Choose the Best Translation Service for Your Project

Communicating and exchanging thoughts and information is crucial to developing and expanding our global economy. Introducing content into international markets or local US markets for a non-English speaking audience requires proper translation of your material to ensure that your translated communications are well received and clearly understood. Choosing the right approach at the beginning of your translation process can save your business time and money while increasing opportunities to connect and engage with global audiences. If all types of translation services are not created equal, how can you decide which approach most benefits your project?

This article will explore the spectrum of translation services, ranking them by their effectiveness and suitability for different needs while considering quality and cost.

Types of Translation Services

1. Machine Translation (MT) – Fast, Cost-Effective Translation with Quality Considerations:

Machine Translation (MT) is an automated process that uses software to translate text from one language to another without direct human involvement. Once limited to essential, word-for-word translations, modern MT systems—enhanced by AI and neural networks—are increasingly capable of producing contextual translations for specific topics and industries. These advancements allow MT to process vast amounts of content quickly and at a lower cost.

However, despite its improvements, MT still needs to improve its accuracy in certain areas, especially with complex, nuanced, or specialized content. In some cases, MT can produce errors or culturally inappropriate translations, which can affect brand image, cause regulatory issues, or lead to financial losses.

More than MT alone may be required if your project demands high-quality, culturally sensitive, and technically precise translations. In such cases, hiring professional linguists who can provide fully human translations is advisable, ensuring that the final product is accurate and culturally appropriate. Alternatively, if your business needs a customized MT engine, talk to an expert at BURG about a custom MT engine for your enterprise.

The Machine Translation Post-Editing (MTPE) workflow combines machine translation with human editing to improve quality while decreasing costs. In this process, a professional editor reviews the machine-translated content and corrects any inaccuracies, ensuring it meets quality standards. MTPE is especially useful for projects where time is a constraint, but total linguistic and cultural accuracy is optional. However, not all linguists or agencies offer MTPE, and it may not be suitable for documents requiring a high level of quality or significant cultural adaptation.

When to Use Machine Translation (MT) or Machine Translation Post-Editing (MTPE)

High-volume content often requires a quick understanding of the information, such as in legal discovery, where a general idea of the content is needed without requiring perfect translation accuracy.

Internal documents or cases where a fully accurate or culturally adapted translation is unnecessary, such as informal team updates or preliminary data reviews.

While MTPE can enhance productivity and accuracy, knowing when a fully human translation is essential, especially for content that demands high precision or cultural relevance is essential.

2. Direct Translation – Literal Translation with Human Oversight

Direct translation refers to a word-for-word approach, which focuses on translating the text as literally as possible without changing the structure or meaning. While this can be useful for simple, highly structured documents, such as basic data sheets or repetitive content, more complex or nuanced text is needed. Unlike machine translation (MT), professional human translators perform and review direct translations to maintain accuracy and precision. However, this approach only sometimes conveys the original document’s whole meaning or cultural context, which can lead to misinterpretation.

A more comprehensive translation workflow is often recommended for more specialized documents—such as legal, medical, or technical texts—where accuracy, consistency, and cultural sensitivity are crucial. This could involve using translator and editor (T&E) workflows, where an editor reviews and refines the translator’s work. This ensures higher quality and avoids the pitfalls of direct translation by enhancing the text’s clarity, accuracy, and cultural relevance.

When Direct Translation May Be Suitable:

Simple data sheets with straightforward information.
Warranty documents where the content is repetitive and does not require extensive cultural adaptation.
Claim documentation in industries like insurance, where precision in terminology is essential.

3. Localization Services: Beyond Translation for Cultural Adaptation and Audience Engagement

Localization is a comprehensive translation process that addresses cultural and non-textual components when adapting a product or service for another country or locale. Rather than simply translating the text, localization focuses on all aspects of the local culture — converting the entire experience to give the user a feeling of familiarity and delight.

Creating multilingual content incorporating the audience’s cultural nuances is key to increasing engagement and tapping into new markets. To provide a fully localized experience, consider applying the same localization strategy to all areas of your multilingual content, including digital and print ads, product information, and training manuals. Fully localized content that offers high-quality, culturally sensitive translations will resonate with your target audience and positively influence how your content is perceived — helping you build credibility and loyalty with international markets.

Localization of content considers elements such as:

Tone and messaging
Graphics and design
Monetary currencies and units of measurement
Payment methods

4. Transcreation Services – Adapting Your Brand for Emotional and Cultural Impact

Eliminating cultural and language boundaries is vital to successful global marketing or advertising strategies. Multilingual reproduction of content is required to keep brand messaging consistent across all channels. Unlike a word-for-word translation, transcreation is a meaning-to-meaning translation of content, requiring the translation to have the same emotional impact on the reader as the source text on the original audience.

Examples of source text include:

Slogans and logos
Social media posts
Email newsletters
Website text
Marketing content

Using a mix of translation, copywriting, and, in many cases, localization, professional linguists create culturally sensitive adaptations of your original content that speak to your target audience. Maintaining the existing voice and intent will help you consistently represent your brand with culturally appropriate translations that are easily understood across all markets. Transcreation is the highest level of translation, and within transcreation, several workflows increase quality and cultural appropriateness.

5. AI Translation – Automated Real-Time Language Solutions

AI Translation, powered by advanced artificial intelligence and machine learning algorithms, is a versatile tool that can translate text and spoken language in real-time across various contexts, such as business meetings, webinars, and live conferences. Unlike traditional machine translation, AI Translation is adept at adapting to contextual nuances and industry-specific terminology, providing a more accurate and culturally appropriate outcome, thereby reassuring the audience of its adaptability.

AI Translation is designed to enhance global communication. It offers a fast and cost-effective alternative that supports dozens of languages simultaneously and allows attendees to choose between text or audio formats. Its ease of use, scalability, and lower cost—compared to professional translation—make it an ideal solution for small meetings and large-scale international events.

When to Use AI Translation:

Business meetings, in-person conferences, and remote events require instant communication across multiple languages.
Scenarios requiring high-volume, fast, and accessible translation.
Applications that benefit from a fully integrated AI system with no additional software requirements.

Choosing the Right Translation Approach: From Professional Translation to AI and MTPE

Suppose you’re still unsure where your content lands on the spectrum. In that case, there are two key factors to consider when determining the right approach for your content translation project: the cultural effect of the content and its value to you and the user.

Cultural Effect

Cultural effect is the impact that cultural differences play in the interpretation of content. Suppose there is a big difference in interpretation of the content between the writer’s culture and the culture of the new target audience. In that case, more rewrites will be necessary to effectively convey the message of the source text into the target language. To determine the cultural effect of your content and the types of translation services that may be involved, identify the style of writing. Is it connotative (where words hold more than their literal meaning, such as idioms or cultural references) or denotative (focused on precise, technical terms)?

In connotative writing, a word’s actual meaning can significantly differ from its literal meaning. Literary books, novels, poetry, webpage copy, and marketing material are all examples of connotative writing and will require translation services that are higher on the spectrum. Denotative writing, such as scientific journal articles and legal contracts, uses precise technical terms to convey its meaning. In this area of the spectrum, word-for-word translations are more appropriate. As a result, more straightforward methods, such as direct translation, would be more effective.

Content Value

The second factor in determining how to translate content is value. The more valuable the content, the more effort is needed to ensure the translation will have its intended effect. Fewer people will need to be involved in the translation process if the value is low. Value can be measured in terms of the number of people who review and approve a document, the time and effort that went into creating the source content, or the level of importance of what is at risk due to the quality of the translation.

Where Does Your Content Land on the Spectrum?

Whether you are expanding your business’ website internationally, issuing legal insurance documents, getting IRB approval for clinical trial materials, providing mechanical installation guides, or publishing your first novel, the key to eliminating communication barriers and captivating global audiences begins with understanding the different types of translation services and where your content sits on the spectrum.