How do you think you can survive, as a business, in a lucrative market? Take a closer look at all industries, you will find the language services sector is quickly dominating other service industries.
Are they eating spinach like Popeye the sailor man? Or the translation service itself is a Swiss account? After much interpretation one can say it’s rather both, as the translation services are speeding up the processes, companies are quite happy with the prospect.
Recently with a prospect growth of $30 billion in more than 30,000 languages, LSPs (language service providers) had offered their high-end services to translate the documents, subject matter expertise and high quality for to be translated projects.
Words travel worlds, translators do the driving – Anna Rusconi
One of the most delicate exercises is to translate one word from another and not everyone has the expertise to do so. Even if you are bilingual it doesn’t mean that you are a translator. It’s a skill that needs to be earned. Amid the nest of translators, it can be difficult to choose the right translation service provider. A challenging task to uphold is to be dependent on the right service.
The question arises: which is the right translation provider for you? How will you decide that the one you want to opt for is the right choice?
It’s tough but not impossible to choose the right business partner. So with the myriad of translation providers to choose from, let’s make sure you pick the best one.
Years of expertise
One of the most basic referrals that every company relies on; what is the expertise of the referred translation provider? For instance, if you are running a business in China, you will require Chinese translation services that will prove to be fruitful for your product’s growth.
It’s important to check out for how long the company had been in the business line. The experience matters because the quality of translation relies on their expertise. They will be better able to handle the documents (even the technical ones).
Who are the team members?
Behind the quality, translation is the hardworking translator, the real assets of the translation provider. How many native translators’ works for the specific agency? Are they allowed to translate other than their native language or not? What is the process to hire the translators?
Such questions need to be asked to ensure that you are letting the right translators engage with the right content. This is crucial not only for you as a client but for the translator as well. What if a translation agency hires the translator for the project that doesn’t cover his area of expertise?
So you need to make sure how the team of translators is comprised of internal working and vice versa.
· Working style
The translation is a constant process that will never stop, so how a translator is supposed to bring new information? The thing is, he cannot add any additional information on its own. Translators are much like writers, they do not need to create content on their own but translating the content is all about rephrasing the sentence structures into another language.
You can take a look at the work samples of projects done at intervals to understand how innovative translators are with their work or how easily they can maintain the quality.
· Time flexibility
What are the average working hours? How far can you rely on the translation provider to be available at the last minute?
The availability of the translation agency puts everything else at the back end if they can’t fulfill the requisite i.e. be available when you need them the most. Certain agencies are available even during holiday slots, nothing can interrupt the work, not even the holidays, so the work just goes on! Besides that ensure the turnaround time. How fast they reply to your queries and their attitude towards work needs to be focused.
· Cost matters
Sometimes it so happens that the ideal translation agency is surcharges for the desired project or the language pair. Their work is highly maintained so their charges will be more than par value but still, it needs to be economical for the business.
Make a list of agencies you see as the potential. Ask the right questions like how much they charge for a particular type of project, what are their charges per word/page? Or will you incur additional charges if the agency uses memory tools to enhance translation quality? Such questions can save up the cost too much extent.
· Mode of translation
Technology is rapidly evolving but still, some tasks require manual attention. Humans created machines for their ease, now we possibly can’t imagine a world where we are not interacting with them even for numerous details. Likewise in translation, two types of translation take place; machine translation or manual translation.
Know this, a company cannot rely on either one of them. A balance is required in both types of translation. Besides this also keep a close look at how translators are assigned for the project and so on.
· Sign-up agreements
All information is highly privileged within the company. Trusting an agency to translate the documents for you is the much-needed sin to commit and is unavoidable. However, if you are looking for the translation provider, do ask for an NDA (Non-Disclosure Agreement). To keep confidentiality at hand, it is a compulsory step that needs to be taken to ensure no information breach ever happens during the translation process.
Find out the details if the company sign and agreements or not, or if all the staff (working for that particular project) is part of that NDA or not. Even if they do not form their end, you can still ask them to type a confidentiality clause for security purposes. So if they agree to this, it’s all good.
Last but not least
The legitimate translation provider will be able to openly communicate with you. They understand your need to ask such questions in detail, provided the information at hand is sensitive. A professional translation provider is right there waiting for you to come at their door, but still, stay cautious of cons so that you do not need to cut corners in terms of translation.
