What an LSP needs to know to translate a document most cost-effectively

What an LSP needs to know to translate a document most cost-effectively

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I think our most curious clients save the most on their translations because they end up talking to us the most about what exactly we will do for them.  The more information we have, the less assumptions we need to make, and it’s always better to err on the side of over delivering to our clients rather than under delivering.  Below is a list of everything a language service provider (LSP) needs to know needs to know to translate a document most cost-effectively:

  • Purpose of the translation
  • Project context
  • Project scope
  • Definition of Satisfaction
  • History buying translations
  • Resources at your disposal

Some of these items might seem unexpected, but by the end of this article, we hope you will be convinced of the importance of each item and how they contribute to efficient resource allocation.  

Purpose of the translation

Why do you need these files translated? Believe it not, understanding the purpose of the translation can help tremendously in developing the most cost effective approach to translating a file.  Here are a few examples of purposes for translations that lead to various translation approaches:

  • Understand if a document it relevant for a legal case
  • Know which part of a document is relevant for your purposes
  • Meeting a legal obligation with associated minimal risk
  • Business development
  • Regulatory requirement

There are many more purposes that create greater nuance, but let’s cover each of these and how they lead to different translation approach.  

Understand if a document it relevant for your purposes: If the only thing you need to know is whether or not a document in a foreign language is relevant for your purpose, then having the whole document translated is excessive and inefficient.  A translator can be used to either translate only the title or explain briefly what the document is about. This is far less expensive than translation of the whole document.

Know which part of a document is relevant for your purposes: Recognizing relevance does not require the highest level of quality.  A machine translation of the whole document would suffice as a first pass and help you recognize what might be relevant and what might not be.  A professional translator can then follow up on only the relevant sections. Professional translation, the most expensive task in the process, is only used on the part of a document that is relevant.  

Distribute information internally with employees: There are some documents, when translated, that don’t need to sound like a masterpiece; spelling and punctuation can be forgiven. Examples could be internal newsletter, employee handbook, or CEO letter.  In cases like this, a professional translator – without an editor – could be sufficient. Machine translation improved by a professional translator might even be an option.

Business development: Documents used for business development are one of the few where an ROI on the translation project can be directly measured.  Usually, the ROI is extremely high since the translation is done one time, but multiple sales can be made from it. This is not the time to cut corners: use a professional translator with a secondary reviewer.  If the material is created in desktop publishing software, then pay for that too on the translated documents.

Regulatory requirement: Different regulators have different rules, but they are usually rather robust.  Whatever they are, follow them. In some cases, a back translation is required to demonstrate quality of the forward translation. 

Given that the purpose of a translation can have such significant influence on how a document is translated, this might be a good place to start a conversation with an LSP.  You can then speak to the larger project that the translation fits into.

Project context

What’s the “larger” project or goal? What’s the “story” that lead you to needing translation? What’s happening to the files you need translated before and after the translation process? These are essentially the kinds of questions you’re trying to answer in order to give proper context to the translation project.  They differ from trying to understand the purpose of the translation as they are meant to help the LSP understand the bigger picture. Here are some examples of context to projects:

  • Corporate litigation involving a company in Spain: During the discovery process a hard drive was found, which included thousands of files that might pertain to the case.  Depending on what is found, the lawyers may need to translate the files for court and also take depositions of people as well.  The deadline for presenting their findings is in about a month and they need to have processed and analyzed all the information from the hard drive by then.  It will also be important to understand some of the laws in Spain, which need to be translated into English.
  • Filing Corporate taxes in the US: The Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) issued a new standard that now requires multinational entities to include information from non-US lease agreements on their balance sheets.  Thousands of lease agreements must now be translated into English so that accountants can properly extract key information in order to properly present the company’s balance sheet. The new standard takes effect this year and filing is due in 4 months.
  • Team training in California: The law in the state of California requires that all employee documents, including employee handbooks, must be translated into the native language of the employees who claim to have limited English proficiency. Employee handbooks tend to be large documents with regular updates.  The restaurant chain can’t afford expenses like this but must meet this legal obligation.
  • New market expansion: The medical device company has decided that the market in Germany for their medical device is worth pursuing.  They plan to attend MEDICA in the fall and want to have an advantage attracting distributors by having all their marketing material and manual translated. These same files will also be put on their website for easy access and distribution.
  • Conducting a clinical study at a new hospital: The clinical research organization (CRO) wants to attract patients with limited English proficiency at a new hospital in order to reduce their recruitment time, but require permission from the institutional review board (IRB) first.  The IRB insists on having a copy of the back translation on file as proof the CRO is being sufficiently ethical and responsible. The trial can’t start until all files are properly submitted and approved by the IRB, which is estimated to take about 3 weeks.

Context brings a lot of added information and significance to a translation project.  The LSP can understand a lot of key aspects about the files, feasibility of accessing the original source format, and actual deadlines.  Most importantly, they can start thinking about how to economize resources between this particular translation project and potential upcoming projects.  In some cases, understanding that a translation project is really just one in a series of possible language challenges that the client will face can completely change the approach that an LSP recommends. Here are a few things an LSP can do when given context to a translation project:

  • Pre-book or scale specialist teams for subsequent projects
  • Organize work to economize costs across multiple projects
  • Find opportunities to provide free auxiliary services to better meet the client’s larger goals
  • Alert on potential missteps that the client might not be aware of
  • Simultaneously create additional administrative documentation that the client may need at a future date
  • Maximize time to maximize quality

There are likely more benefits, but the ultimate understanding should be that any information can be used to create opportunities to better service the client, so the more a client shares, the better.  

Project scope

Project scope is typically the most common information that clients provide.  It is essentially the files that need to be translated and the target languages. Depending on the file type, what’s inside the files, and the target languages, more things might need to be considered when scoping a project.  

File type: If a file is an Adobe InDesign file, desktop publishing should be within scope for the LSP.  This is because text in different languages tend to take up different amounts of space on the page. Therefore, before and after translations, the files need to be augmented to take this into account.  Another example might be video files, and whether or not voice is included within scope or not.

File contents: Different kinds of documents have different characteristics about them that need to be taken into account when translating them.  For example, for a business card, does the address change to a local office address? Are there preferred spelling or Chinese characters for the name? What should not be localized? For a scientific journal article, should the references be out of scope? Should we use the pre-existing English abstract or should we translate it? For a report, the text in the chart is a graphic, rather than accessible text, should they be translated? Should the document be reindexed in the new language?

Target language: Target language is straight forward, but sometimes it can be a little confusing.  There are at least three kinds of Spanish, two kinds of French and two kinds of Chinese.  MorEover, if you’re targeting a particular country, the country might have more than one national language.  Finally, if you plan to target more than one country that speaks different versions of the same language (think Spanish for Mexico and Spanish for South America) a “universal” flavor might be more appropriate.  

When it doubt, explain to an LSP what you’re trying to do and confirm the target language with them.  

Definition of Satisfaction

Not everyone is satisfied the same way.  What factors affect your company’s decision when choosing vendors? Is it about quality? Price? Meeting deadlines? Availability and responsiveness? Post-sale support? A good LSP will want to know what makes you satisfied, and it’s usually not just price.  For example, a mobile phone in the signature of your point of contact at an LSP could be very reassuring if your translation needs are spontaneous and urgent.

History buying translations

Historically, the translation industry has not be regulated.  Standards are new, rarely used and certainly not implemented consistently around the world (where the translators are).  It’s very common to meet clients that have bought translations before, had a bad experience, and are now shopping around to find a better source.  Even some of the top LSPs in the industry have a bad reputation of selling variable quality and treating clients “like a number”. New LSPs that you want to start afresh with would appreciate knowing about past experiences and what you would rather not want repeated.  

Another important facet of your past experience with translations is whether or not you used a substitute, for example:

  • Google Translate
  • Interns
  • Internal staff
  • Another vendor (not an LSP)
  • Their client

This is important for understanding why things may not have gone well in the past and what needs to be done differently now in order to improve cost-effectiveness.  For example, here are a few things that may have gone wrong and what might have to change moving forward to improve cost-effectiveness:

Google Translate: The accuracy was inadequate.  While Google Translate is free, it doesn’t meet the minimal level of quality that you need.  Some money might need to be spent to either improve the machine translation output, or to use a different approach altogether.  For example, either one or two translators might need to be used moving forward.

Interns: The accuracy and application of technical terms was questionable.  They may take a long time to write and update documents, plus they inform you that they feel uncertain about the quality.  If you’re committed to using interns, then have the translations checked by a professional. One key opportunity that is missed when using interns is the use of translation memory to minimize the amount of repetitive text that needs to be translated and to maximize consistency.  

Internal staff: The staff complained about the amount of time it takes to translate and they weren’t trained in the technical terms in both languages, so they’re not sure of the quality of the translation anyway.  From a cost-per-hour point of view, LSPs are far more economical, which means the opportunity cost of having your team translate, do a fair job, and feel resentment, is higher than having an LSP, who specializes in translations, get it done while your own team focuses on what they do best.  

Another vendor (not an LSP): Sales are not as high as expected abroad or your vendors are charging a lot for translations and it’s not clear if they are adding a margin for their own time or if the quality of the translation is adequate enough to meet everyone’s needs. If translations are for sales purposes, it’s far better to take control of it and rule it out as a potential cause for low sales.  If your law firm or another vendor is charging you their time to translate, it is surely more expensive than going directly to the source.

Their client: Each client has to do their own translation, which includes an additional obstacle to buying from you or working with you.  It’s not the best customer service and it’s potentially losing you money. Highly efficient companies defer translations to LSPs for a lot of reasons: translations stay consistent and on-brand, they are not the cause for inadequate sales, updates to documents can be shared to past clients easily and better keep clients with the company.  

Typically, dissatisfaction comes from underpaying for an adequate level of effectiveness, compromising on speed, or being surprised by unexpected costs or outcomes.  History of buying translations helps LSPs understand what you value (quality, speed, cost, service) and better ensures that moving forward, this is taken into account to better meet your needs in a cost-effective way.  

Resources at your disposal

The final item on the list is what resources you have at your disposal.  Do you have your own design team? in-house translators or people who want to contribute to the translation process? Using your own team, if they feel comfortable with it, could lead to a strong collaboration with a synergistic outcome.  The LSP can do the core work of preparing files and translating, while your own teams can review the translations to personalize them to the company and better economize resources internally. The outcome would be leveraging your own internal resources in a way that stays efficient for them, while leaning on the LSP only for the contribution they need to make – making the overall process highly cost-effective.  

If you’d like to learn more about how BURG Translations helps you ensure high-quality translations, contact us today.