Nowadays, content is important. There is so much competition. Impactful content is crucial. If content reinforces the brand and the reward… people will buy – sometimes even without trying the product or service. Decisions are often based on metaphysics of brain and heart, often triggered by well-targeted marketing. People are buying increasingly without meeting a real person. I meet people embarking on multilingual content programmes. They seek revenue growth by expanding in existing or into new geographies.

The question I ponder is,

1. How successful are content mangers in effectively delivering multilingual content?

For me the correct process to benchmark against is:

A. Produce well thought-out English content, adapted to the target audience and the media, i.e. print, computer or handheld device.

B. Appoint a localisation vendor with scalability to deliver the content in the required languages simultaneously with technologies to reduce time to market and cost.

C. Check the quality you are getting. Make sure people ascribe a positive value to the product or service as intended in accordance with brand guidelines.

Some localisation vendors are volume centric… they just want your content and will deliver it back and send you the bill. Don’t accept speed over quality. This may work if you have time to tinker, but a really good vendor will have unique services and technologies that lend themselves to a proper strategic business partnership, that delivers content fit for purpose.

In terms of technology, the use of:

TMS (Translation Management System) and

Terminology management software.

Will bring the many processes of a robust localisation processes under control.

A TMS is a standard platform which unifies translation, review and commenting (feedback and amendment) in a single application.

Terminology management software ensures that your brand is maintained on your terms, in the countries that you are selling into.

Maintaining a database of terms for the client for each language pairing speeds up translation and improves consistency. Translators have access to this database as a guiderail to stay “on-brand” and automated QA checks police the usage of prohibited terms.

Most of our customers expect the target audience to accept the localised content as having being authored locally. Read more.