AAA Translation - We'll Take You Global

As a business owner, department head or project leader, you want your HR documents, marketing collateral or other translated materials to be accurate and timely.

Because translations done WELL are paramount to your global success, we have several tips to help you directly influence the outcome, speed and cost-effectiveness of any translation project:

1)    Start with a well-written, simple piece. If the original marketing collateral or internal communications document is wordy, ambiguous or poorly written to begin with, the translated document will follow. Translators cannot rewrite. Their job is to accurately translate. To increase your success in the original language – and in the translated one(s) – make sure the piece is written really well.

2)    Be careful who translates for you. Someone may be bilingual, but that doesn’t mean they are an experienced translator, understand your industry or are up-to-date on the latest, localized language nuances in the market you’re trying to reach. It’s best to work with professionals who have teams of in-country, experienced translators.

3)    If you have preferred company lingo or branding guidelines, provide that to your translation company BEFORE the project begins.

4)    Be careful who proofreads your documents. You may have someone on your team who speaks Spanish, for example, but the nuances of Spanish in Mexico differ greatly from Spanish in Colombia. And even if someone is from the area, if they no longer live there, they are not as knowledgeable as an in-country translator and proofreader. AAA Translation’s founder and CEO Susanne Evens, for example, no longer translates German, despite growing up there. “I still speak German often and visit Germany, but I have lived in the U.S. too long to provide the kind of accuracy that I expect and get from someone who still lives there.”

Want to get more tips or learn how you can work with AAA Translation for your next translation, interpretation or global consulting project? Contact us at 636.530.1010 or visit www.aaatranslation.com to learn more.

With only 30% of the world speaking English and non-English speaking business opportunities on the rise every day, more and more websites simply MUST be multilingual.

When creating a website in multiple languages, avoid these 7 common mistakes:

1. Don’t ignore the language preferences of your target markets.

It should go without saying but we’ve seen it ignored too many times before to not mention it here. If you want to attract a market, make sure you are speaking their language. Don’t assume that your customers speak your language well enough to skip translating your website into their language(s).  In a European Commission study based on a Gallup survey of language preferences among Internet users in 23 countries in the E.U. (where people often speak more than one language), nine out of 10 said that, when given a choice of languages, they always visited a website in their own language, and 42% said they never purchase products and services in other languages. Translation: if you want them to buy, your website must speak their language.

2. Don’t use machine or automatic translation programs.

The results of using machine or automatic translation programs – rather than real humans who have translation experience and understand the nuances of both languages involved – is often disastrous, embarrassing and/or costly. There are so many examples to choose from. A recent one involves Taco Bell's new website in Japan. It was built using Google Translate, rather than a professional service. The result? Cheesy chips became "low quality chips" and Crunchwrap Supreme became "Supreme Court beef." It made some headlines before it was swiftly taken down.

3. Language translation isn’t enough – don’t skip other localization work.

Language translation is just one piece (albeit a large piece) of what is called localization. The goal of localization work is to give a product or service the look and feel of having been created for the target market AND the company, eliminating, or at least minimizing, local sensitivities. Regardless of the language used, the online experience must be culturally relevant and correct. Conduct research to understand the cultural considerations for your target audience. You may need to adapt graphics, modify content, adapt the layout (the translated text may be larger or smaller than the original language site), convert text/graphics to use different currency or measurement symbols and change formatting for dates, addresses and phone numbers, etc.

4. Don’t make it difficult to find your multicultural websites on your main site. 

Don’t make users hunt for your multilingual websites when they land on your main one. Access to multilingual websites should be made available in the global navigation at the top right on every page of your main site.

5. Don’t forget about SEO. 

Use a stand-alone, dedicated URL for marketing and search engine optimization purposes. You can redirect it to another one that’s more in line with your brand or URL convention. Also – think beyond Google. Google is not used in China, for example, so it’s important to have search engine optimization that is tailored to the search engines used in the countries you are targeting.

6. Don’t build it and then forget it.

Plan for regular updates and maintenance to ensure that your multilingual website remains comparable to your main language’s site.

7. Don’t build it if you can’t support customers beyond the website.

You have a multilingual website that avoids all the missteps above…but what if a customer has problems or questions? Think beyond the website and integrate your multilingual website initiatives with your internal and customer support initiatives, such as in-language phone and email support.

Need help localizing and translating your multilingual websites? AAA Translation, founded in 1994, works in more than 150 languages, and our experienced team can help make your multilingual websites a success. We provide translation/localization, interpreting, multilingual customer service support, over-the-phone interpreting and more. Contact us toll-free at 844.293.3519 or learn more at www.aaatranslation.com.