinely unusual. Belgian companies do not need to be convinced that multilingual communication is necessary. They put two or three languages on their packaging as a matter of course, their websites have a language switch, their internal meetings change language mid sentence.
So the argument that takes an hour in other markets takes thirty seconds here. What they need is not persuading, it is a supplier who can actually deliver both sides without them having to manage two separate relationships.
That is a real commercial opening for a creator or an agency: not "we make videos", but "we deliver Flanders and Wallonia in one order".
Which sectors buy
Ecommerce and retail, in a country with very high online purchasing. Food and drink, including a strong specialty export scene. Fashion, with a design reputation that outsizes the country. Pharmaceuticals and personal care, which is a large industrial sector here. And a dense layer of small and medium businesses that sell across the border into the Netherlands, France and Germany.
Add the institutional and business to business world concentrated around Brussels, which buys explanatory video and recruitment content and almost never buys it from creators, because nobody offers.
The cross border trap
Belgians shop across borders constantly. A Flemish buyer uses Dutch webshops, a Walloon buyer uses French ones, and both are exposed to advertising produced for the Netherlands and for France.
This cuts two ways. Content made for the Netherlands is understood in Flanders but reads as Dutch, not Flemish, and the difference is audible. The same goes for French content in Wallonia. A brand that saves money by reusing its Dutch or French assets in Belgium is making the same mistake as the brand that subtitles, one step further out.
It also means the competition for attention in Belgium includes campaigns that were never aimed at Belgium at all.
Disclosure is not optional
Belgium has its own advertising self regulation and applies European rules on identifying commercial content. A video that runs as advertising has to be recognisable as advertising, in the language of the audience watching it.
Two versions means two disclosures, correctly worded in each language. It is a small detail that gets forgotten precisely because it is small, and it is the kind of thing that turns a campaign into a complaint.
Where a brand should start
Pick the larger market first unless you have a reason not to, which for most consumer categories means Flanders. Produce two videos rather than one plus subtitles. Use two creators. Compare the results per market rather than as a Belgian average, because a Belgian average hides exactly the information you paid to obtain.
And treat the first campaign as a way to learn which of your two markets responds better. That answer is worth more than the campaign itself, and most brands never get it because they only ever ran one version.
Keep reading
- Flemish Dutch and Belgian French in Your UGC
- Who Hires UGC Creators in Belgium
- Invoicing and VAT for UGC Creators in Belgium
- Setting Up as a Self Employed Creator in Belgium
- The complete UGC guide for Belgium
Frequently asked questions
Can one video cover all of Belgium?
Only if you accept reaching one language community properly and the other partially.
Are subtitles enough for the second market?
No. Subtitles fix comprehension, and creator content is bought for belonging rather than comprehension.
Which market should come first?
Usually the Dutch speaking north, because it is the larger consumer market.
Does Brussels need its own version?
Often yes, and frequently in English, because the audience there is heavily international.