Functional Designing in Translation

Design in typesetting has undergone a vast change due to the pressures of localization and translation.       

While talking with an old friend about the recent films we had seen, concept of the international market cropped up. Hollywood-based American film industry used to produce films with a complete flair of American to them.

Soon the studios in HOLLYWOOD realized, they were not catering large potential foreign audiences as their films were endowed with the American flair. So, they start thinking from the point of view of international audiences; films that would result best in the domestic market and foreign market with less tinkering. With this ongoing trends, we have more films with less dialogues, more special effects, and more international actors rather than 100% American casts. There is nothing wrong with that, of course – in fact, it mirrors a movement in typesetting and design that seeks to be more easily ‘international’ when it comes to translation work.

The Format of Translation

Typesetting is an artistic form. Most of the work is automatically done and no one has to calculate the leading and kerning themselves any more – but the functional design is still a prerequisite for any print or even electronic product, and more importantly designs are functional that can be easily translated. In the past, when a book was published in America for example, would simply be published in English and if translation is to be done in other dialects than they would have to do so completely from scratch. In the digital age, however, many content creators and publishers are ensuing to have their texts and other products out in all possible markets at the same time. Text specific languages often result in often results in bag layouts as text adapts differently, and moreover, doesn’t fit in the given space. The result? Some new rules for designers, and layouts that are a bit more comprehensive and are adaptable into different cultures and languages.

New Rules of Design

The new approach to design has a similar philosophy to the movies: keeping it simple and with a more room for adaptability:

White Space: Exclusion of White space as it made pages look empty and bare. However, now another point is followed, white space renders translation professionals more room to expand text boxes if required, to fit the translated text.

Keep Design Elements Light: There was a time when textbooks were heavily designed. They were endowed with multiple elements like different text boxes for different types of information. This resulted in beautifully compiled products but are difficult to translate. The new thinking is KISS: Keep It Simple, Stupid.

Avoid Columns: The situation becomes more complicated when there are more columns on a page,  and a less room to work with, specifically if your short English word is replaced with a twenty-four letter German term.

These just point changes that have swept design in typesetting- there are many other subtle changes that are beyond your notice.(TRANSLATION SERVICES IN NEW YORK)

WHAT ABOUT MARKETING AFTER WRITING CRISP CONTENT?

WHAT ABOUT MARKETING AFTER WRITING CRISP CONTENT?

Have you written first-rate content?

You know the purpose of your writing.

Your blog clearly conveys your ideas.

Then what’s going wrong? Why are things not in your favour? You are not getting right traffic, likes, tweets and comments.

Don’t get panic. Here is the sure-fire formula for your deliriously written content.

1. LinkedIn Promotion for B2B

It raises the eyebrows when the Content Marketing Institute (CMI) accoladed LinkedIn with a status of the supreme platform in 2014. Put your best foot forward with LinkedIn promotions. If your content is an eye catchy then this can surely help to convey your ideas to the B2B prospects. One of the major content promotion method that can avail you the loyalty of B2B marketers. Post plagiarism free content and get jaw-dropping results.

2. E-Books

By referring to an e-book, it doesn’t mean I am talking about a lengthy novel. It is an infallible and an ideal way to introduce your visitors to your ideas. It will also get you more exposure and email contacts. Don’t forget to proffer your e-book as an incentive to sign-up. Make certain that each page is endowed with precise, crisp and succinct content. Visually appealing content is also the prerequisite, so enroll designer in your marketing strategy. Use bullet points to enhance the flair of the book. Stats and reputable quotes give e-book a solid backup.

3. Don't Dismiss Email

Inbound marketing gimmicks may come and go, but the use of emails is still at full throttle. One cannot turn a blind eye to the potential of email marketing. If people have signed up to your emails, there are sporting chances that they look up to you for quality oriented content.  Make sure that content should be alluring, intriguing and precise rather than just a barrage of sales spiel. You can attract readers with different types of stuff that you can email your viewers including competitions, blog posts, e-books, event invites etc.

With a view to multiply your contact list, fix several sign-up tabs on your website. Don’t forget to give your customers an incentive to sign up and develop a close liaison in order to gain customer confidence.

4. SlideShare presentations

 Your content can create buzz with the SlideShare. SlideShare is an awesome way to unveil your ideas as it encompasses 60 million global users. You can also call it as most preferred content marketing platform. You can showcase your content in the form of presentations through slide by slide and strong point is that you can also upload infographics, documents, PDFs, webinars, and even videos. It will not only develop brand awareness but also keeps your edge above the others.

5. Don't Ignore Paid

Do you think you can get assured success with inbound marketing tactics? Absolutely. What about the paid marketing strategies?  About 60% of marketers use online paid search advertisement in their content marketing tactics at least occasionally. Pay-per-click (PPC) is in a trend and positioned as most effective paid tactic.

I am not saying to splurge your money, but if used wisely with little investment, then it will be like bang for the buck. Other set of paid tactics, like billboards, print advertising and radio commercials are out of range and do not dive in desired traffic.

6.PR

You must have heard “sell the steak not the sizzle”. Brand awareness is also a key aspect for this. Press release is a tried and tested tactic that truly conveys the essence of your brand. What makes the press release cut above the rest? You directly communicate and openly talk about your brands and latest updates in your company. Your company’s status, collaborations, accolades also play a key role in deciding the result your press release. And if all else fails, try and think outside the box. Don’t give up if any publications fail to recognize your PR because any unique content on the web that relates back to you is always reliable for SEO.(TRANSLATION SERVICES IN NEW YORK)

Get your dream jobs with One-Click Endorsements

Being a content writer, I keep my ears to the ground to find out new ways to get new clients and subtle ways to cater their needs that let them crave for more.

LinkedIn is a great platform to inflate your sphere but with the right strides. As it is growing professional network, people seek new opportunities with solid profiles. The foremost thing I try to do is to give a kick start to the career of newbies for the jobs they are best for-  I don’t take translation business as a cut-throat environment, but as a rising tide that saves all boats sort of approach.  I relish on the philosophy of constant and sustainable improvement and to that end I never mind to introduce the customer with the another freelancer who can accommodate better than me and on the other side never try to shove the square peg in the round table.  To the user ease, LinkedIn has brought in the one click ‘endorsement’ button to showcase the skills socially.

Easy Recommendations

A gateway to this is quite straightforward: As you visit the profile of your connection on LinkedIn, you will see their recommended skills on top of the page. Click on the skills that you can endorse with on the basis of your past experience with them. Likewise, other skills can also be added from their profile if you think LinkedIn’s automatic scripts skipped something they excel in.

One cannot give an excuse for not doing it as it is easy to use.  Endorsements can be done in a few clicks and keep a reminder of doing it until it becomes the second nature. It can be a tipping point in the network of deserving candidates and help them to leverage in their respective fields with the potential clients in their satchel.

 Reasons to Endorse

As I said, I balk at the idea that I am in competition with others, striving in the same field and it’s not worth to spend time and energy in tearing down people. It’s just that endorsements bring potential peers under the spotlight and raise the curtain from proficiency. Be a driving force for someone and help others to get recruited. It will be like an icing on the cake for you if your recommended person is hired by the leading entrepreneurs as it reflects well on you. Endorsements can reward you with great repertoire, if used wisely.(TRANSLATION SERVICES IN NEW YORK)

3 Major Problems with the Translation Industry

Translation business is the burgeoning globally. Those who have deep insight, are running their business at full profit lance. These companies affirm that they have thousands of professional translators in their satchel to suffice the client’s needs. Clients have many choices to get the best and the most like translation agencies, apps, freelancers, but are they receiving the best service? 

Here is the overview of the hurdles that are constantly encountered and plaguing the translation industry:

1. Translators Aren’t Being Felicitously Vetted

Glassdoor is a site where employees post their views about their recruiter or the retrospects and an anonymous translator compose on the unrevealed truth of the translation industries:

He brought the issue of the confidentiality under the spotlight that the translation companies deceive the clients and breach the confidential clauses. Documents are sent to the unverified translators overseas that don’t give a hoot to the confidentiality. A translator just needs to clear the easy-peasy 300-word test to get hired to redact.

I couldn’t resist myself to copy his words as it holds unrefutable truth. It’s a good business model: Hire cheap labor from another country, costing an arm and a leg for the small projects and paying a fraction of it to the translator and then torture the less-paid translator, did a smack dab job that clients crave for more.

It is the common practice of the translation agencies to enroll independent contractors and freelancers rather than employees. Virtual connection with the translators is made via Email, where a mask is worn by the translators to hide their fluency in languages, credentials and sometimes identity also. It’s a zig-zag way and necessitates the thorough assessment of the translators.

2. Translators Are Barely Being Paid

There is the web with over 7,000 members where translators bring into the notice their bad experiences in concern with the ridiculous offers, they get online and offline to aware others.

It is the fact that you get what you pay for, but it remains out of the sight of most clients that lump sum is being given to the translators, does not do justice with their hard work and if the translator does not receive a fair wage then what incentive do they have to turn in a quality oriented translation? If the agency breaches their contract due to fallacious translations, they can simply move on and get paid peanuts elsewhere.

3. Follow the norms of quality standards

It is likely that many translation agencies won’t have the proof-readers from English to Burmese or you have? So, agencies rely only on the translators to get their work perfectly done and if their translator is again paid less, then the translator would not heed towards perfection and would slave away.

Nobody dares to raise a finger on the quality of the translations. Being less acquainted with the quality assessment methods and little knowledge about the translator potential then the translation could be just guesswork. Clients usually don’t raise an apocryphal because they’re not native in the language pair, and it would cost nickel and dime to opt an independent assessor to take the deep view of the translation. (http://wordsmithglobal.com/

Positive Impacts of using Translation Services on your Business

Translation services have become essential to expand your audience and to reach new customers nowadays, no matter what kind of business you operate. At the first glance it may seem that it is unnecessary to spend on translating your companies marketing materials, but slowly and gradually it is realized that translation of business materials paves the way for businesses to reach out to foreign markets, to do business and to interact with customers and staff all over the world. Moreover, translating company documentation, websites and marketing materials has many other beneficial results.

If you want your business to flourish in new markets then having a global outreach and a multicultural footprint will provide you the expected benefits. At our Translations Services in New York, our immense knowledge of business translation can advance your international presence into exciting & unexplored domains.

And, if your business already has its foot in the door of the global market, then it may be dealing with companies in a wide range of foreign languages. Also, if your business is looking forward to expand internationally for the very first time then there will certainly be hurdles that can successfully get crossed through business translation services only. Our responsiveness of business security issues means you can succeed through borders in safety.

Two major steps that need to be taken to help your business prosper are:

1. Translation and Localization of Websites and Other Online or Marketing Content

For a large number of prospective customers, a company’s website is generally the first port of call. It is the website of the company which is its online face. Therefore, it is essential for the company to be found effortlessly in the native language of the customer. It enables the customers to clearly navigate the site so as to find what they are looking for. Using a professional language service provider guarantees that your online content is completely localized by skilled and proficient linguists.

2. Use of Interpreters at Business and Sales Meetings, and in Trade Shows

Interpreters can help overcome cultural issues and to avoid confusing and embarrassing situations by assisting with verbal communication when there is a need to convey to a group of people who cannot speak the same language as yours. If you use interpreters, then the main benefit that your business gets is quality assistance with linguistic or cultural slip-ups. Reaching with a correct approach to your customers at the very first time is necessary because in such cases, the first impression is really the last impression.(TRANSLATION SERVICES IN NEW YORK)

Machine Translations v/s Human Translations

Machine Translation

The translation of text by a computer, with no human assistance is known as Machine Translation. It can also be referred to as Automated Translation. It comes with a significant number of pros and cons. What makes Machine Translations the most advantageous is its speed and cost-effectiveness. The shortcoming to this is that the standard of translation is not maintained. The translations can be inaccurate, inconceivable, and possibly risky.

The advantages of machine translation

Machine Translation increases the productivity by delivering translations faster. To pre-translate new segments that are not influenced by translation memory, freely available machine translation can be used. One gets flexibility and choice to select from a number of different language pairs and engines with machine translations to suit all types of projects. There are also various options to relate and compare the outcomes of instruction-based and statistical machine translation engines.

There are also many free tools readily available on the internet like Google Translate, Skype Translator, etc.

The disadvantages of machine translation

There are several disadvantages of using Machine Translations. The level of accuracy of machine translations can be very low. There is also a risk of inconsistency of accuracy across different languages. Machines can also not translate the context and the costs to be paid for the mistakes can be high. There, also are times when mere translations simply do not work.

There are many technical documents such as medical equipment, aviation manuals, legal documents that cannot afford even the slightest of inaccuracy. In these cases, the cost of errors can be someone’s life, huge amounts of money and irreversible damage to the image of your company. So, choose carefully!

Human Translation

Though there are machines that can carry out the process of translations, human translation is still the best way of translating any written document. Human translations mean that all the translation processes involved in the translation of any written text are carried out by human translators.

Human Translation promises a higher standard of accuracy but at the cost of longer turnaround times and higher costs.

The advantages of human translation

The highest accuracy can be promised only by human translators. Interpreting the context and capturing the same meaning of the text is a human thing. Machines can just simply translate words. Human translators can interpret the creative use of language and can also efficiently understand the idiomatic differences among all the languages. They can review their work and therefore, provide a quality process. Human translators have the ability to recognize the content where literal translation cannot work and to find the most appropriate alternative.

The disadvantages of human translation

With human translators, the turnaround time is longer. Moreover, they seldom work for free, unless you work in collaboration with a translation agency that has access to a long list of translators.

Human translators are the best option when accuracy is required. Also, human translators work the best when the source material is not-so-easy to comprehend and the languages you are translating between are complex. Machines seem to be worthless in both these situations.

When to use machine and human translation

The fact is that competing between machine and human translation is a pretty useless distraction. Both serve extremely valid purposes and therefore, what is necessary is to have the knowledge about when these two different types of translation services are to be used.

Machine translations are preferred when there is a huge bulk of content to translate and the general meaning is sufficient. Machine translations can also work when there is no final audience for your content or when documents are to be translated for internal use within a company (only in the cases where 100% accuracy is not required).

But, when there is an essential requirement of accuracy, for example, while translating technical or legal documents, medical guidelines, product instructions, and content related to health and safety, then the need for human translators arise. While translating marketing material or other texts for creative language uses and other such cases where there is a target audience for your translated content, human translations work the best.

Both, Machine Translations and Human Translations deserve their specific place in the industry, even if they play very different roles. Therefore, it is necessary to focus on choosing the right service for your translation projects instead of debating over the two.(TRANSLATION SERVICES IN NEW YORK)

Deep insight into terminology management

Terminology is the integration of collection, processing, description and performance of terms, which are lexical items in strict accordance with the subject field (e.g. medicine, law, engineering, library science or art history). Being enrolled in the translation project, translators must pay attention to find out exact equivalents for the particular terms that they face in a source text in other dialects. In addition to this, the priorities of the client regarding the particular terms must be taken seriously. Researching for the specific terminology can be head-scratching as it is time-consuming and laborious and it does not make logic to repeat the research in case of every new project. Glossaries and specialized dictionaries are frequently used over the years and the idiosyncratic self-collection of the translators involved the paper slips or index cards narrating the story of their research efforts until electronic repositories came to our vision for terminological research and recent applications of the computer. Translation industry encircles around the turnaround time of the projects and on-time delivery of the time bound projects stand in a need of elimination of time-consuming stuff. A snapshot over the usability of the term bases by the translator was conducted which puts the spotlight on the reason for recording information in a term base.

Nevertheless, it does not guarantee the return on investment while managing terminology in relation to the context. The reason in support of this is being not upfront because terminology research is in cahoots with the translation process and is not broken down as a separate cost. Giving cold shoulder to the strategy of the terminology management may keep its benefits out of the sight like the potential losses and, miscommunication hat can crop up without such a strategy. Revision cost can be significantly reduced with the implementation of the terminology consistency over the source text. This is confirmed in the cases where the texts are earmarked to translate in multiple dialects where fine tuning in the source text ultimately fixes the problem in other dialects.

Keeping that in mind, these simple strides can help translator to bring gratification and grant client with the resourceful and seamless translations in accordance with the turnaround time. Effective terminology management rewards you back with the cut down in costs, fine linguistic quality and accelerated turnaround time. The cardinal role of terminology ascertains better communication of a company’s brand and evading potential legal liabilities that could stem from fallacious interpretation.

Keeping up the frame of references of the terminology management and looking from the counter perspective, mismanagement of terminology could invite negative repercussions. For example, terminological inconsistency could obstruct communication, stymie progress, downgrade a company’s image or even result in legal issues. So, don’t underestimate the importance of the terminology management as aftershocks are beyond our field of vision.(TRANSLATION SERVICES IN NEW YORK)