Running a successful translation campaign for your business does not require loads of cash. By carefully planning your translation project, you can end up saving a lot of money, because truth be told, not every piece of information requires translation.
In a bid to inform our readers of the intricacies involved in translation, we would be putting out blog posts that would help businesses make better-informed decisions.
If you are still on the ledge regarding whether you need to translate and localize your platform for an international audience, you may want to check out this post, as it highlights what your business stands to gain.
In today’s post, the senior project manager at TIL, Valentina Vignolo-Love, provides insights on how businesses and SME’s can reduce translation costs.
Why planning your translation budget is crucial
Finding creative and effective ways to reduce running costs has become really essential, especially during this pandemic when resources are scarce. Doing so leaves you with more resources that you can channel towards other productive ventures.
An excellent way to start is by knowing your exact needs. Valentina Vignolo-Love, who explains this further, says,” When it comes to translation budgets, there is “no size fits all approach”. Each company has its own needs, and what works for a big company might not work for a start-up.”
Do not attempt to translate all the information on your platform. Instead, focus on content that enables your organization fulfill its short and long term goals
Tips on reducing the cost of translation
Here are a few practical tips on how your business can reduce the cost of translation;
- Always plan ahead
Proper planning enables better-informed decisions. For instance, by measuring previous translation campaigns, you can always identify areas to tweak going forward to improve your desired conversion. Planning with foresight makes it easier to group future campaigns in order to get bulk discounts from your translation agency.
- Schedule your translation project early
Early scheduling basically takes a cue from planning ahead. It may surprise you to know that many businesses leave their translation project till the minute only to pay a premium on express delivery. We recommend that you make preliminary preparations before the financial year commences and for you to engage your LSP long before the execution date.
- Utilize translation memory
When communicating content with your diverse audience, several words, sentences, and phrases would be used time and again.
Keeping a record or a sort of dictionary of previously translated texts helps in saving time and valuable resources during future translation projects.
- Localize instead of translate
As strange as this may sound, it is a very crucial recommendation. By localizing similar language pairs, you end up saving the cost required for the full translation into said language pair. Valentina Vignolo-Love cites an example of translating content from Italian to two variants of English (UK and US). A business can reduce costs by first translating to the U.S variant, before localizing the same content for the U.K audience.
- Avoid uneditable documents
Providing editable texts during translation campaign enables language service providers to work faster and more efficiently. On the client end, they stand to avoid extra costs associated with extracting information from scanned or hand-written documents.
- Always communicate with your LSP
Proper communication with your language service provider goes a long towards reducing the cost of translation. By communicating, you can adequately sell your visions and manage your expectations. The senior project manager at TIL recommends that every business should think of their LSP as an integral part of their company and must not be afraid to reach out to ask for input.
Valentina summarizes everything by saying,” It is essential to set realistic expectations. Approach your language service provider and discuss your expectations, volumes, and language pairs. Plan ahead to avoid the busiest times of the year like Christmas. Finally, keep track and monitor the results but also the feedback of the users and share any feedback in time so the vendors can implement it.”
As the world transitions into a recovery phase from the pandemic, many businesses may need to make up for lost ground by reaching out to a diverse audience. What you need is a reliable language service provider who acknowledges your budget and puts your translation needs first.