Spotlight on Creative Agencies: Part 1
Navigating Translation: Helping clients achieve international growth
If the words translation and localisation keep popping up in client meetings as they look to achieve international growth, but you’re unsure of how best to integrate foreign languages into your creative and digital processes- don’t panic! Translating websites for your clients can seem daunting, but a little insight into the translation industry can go a long way…
We’ve compiled a compact 2-part guide to help demystify the translation industry, designed to leave you feeling more equipped to discuss next steps with your clients.
Tip #1: Plan ahead
A basic bit of advice, but one that will save you a lot of headaches down the line: where possible, make sure you work with a CMS that lends itself to multilingual capabilities (WordPress or Magento for example). Equally, if your client is thinking about a website redesign, opting for a translation friendly CMS and combining this with a translation strategy is a wise move. Yo may also like to submit a small sample of content for translation to feed back to your client for internal review before pushing ahead with all content, if time and resources allow.
Tip #2: Think about formats
Sooner or later you’ll be exchanging a lot of files, and your life will be made much easier if you have an effective way of feeding these files back into your system. Translation technology is big business, and there are a growing number of tools out there that can handle many file formats, from .html to .idml, making the whole process easier than you may have anticipated. So make sure you discuss this with your chosen translation provider.
Tip#3: Gather all the reference information you can!
Before you send your files for translation, gather as much reference material from your client as possible. There are a lot of very talented translators out there, but without adequate context and background information, they will have a tough time crafting a great translation. Content is key, and this step should never be dismissed. By providing reference material (such as spec sheets, yearly reports & product catalogues), you are essentially taking steps to ensure you get a translation that corresponds fully to your client’s expectations.
If you’ve found these tips helpful, don’t miss part 2, which we’ll be posting to our blog this Thursday!