Make sure your message is conveyed correctly
So you need to reach clients in another market.
You want to translate some content into another language for whatever reason.
You need to hire a translator.
But why?
There are often companies or people who think they don’t need the professional services of a translator or a translation agency. Others think that by using other means they can save money.
That’s rather short-sighted. You need your content to reach the right audience, in the right way, and in the right language.
And there’s no substitute for a qualified translator and a quality translation.
Here are four reasons you need to hire a translator.
1. Translation is an art and localization is key
You might not have heard the term ‘localization’ before.
Localization means adapting something so it suits the target market. In terms of translation, that means taking into account cultural nuances in the regions where the target language is spoken.
A direct, word-for-word translation might not be technically incorrect, but it might not be the most accurate.
For example, in Spanish the saying “la gota que colmó el vaso” translates as “the droplet that caused the vase to overflow”. Now, in English, we would never use this phrase. Instead, we’d say “the straw that broke the camel’s back”.
The same idea applies to all translations. And a translator has the cultural and linguistic knowledge to do this. A translator will have studied their craft and practiced it over the years.
There’s no substitute for that.
2. Juan in HR might not know as much English as he claims
You might be thinking, “But I have somebody in my organisation who knows English”, if that’s the language you’re going for.
Unless that person is a native speaker, their English will more than likely not be perfect. They may use the wrong preposition or conjugate a single verb incorrectly. But even small errors will reflect badly on your business when read by potential clients.
You wouldn’t ask your company’s graphic designer to work in customer services, or your accountant to work in IT. So why would you ask somebody who isn’t a translator to translate something important for your business?
3. Google Translate is not your friend
Today, there are many online translators and applications. These can help if you’re in quick need of some foreign language assistance while on holiday or something. But when it comes to your business, you want to make sure you get a quality translation.
Google Translate isn’t going to give you that.
Just check out some of these funny mistranslations if you don’t believe me.
4. Proofreading a machine translation can be more difficult
Sometimes companies opt to translate something using Google Translate, or a similar application, and then have somebody proofread it.
Yes, you can, but this is often more time-consuming and more difficult than simply translating the original text, depending on the language pair used and the standard of text it generates.
Translators usually charge per hour for proofreading, so this could end up more expensive than if you’d had the text translated in the first place.
You’ll likely then need a translator to revise the text it generates and compare it with the original. Trying to proofread a badly translated text without the source text is difficult. Sometimes it’s impossible, depending on the phrases the machine translation throws out.
Perhaps in the future, AI will render human translators superfluous to requirements but we’re not there yet.
In a globalised world, the importance of a quality translation can’t be underestimated.
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