When it comes to launching your product in
new languages, translation is only one part of the picture. Your brand lives or
dies with your international customers during runtime, and there’s only one way
to ensure you make a good impression: localization testing. If it sounds familiar, pat yourself on the back, because you have probably seen it before in our top ten tips article.
Before the press releases go out, get your translation project “outside the lab” for a little real-world, in-context experimentation. In this post, we’ll review three of the most important zones for localization QA, and give you an idea on how to get the real deal when it comes to customer perception.
When thinking about translation, we know idioms commonly used in English (like "it's raining cats and dogs" or "lame duck") are difficult to translate. But what about simpler things such as names and dates? As it turns out, they’re not so simple when it comes to software localization, as LinkedIn found out in this post on their website. With languages like Chinese, Japanese, and Russian you must understand not only new character sets, but also date ordering (month/day/year? year/day/month? day/month/year?) and even spacing — in our world, these fall under the umbrella term of "internationalization". Let’s take a proper look at proper names in translation.
At many large companies, all of the various components of a typical localization project — from organization to process to budgets and schedules — are in the hands of a project manager (or PM). This is no small task even when all the pieces fit together well...and when they don't, your typical localization PM has a lot to juggle. If you're tasked with producing localized content at your organization, Acclaro CEO Michael Kriz discusses ten best practices for project managers in an article on Content Management.com, and we've got a sampling of it right here.
We know...we're pretty awesome. We hear it all the time [blush]. You can give us anything for translation: software, websites, documentation, audio, video, any language and most any file format, and we'll transform it into exotic gibberish that you might not understand (but your global customers will!). But our full spectrum of services go beyond translation. Sharpen your pencils and open your notebooks, because you're about to get a lesson in Localization Agency Services 101.
Liesbeth Matthieu of NetApp and Emma Young of Acclaro presented at Localization
World Santa Clara on October 10, 2011, offering more specifics around the
in-country linguistic review structure highlighted in our blog post “NetApp Achieves Gobal SimShip with High-Quality
In-Country Review.” The following are five tips from their presentation
that will help your business create an effective in-country review program:
Language is a fluid and dynamic means of communication. Historically, translation has been best performed by human beings who can accurately adapt and express this fluidity and dynamism in the face of the logical contradictions and irregularities that most languages present. However, in recent years, “machine translation” (or MT) has started to come into its own, as its once-stoic technology – the realm of 0s and 1s – catches up to human adaptability.
Ora Solomon, vice president of sales and operations at Acclaro, describes how machine translation can complement human translation in an article for Marketing Profs:
1. Human Translation
Definition
A professional linguist (most often, an in-country native speaker) reviews your project and, using guidelines agreed on beforehand, translates it to the language you require. The goal is to speak to your audience in the most natural, effective way. You can expect human translations to be free of idiomatic errors and to flow naturally and fluently.
The First Three Steps
of Software Localization
Now that you’ve decided to enter into the rich global software market (after internationalizing your product, of course), what’s next? Well, it’s a fascinating – and fairly complex – process. You’ll definitely want to partner with a localization company that’s skilled and experienced in adapting software to make it easy to use and appealing to your future customers around the world.
Let’s take a look at what goes on behind the scenes at your vendor as they localize your software. We’ll sketch out the first three steps below. And if you’re serious about your pending software localization project, we invite you to read our more thorough explanation here, complete with all six major steps.
Step
1: Preparation and Analysis
The first step is to identify the source files that contain the localizable
text, zip them up and send them off. Your source files may be in formats such
as java properties files, .net resx files, traditional windows resources, xml
or even just text or table formats. Your agency will prepare them for
translation, carefully locking down the non-translatable code to ensure that
the localized software functions exactly as it does in English.
In Spanish they say, “Lo bueno, si breve, dos veces bueno.” The good, when brief, is
doubly good. Brevity is considered a virtue in most communication circles. In
the world of translation, however, brevity is even more: it’s a money saver.
The first thing any localization vendor will tell you about the cost of translation is that it's a direct function of word count. The more words your document, brochure, program, app or website contains, the higher the cost for translating it. Rather straightforward, right?
Containing your localization budget through reducing word count at the pre-translation stage requires a challenging time investment on your part, as no one can really perform an “audit” of your resources in your stead. To execute this effectively, you need either to distinguish between must-have and nice-to-have content through a complete content review, or pare down all of your source texts across the board through avid and diligent editing. It would definitely be easier to simply send all of your files to your language partner and hope for the best.
Yet when implemented, this phase of content review will ultimately pay off two-fold: it will save you a good sum of money on translation across all target languages, and it will make your end product better, since content that has been reviewed with a global audience in mind can be rendered more accurately.
Here are a few ideas for reducing your content as you go global with your program or product.
A picture is worth a thousand words.
What are some ingenious ways to do away with words in the context of your product? You may have the ability to substitute appropriate imagery, for example. After all, a picture is worth a thousand words. Take the example of the Apple iPhone OS. English has the wonderful benefit of offering two practical and short words for the settings buttons: on/off. But in most languages, the translation would occupy the whole width of the phone screen and result in what we call TVA: total visual awkwardness. Here is what Apple did to solve that problem:
Writers these days, whether for websites, software, or documentation, face interesting
new challenges when communicating technical material and product info to a
broad-based international audience. In a recent article for the Content Wrangler, Acclaro President Michael
Kriz offers up compelling
insights and ten useful tips to help you create content for your diverse global
audience.
As we become an increasingly global economy, there is increasing demand on writers — particularly those who work with technical language that describes products and services — to adapt to the changing needs of companies’ customer demographics. When a product is slated to launch in 20 new markets, and over half of the markets require translation of documentation, it completely changes the game for the technical writer. So, to effectively scale a global business, you and your writers should keep a few things in mind.
1. Use global English – For every native speaker of English, there are about three non-native speakers. It’s important that your communication in English is understandable to all English speakers, which means short, simple sentences and no idiomatic expressions or cultural references.
If you’re developing, selling, or
marketing web-based software, standard desktop software, or mobile 
apps, you’ve
probably already heard about internationalization, and you know why it’s
important. If not (or if you’d like a quick refresher), read on.
Internationalization is the process through which you enable your software to handle the language and conventions of your target global markets. Internationalization wipes your product’s slate clean of language bias and removes the assumptions of a “default” culture.
Why is it so important to internationalize your product?
“Brevity is the soul of wit,” Shakespeare famously posited in Act 2 of Hamlet. Brevity may be an effective, low-cost way to introduce your product or service to international markets, too. Enter the minisite: a fun, interactive, compact teaser site that draws attention and prepares you for a larger rollout down the line…or helps judge brand interest to determine if your international markets are suitable for you and your goals.
Localizing a minisite is significantly easier and more cost-effective than a full site, and can get your name “out there” in a new region while you consider the rest of your localization strategy; e.g. do we really need our entire product catalog translated? What about SEO/PPC keywords and ads? Is our CMS ready to handle Chinese?
Here are some quick steps to help you get your minisite up and running:
1. Pick a handful of pages – really, no more than five – that share the basics of your product or service.
2. No TMIs or oversharing! Less is more here; you’re mainly trying to drum up interest so your visitors either learn the basics about your brand or highlighted product, or they immediately buy something on your site.
The Acclaro blog entry below is featured today on the Japan Intercultural Consulting Blog. Japan Intercultural Consulting is an international training and consulting firm focused on Japanese business.
Translating content into Japanese presents a variety of challenges, most notably capturing the natural flow and tone of Japanese sentences. In American business, writing tends to be more informal, yet if translated into Japanese, it would seem too casual and possibly even rude. Translating English content, which is more than likely not in the appropriate tone for Japan, into Japanese is challenging, but not impossible. Read these tips to achieve high-quality, natural Japanese translations when working with a translation vendor. Also refer to our tips for preparing for any translation project, no matter what the language.
Our recommendations for translation into Japanese:
How do you translate your website’s
U.S. appeal for an international audience? Let’s look to three multilingual
sites from TIME’s 2010 Top 50 list for
a few examples of how website localization can be done right.
Each teaches a different lesson — but what do these sites have in common? The companies behind them took the time to really understand the true goal of website localization: making sure a user from a different culture could easily interact with their site. Rather than just translating to other languages, they optimized their interfaces to make it easy, familiar, and enjoyable for their international users to navigate, shop, and network.
1. LinkedIn: Align your website localization with your global business strategy. In order to achieve their business objectives in other language markets (German, Portuguese, Italian, Spanish and French), the premier social site for professionals established:
Crowdsourcing is hot. And not just in the tech world. The crowd is changing the face of the translation industry with every passing day. There’s even a buzz phrase for it: social localization.
Regina Bustamente from Guideware and Janice Campbell from Adobe recently gave a talk at the Acclaro San Francisco office on tips for making translation crowdsourcing projects successful. Here are a few highlights:
Depending on the nature of your products
(consumer or enterprise, etc.) you are likely to have different user groups. Remember
that open-source techies do not share the same skill sets with your followers
on Facebook, for example. You will want to make sure and encourage collaboration
within the right user group for a particular translation project.Remember those badly dubbed Pippi Longstocking movies? A generation of Americans will never forget the way her out-of-synch mouth movements made her misadventures seem even more comical.
Successful voiceovers are
nearly imperceptible – they can make you think you’re watching a film in your
own language. Such inconspicuous dubbing isn’t easy. But with the right
localization partner and the right process, you can achieve flawless voiceovers
for local appeal in your target-language markets.
Just follow these five tips
to maximize your studio time, and avoid expensive re-recordings.
1. Determine your voice style. For each language market, do you want to convey happiness, expertise, excitement or professionalism? For example, in the U.S., enthusiasm and hyperbole are standard, but such pep could be seen as overdone in Germany, where a factual, instructional tone establishes more credibility.
2. Choose the right voice talent.
Good translation has nothing to do with luck and finding a four leaf clover. It has everything to do with preparation. You prepare for a launch. You prepare for a meeting. You prepare for a presentation. You may even prepare for St. Patrick's Day (happy St. Paddy's Day!). And you should prepare for your translation and localization project. It'll save you time and money in the long run.
Here are five quick tips to help you prepare for any translation project — no matter what the target language (i.e. German, Arabic, Portuguese, or perhaps, Gaelic).
1. Create a glossary and style guide that are reviewed and approved by all internal parties. Determine the tone of what you’re trying to capture in the target language. Constantly update your glossary with new terms and revisions.
2. Give as much detail to your translation vendor about the subject matter. The more detailed the better so your vendor can choose qualified translators who have an advanced degree and/or extensive experience in the subject matter area.
World-ready has a nice ring to it, doesn’t it? Interested in learning how to take your software global by making it world-ready? Join us this Thursday for a complimentary software localization webinar and take your first step towards tapping into new international markets.
The global software market today is valued at $272 billion. Europe (key languages include French, Spanish, German, Italian and Portuguese) generates 36% of global revenues, while 22% is generated by Asian-Pacific markets (key languages include Japanese, Korean, Mandarin, Tagalog and Thai). How can you get your software into these lucrative, international markets?
Our webcast will break down the internationalization and
localization processes into bite-sized, manageable pieces perfect for the
amateur or “localization newbie”. Consider it akin to Software Localization
101. If you have the desire to go global but not a clue as to where to begin,
this is a must-see presentation for you.
Through a series of basic steps, we will highlight the best way to approach the process of internationalizing your software and then adapting it to new foreign cultures. From initial preparation to linguist/cultural adaptation and finally testing/QA, we will demystify this seemingly convoluted process.
Guest author Christine Kent is an editor with the Content Bureau, a full-service copywriting agency.
The process of transcreation requires
writers and translators to come up with alternatives for the idiomatic and
casual language often used in marketing campaigns, particularly for consumer
products and advertising. However, for some marketing pieces, the transcreation
process can be made vastly 
easier by simply writing clean, usable copy from the
very beginning. In other words, assume that your text will need to be
translated down the road, and from the get-go, avoid piling on the clichés and
idioms.
(Whoops, I’ve already broken this rule in the line above: “down the road,” “get-go,” and “piling on” would not make life easier for writers doing a transcreation. Lucky for me, we’re not planning to get this blog post translated!)
This “think before you write” approach makes sense for some, not all, marketing pieces. Ad campaigns usually demand highly colloquial language, especially for taglines—better to write them in the fashion required for the initial audience, then recast the copy into another language using idioms that convey the same idea. However, product brochures, fact sheets, and white papers likely don’t require the use of much untranslatable wording, so it makes more sense to tone down the casual lingo in these documents.
About author Jon Ritzdorf: Jon serves as the Acclaro
in-house globalization architect, regularly consulting with clients and presenting seminars for many of the world's leading IT
corporations on localization best practices, internationalization and testing
products for global release.
Web developers and marketing managers often ask me for recommendations as to
how they should configure their navigation system on their multilingual
website. Ideally this is determined well before starting website localization,
as this decision can really affect your overall global site architecture moving
forward.
For multilingual site navigation, it’s good to familiarize yourself with all the different options available for navigation and how they will impact your site. In short, with global navigation it comes down to four major options, which can be combined or kept distinct within a site:
Usually the first two options, language toggle and dropdown, work well for smaller sites.
For a small- to medium-sized site that is only going to be localized in a few languages, I would suggest the very simple toggle approach, like seen with Northeastern University. Or, a language dropdown written in the native script for the language markets you are targeting, as seen with Vuze.
We’ve already written about the importance of a glossary and
why it’s important to create one before 
starting any major translation effort —
whether it be for technical documentation, marketing communications, web,
software, eLearning, or multimedia projects. Now, let’s look at what should be
included in a glossary.
What goes into a glossary?
What should a glossary look like?
A glossary can be a complex database or a simple spreadsheet. It depends on your global reach and the size of your overall globalization efforts. If you are just starting out, you may just want to use an Excel spreadsheet. Then you can work your way up to a more complex database.
Smart, fun and useful. Acclaro shares news and tips on translation, localization, language, global business and culture.