The ROI of Translation

Transcription

1 The ROI of Translation

2 How can a business tell if an investment in translation is likely to be a good investment? In other words, will spending on translation yield a positive return on investment (ROI)? Evidence indicates that translation contributes to revenue growth. $ $ $ $ $ $ The evidence clearly indicates that translation can contribute to revenue growth. A survey of Fortune 500 companies by Common Sense Advisory found that in 2011, companies that increased their translation budgets were 1.5 times more likely to experience an increase in total revenue. Firms that translate in order to keep up with or to gain an edge over their competitors enjoy increased profits more than those that do not. Understanding how translation can contribute to a company s bottom line requires understanding the many reasons companies decide to invest in translation. Those reasons include both direct and more intangible advantages.

3 English-language users account for less than 30% of all internet users. Internet World Stats % of foreign consumers prefer to buy products in their own language. Common Sense Advisory Reaching New Customers This is the first thing most businesses think of in looking at investing in translation. Translating their website and other marketing materials can reach new potential customers and result in increased sales. Certainly much evidence indicates that people are more likely to buy a product when information is presented in their own language. In the age of the internet, potential customers are also more likely to find your products or services through a web search if your website matches the language of their search. Whether the target is overseas markets or multicultural markets within a country, translation can open up large new pools of potential customers. But actual sales leading directly to increased revenues are only part of the equation when looking at the ROI of translation.

4 2. Generating Good Will Businesses regularly spend significant amounts of money on, for example, public relations and charitable activities, to build up their reputations in a community. They know that, over time, a good reputation will help to attract new business and also to smooth relations with local governments and community groups, creating a better business environment for them. Good will attracts customers and helps retain loyalty. Translating company materials can also help to create good will. Offering materials in the language of the target market is one indication that a company is serious about establishing a presence in the market and respects the local culture.

5 3. Protecting Your Brand If you sell products in non-english speaking countries or communities, chances are that translation is involved even if you don t provide it. Whether it is simply one person on the street translating for another or a local distributor doing their own translations of your materials, potential customers will become informed about your product or services in words of which you have no knowledge or control. When Coca-Cola was first sold in China, the company had not established an official transliteration for the product name. Merchants simply transliterated the name according to their own ideas of what the words sounded like. They came up with phonetic names that literally translated into phrases such as bite the wax tadpole. This is an extreme example of what can happen if a company doesn t exercise control over how it is presented in other languages, but it is not unusual. Bad or misleading information can proliferate if your company simply allows others to determine how its products and services are presented in other languages. In fact, Common Sense Advisory found that protecting the brand was one of the major reasons that Fortune 500 companies invested in translation. A brand s reputation, just like a company s overall good will, is clearly linked to sales performance.

6 4. Supporting Business Partners Translating support materials can decrease the need for more expensive forms support. In addition to protecting your brand s reputation, providing translated materials is another way to offer support to those business partners that facilitate your sales in foreign or minority markets. Being able to present professionally translated materials and to point to your company s foreign language website and marketing helps partners to gain legitimacy and concentrate on making sales rather than on communications. It increases their morale and loyalty and allows them to make the best use of their time in representing your company. 5. Supporting Customers Common Sense Advisory found that customer support was another of the three major reasons that Fortune 500 companies translated materials. This can be advantageous both in terms of sales and in terms of cutting costs. Knowing that technical and other customer support materials are available in their own language will certainly help facilitate initial sales of many types of products. Perhaps more importantly, it will increase customer loyalty, as customers who experience difficulties find it easier to get solutions. And just as having online and written support materials available in English can cut down on the amount of time customer and technical support representatives spend on the phone, having materials available in other languages can decrease the need for other more expensive forms of personal customer support in foreign markets.

7 6. Motivating Employees If your company has significant numbers of employees whose first language is not English, providing them with translated versions of employee manuals, training materials, etc. can not only increase employee morale, but also lower administrative and production costs. Translating workplace materials can: increase employee morale lower production costs avoid accidents Failure to deal with language barriers can result in problems such as miscommunications that impact production, higher accident rates and lower quality. In addition, failure to translate training materials usually means that training is not as effective as it could be, even when employees seem to be learning. Research has shown that employees whose second language is English not only may not learn as well in English, but also often overestimate the extent to which they have grasped the materials.

8 Cost Saving Strategies Of course, return on investment depends not only on revenue generated but on the costs incurred in producing translations. Therefore, it is important to plan your translation efforts to minimize the expenses. There are various strategies to accomplish this. Pick what to translate: Not everything needs to be translated for every market. What products or services are you focusing on selling in that market? What information is most crucial for potential customers, employees and partners in that market? Plan for translation: Simple tricks in writing and design can make your materials more easily adaptable into other languages. Putting a standard process in place for authoring including using the appropriate software tools and for translating will save time and money. Pick the best method for the type of material: The occasional business doesn t require the same level of translation as your marketing materials and website. Professional translation is necessary for high-value materials. Highly repetitive material or material that is constantly being updated, especially if it is also high volume, may be suitable for machine translation (MT) or MT with post-editing. Partner with a professional translation agency: A professional agency can provide advice on the best procedures and will screen translators and interpreters for you to ensure that they match the skill level and subject expertise necessary. They will also use professional computer-aided translation (CAT) tools that maintain translation memories (TM) to avoid the need to retranslate language that has already been translated once.

9 Conclusion Like any investment, spending on translation, by itself, won t guarantee increased returns. The decision to translate materials must be part of a broader strategy based upon research as to the most likely markets and their preferences, as well as the competition in those markets. However, if your company does the spade work, there are many ways in which translation can make a significant contribution to your company s bottom line. Sources: Rebecca Ray and Nataly Kelly, Translation at Fortune 500 Companies Common Sense Advisory, March 27, Fortune 500 Companies that invest in translation report higher revenue, tcworld, May Lost on Transliteration, MTM LinguaSoft, July Dealing with language barriers in the workplace, MTM LinguaSoft, September Multilingual e-learning: right from the start, MTM LinguaSoft, May 2006.

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