As globalization increases, companies are coming to terms with expansion to other markets. However, once they decide to step outside their native markets, they must be ready to face some challenges such as capturing target customers’ attention and making a mark in the tough competitive landscapes of other markets.
Of course, this expansion to global markets is incomplete without translating and adapting content to fit the language of the target markets. Translation and localization come with their own set of challenges and problems that a company must overcome if it wants to make it big in the target market. If it fails to overcome these challenges, it could lose potential customers and sales in the new market.
Understanding the most common challenges of translation is the key to overcoming them for a hassle-free and smooth transition into the new markets. Let us take a look at some of the most common challenges of translation.
The Most Common Challenges of Translation
- Linguistic and Cultural Differences
Perhaps the greatest challenge that companies face when going global is the linguistic and cultural difference between their native and target markets. For accurate translation, it is imperative that the translators have a deep understanding of the grammatical structures of both the source and target languages. Understandably, translation demands a sensitivity towards differences in meanings and cultures, and this influences how a native customer would perceive your brand.
The challenge of translation is to find a common factor between the two languages and to keep these things in consideration when translating:
- Idioms and figures of speech
- Cultural references
- Humor and sarcasm
Even if you are providing translation services for different industries such as engineering translation services, technology translation services, or telecommunication translation services, you need to keep the cultural context in perspective during translation.
- Cost and Time Challenge
For translation, you need to hire a translator which takes both time and money which you could otherwise invest to grow your business. You might also spend hours searching for the right translator or agency for the translation job, and then you have to pay them and wait for them to complete the task.
To avoid the high costs associated with hiring a translation agency, some companies opt for the cheapest and fastest options available on the market. However, by doing so, they risk getting a low-quality translation which costs, even more, to review and correct. Hence, hiring a professional translation agency comes with a high cost that a company must be willing to pay if it needs accurate and professional translation of content.
- Requirement for Specialized Translation
When deciding to go global, a company must consider its translation options and decide whether it wants specialized translation or translation of some specific content. There are different translation requirements for different industries as well as different terminologies that need to be kept in consideration. If you are looking to get professional telecommunication translation services, you must hire an agency that specializes in delivering translations for telecommunication companies. Likewise, if you intend to get a translation of technical content, you must look for agencies that deliver accurate technical translation services.
Finding the right agency that has the appropriate translation expertise that you want is a challenging task in itself.
- Lack of translation automation and resources
When choosing a translation agency for a project, you must be prepared to take a closer look at its automation and translation technology. Ask yourself whether your chosen translation partner is using translation memory or glossary to execute the translation task or not. In many cases, a translation agency does not have the proper automation or translation technology to execute the task properly. It might have come across similar translation tasks in the past but owing to the lack of translation memory automation, it may have lost the previous record and would have to go through the whole process of translation from scratch. This is why proper homework is a must before you decide to get your content translated.
How to Overcome the Challenges of Translation?
As a company seeking to get your content translated by translation experts, it is understandable that you do not want to take any risks to get an accurate translation of your content.
Although a myriad of challenges exists in getting the right translation, you can ensure these challenges are overcome by taking these steps:
- Simplify the text to be translated before delivering it to the translation agency so that problems in words and terminologies could be avoided.
- If an idea can be expressed in simple terms, try to keep it that way to avoid any complications during the translation
- Instead of looking for cheap alternatives to translating your content, it is better to hire one or two translation agencies who can get the translation job done
- Take out time to do a background check on your chosen translation agency to check if it uses translation technology and translation memory to translate text
- Hire a translation partner which has experience in translating the required type of content and has a team of certified translators who can execute your translation task professionally.
The Last Word
Translation of content from one language to another is a tough task that comes with its own problems and challenges. However, overcoming these challenges is easy if a company has the support of a certified translation agency that can handle all translation tasks easily and effectively for a hassle-free transition into the global market.
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