Bloggertone

Very good points here. I was reading an article just yesterday where they were saying that 50% of Tweets are not in English. I think it is also important to get really good translation done as well. That may sound obvious, but bad translation, and translation that doesn’t take into account the cultures associated with the language (and that can affect design and content as well), can create negative outcomes – or hilarious mistakes.

In Canada, where I lived for some time, French is an official language, and has to appear on packaging alongside the English. It seems to be a bit of a nuisance for some companies that would really rather not bother, and leads to funny messages. A couple I remember were on food products. ‘Sans preservatifs’ for ‘without preservatives’, but that actually means ‘without condoms’. ‘Farine Ecrit’ for ‘spelt flour’ but that actually means ‘written flour’. And so on. So, the messgae is, don’t take translation lightly or regard it as a chore that needs to be done as cheaply as possible!

Thanks Fred. I’m just back from the Digital Landscapes conference (see under announcements). One of the key messages from the very distinguished panel of speakers was to encourage Irish companies to view their businesses as global businesses – the web has enabled us to transact, and now interact, on a global stage. To follow that route, as the blog says, it’s a glocal strategy: think global, act local. Think how you can best interact with your prospects and customers – what’s easiest for them.

Hi Barney, I’m talking at Wordcamp Kilkenny this Saturday on Blogging for International Markets: I’ve got a few interesting case studies of Irish companies who are using blogs and their blog posts as an anchor to their Social Media Marketing Strategy. Very few are translating their blogs – well, very few are blogging for international markets, but it’s coming. We all know the commitment required to deliver new content: it’s another commitment to translate. But, that’s what’s got to be done if one wants to win interational business.

Same comments were made yesterday at #DLUCD – the Digital Landscape’s UCD conference (under Bloggertone announcements). People like Damien Mulley pointed out that many small businesses can now look to a global market place as opposed to depend on local footfall for business. John Herlihy, CEO Google said Irish companies can solve “complexity” through our online world – we have multi-lingual, multi-cultural capacity.

Hi Bertrand. See, I did actually get the blog translated into French version on my own blog, linking back to hear – for demo purposes: http://www.codegaconsulting.com/blog – walking the talk.
One of the issues with just translating the blog is that it may set a false expectation – what happens when it elicits French comments? Do you have the resources to interact at that point in French, for instance? Entering new markets requires planning and resources. Understanding one’s opportunity versus other markets is the first step.

Hi again Una. You are right. When somebody reads a comment, article or site in one language, they expect (and are right to) be able to interact with it in that langage. You therefore need a way to follow up on those leads in that langage. This is what I actually do for that customer I am translating the site for: I carry out offline actions, and I insure any lead from all marketing activities are delt with in French, including phone, email, proposals and so on. Technology allows that without the requirement to be in a physical location, so these is done in a very flexible way.

Bertrand, are you on twitter? Are you a fan (Facebook) of bloggertone? We’d love to get more of your comments in the future.

The problem is that the ‘google button approach’ will work from some businesses, not others, in some countries and not others, for some products and services but not others, for some target customers but not others.

IMHO, that isn’t exactly what could be described as a good start if you lack the judgement or experience to make that call.

Bad starts are expensive to repair and may never be forgiven or forgotten. Those of us with long experience of Japan, China and South East Asia markets will know this. I think that mrodgers makes some very valid points about the true nature of internationalisation..

Enterprise Ireland offer fabulous financial expertise and support for Irish businesses who want to develop international ebusiness and offline global strategies so it is utterly unnecessary to produce something third rate.
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Of course, if you haven’t done the research and planning and produced a proper business plan to enter a market then EI won’t give you support. But then you shouldn’t be entering a market if you haven’t done the basic spadework. True entreprenuers don’t take risks, they manage risk.

My sense is that nothing has changed since the 2004 ‘Ahead of the Curve’ report by Forfas that documented the abysmal export performance of the Irish SME sector.

A key issue highlighted in that report was state supports aren’t enough and that investment in producing good international marketing graduates with languages has been insufficient. Its really great that Una has created the space for us to re-ignite this debate.

I think it is naive to see the translation issue as a binary choice between paying 80 euros an hour to a domain expert translator and nothing for google translate.

There are other options – there are high quality crowd sourcing solutions to translation that are free – in addition, the cost of translation can be wound down over time by asking for a styleguide, a glossary and a trados translation memory as part of any translation deliverable. This allows you to switch translation company without having to pay again for the initial research costs while maintaining consistency of quality, tone, pitch, terminology.

Another great way of saving money and site dev iterations is to make sure that when you build your English language site that it has been developed so that it can be easily translated. Developing your site right in English makes translation, SEO and quality less expensive when you get around to translation and it shouldn’t cost you any more money that developing a site that isn’t world ready.

With content, make sure that you adapt the english text content for the new market (legal, product range, addresses, target audience etc) and text is frozen *before* you send it to translation.

Finally, if you really must insist on ‘translating’ your website using Google Translate – try roundtriping the text in google translate e.g. translate it from English>Albanian then that translate it back from Albanian>English.

This will give you some idea of the quality if you don’t speak the language. Watch out if your site uses a lot of jargon, idioms, slang and or non American English terminology and try to remove all these before you press the button.

Don’t, under any circumstances, use Google Translate for any form of legal text! Leave in English!

Beyond page text, watch out for text embedded in Art, concatenated strings, etc. If you are translating UI strings such as menu items, watch out if your target language is inflected… I could go on – if you haven’t asked your web dev for a world ready design, get the site audited for issues before you start translation. Having a site with mixed language UI or hardcoded syntax is a horrible and insulting experience for the customer you are supposed to be attracting.

Be careful out there people!

hoà bình! DermotQ.

Hi Una, As I attended your #wcirl speech I will react both to your post and speech.

My main issue is that, as a consumer, I am not so fond of websites translated from a language I speak reasonably well. If I can understand the original I always feel the translated version is second rate. Many translations are not good at all, more often than not they leave you with only partial translation of the website or bad language. But even when the translation is good a lot of subtleties and cultural context gets lost.

When the content of a website is very factual, like an airline booking, working with a translated version is OK. But as soon as it gets more complex, like a technical explanation of a Google product, I’m feeling like “please help, where can I switch back to English?”

What I consider more important than translation is whether you have thought about more practical market restrictions like sending and payment options or tax regulation. If you target the Dutch market, please offer iDeal payment and know about European VAT regulation.

Thanks again Dermot for debating the discussion. Interestingly, when I was recently chatting to @keithbohanna @dbtwang, he said he has found GTT useful (in a limited context). He recently received a German comment on http://www.DbTwang.com. Germany is not a market they currently support but of course he wanted to respond. He used GTT to translate the original comment and then translate his response. Other than that, I agree whole heartedly with your sentiments.
And it is a beautiful day.

Una, thanks for this post, which started quite an interesting conversation. It will indeed be very interesting to see how companies solve translation issues to get to untapped markets.

If you think about it, it’s quite amazing that despite all the advances of modern technology and communications, you can still travel across a border and be completely unable to communicate with another human being because of language differences.

Given enough economic motivation, companies will probably solve this issue online eventually.

Hi Una, localised websites are most certainly the way Ireland needs to be going, attracting international business, in whatever way makes sense. Perhaps we’ll hit the tipping point soon enough and find the single language service offering websites amusing. Keep up the good work. John

Excellent Article. This is such an important space. Mark is correct in the key points he highlights here.

Metatag information is often overlooked by clients looking to translate a site. As a company that specialises in this area we come across this all the time.

Going global though is a big decision. There is more to it that just the translation of the website text.
As Mark rightly says – this is marketing material. Someone in another country is going to read this and its the first time they will probably ever learn about your company. So you have to make sure you look professional and are sending the correct marketing messages. Everyone laughs when the see bad English translation from foreign countries. Do you want your new potential clients to see you in the same light?

It came be a little bit more expensive to get a site professionally translated, but the benefits far outweigh the costs.

An interesting trend in popularity is Google Translate. Some clients say – why can’t I translate the site for free with Google. Google Translate really is just for gisting (getting the idea) in another language. Even they say you should not use Google Translate for website translation (see their webmasters pages). Bad translation will not be indexed.

Another key aspect to consider on web translation is what languages to start with – and the follow up is what happens when a client is interested?

If someone sends you a sales enquiry back – can you answer it? If you had a sales enquiry email in French – could you deal with it?
In this case you can use Google Translate for yourself to find out what they are asking – and then have a profressional response created by your translation company.

All in all – putting together a complete strategy for your international sales is important. This starts with the translation, and then extends to marketing, customer service, seo and product development.

Damian Scattergood
http://www.star-ts.com
Confidence in a Translated World