How Not To Get Lost In Translation

February 4, 2010 | Published on Digiday:DAILY by Swamy Viswanathan, VP of Products at Language Weaver

When marketing to global audiences, a company’s message must be clear, accurate and targeted to build consumer trust and brand loyalty.  Satisfied customers often result in repeat purchases and increased business ROI.  To make sure marketing messages are properly conveyed to different global audiences, translating content into their native language is essential.  And when it’s done properly, the benefits are immense.

Marketing content may be defined as any content that exerts emotional influence on a defined demographic in order to impact a desired behavior – usually a purchasing decision.  It’s a broad term that covers various types of content on a typical Web site. For ecommerce sites that sell physical products, product descriptions would constitute marketing content. For sites that sell services such as reservations to hotels or vacations, the description of the property or the delights of the vacation would be marketing content.

With the increasingly globalized nature of visitors on the Web, every site needs a strategy to ensure it communicates with its visitors in the manner that the visitors are most comfortable. According to a study by Donald DePalma of Common Sense Advisory titled, “Can’t read, Won’t buy: Why language matters on global Websites,” it’s important to make sure that content on a site is made available in the language that visitors to the site understand best. In other words, it is critical that all marketing content be available in the languages of visitors to the site.

For the greatest amount of site marketing content to be translated in the fiscally most responsible manner, site owners need to ensure that there is clear alignment between the form of translation that is used and the nature of the marketing content being translated.

1. Use human translation for highly nuanced content: Marketing content that is highly nuanced such as advertisements or content which contains human elements such as humor or highly personal observations are best translated by humans. Human translation can ensure that brand sensitive information is translated with the right nuance, ensuring the right experience to site visitors.
2. Use automated translation for fact based content: Marketing content such as reviews or factual product descriptions lend themselves well to automated translation. Not only is automated translation inexpensive but it is also fast. This combination allows the site to potentially translate all fact based marketing content.
3. As expected, there are benefits and pitfalls when translating marketing content via human and automated translation.  Too much reliance on human translation will result not only in high costs but very limited translated content on one’s Web site, where visitors are most prone to go to look up company and product information.  If visitors can’t find what they need – in the language that they need it in – customer and brand loyalty is at risk.  

On the flipside, the use of automated translation to translate highly nuanced content will likely result in significant brand risk. The right balance between automated and human translation, however, will result in a site that is able to translate all of its marketing content, thereby enjoying the benefits of control over its brand elements, and increased search ranking and findability in the native language of the site visitor. Furthermore,  companies and their marketers will get the best return for the translation investment. And that is even before the site enjoys a greater commercial return from its visitors’ increased engagement. 

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