Targeted Marketing Translation
Translation blunders which appear in marketing and advertising campaign will result in both branding suicide and financial harakiri. Finger Lickin' Good, Mist Stick, Nova - what does these three slogans have in common? Not much unless if you factor in their negative impact on foreign shores.
In Chinese, “Finger Lickin’ Good” literally translates to "Eat Your Fingers Off". Not exactly the image of your fast food chain you want to impress upon your target segment. In German, Clairol’s “Mist Stick” translates to “Manure Stick”. When General Motors expanded their business into the Latin American market, they made the unwise decision to leave the name of their model "Nova" unchanged. In Spanish, this means “'Does not go". The executives knew about the meaning in Spanish but decided to go with it anyway and things got complicated to say the least.
A lot of effort, time, research and money would have been invested in designing your message to reach the target market. A slick TV advert or a catchy slogan might bring your business forward in your domestic market but as the unfortunate examples above illustrate, foreign markets demands sensitivity and consideration to the local language.
We feel that to achieve any form of professional translation, the translator has to be translating into his native language. It is commonly witnessed in translation that the subtleties, tone and shade of the language can easily be lost if the language is not native to the translator. Factors such as cultural norms, idioms and metaphors are crucial in delivering messages efficiently and also in an understandable fashion. You can be assured that any of the native translators that we assign to your project has extensive experience in Marketing, PR, and Media. We will make sure the stylistic and technical elements of your marketing copy are localised to the segment in your target market. Further care is taken that the translated copy does not offend any cultural or religious sensibilities.
Below are several of the common software programs that our translators are skilled in:
• Indesign
• Publisher
• QuarkXpress
• FrameMarker
• Photoshop
• Powerpoint
• Flash
• Freehand
• UltraXML
Our Native Translators
To be a part of our team, potential translators are not only required to be native in the languages they translate. They are also required to possess a minimum of 3 years of experience in professional translation and a degree from a recognised university. In addition, they must excel at the entry test we set for them and we conduct qualification, background, and job reference checks on them before they are hired. The senior translators on our team hold memberships with accredited translation associations such as ATA, ITI, ATLF, WATA, etc. On average, we turn down 7 out of 10 applicants.