Avoid These Web Translation Traps

Any business seeking to expand its reach to markets where English is not the first or dominant language will require a website translation service. Entire websites often need to be translated before entering a foreign market, and this can create a litany of problems in terms of marketing, messaging, brand audience, and other related factors. Translation is not an easy process and there are several traps that you should avoid before, during, and after the translation process.

Failing to gain clarity with the translation vendor

Your translation vendor is going to be the key player in this process, and it is absolutely imperative that you receive maximum clarity on this process. You should request as many details as possible about the talent that will engaging in the translation process and the levels involved in the process. Translation transparency is not a financial concern but a linguistic concern. If your vendor fails to provide you with any transparency in the process, you may be better off purchasing a cutting edge translation software. Working with a translation agency is desirable only if you are capable of confirming the credentials of the talent working on your website.

Failure to localize content

Localization is one of the primary concerns of any website translation and your messaging may as well be non-existent if it fails to include the requisite amount of domestic content. Local content should be added to the landing page, social media pages, CTA buttons, email marketing campaigns, and any other place where it is necessary. If your market is primarily a mobile-driven market, app localization becomes a crucial piece of the puzzle.

Failure to choose native speakers

In a large majority of cases, no one is capable of understanding a language, culture, or localized requirements better than a native speaker. You must engage with the translator to clearly understand the nature of the translations being performed. You need to maintain an open channel of communication with the translators to ensure that the process is working for both parties.

Translating websites in one go

This is almost never a good idea as you could easily miss some crucial details that are relevant to the market you seek to cater to. If possible, translation should be agile and strategic in nature where a certain amount of website content is released to an audience to gauge the content before the full launch. Going big or going home is a careless strategy that could involve huge upfront expenditures that may affect your firm in the long term. This point becomes more vital when you are translating to multiple language simultaneously and you are not strategic enough in your creation and deployment of different language websites.

Translating without establishing robust business value

Why are you doing it? Is the market a necessary investment for you? Is it a good long-term investment? Can you roll out the product in time? Before translation, every company should clearly identify how translation will be good for your business prospects unless you happen to have very deep pockets. If your translation efforts do not have clear goals, it can easily lead to aimless operations, a lack of conversions, and wasted resource. Every firm needs to have a detailed translation ROI where every point can be backed up without fail. If you have good enough reasons for pursuing translation, you will be able to witness viable results sooner rather than later.

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