How Website Translation Differs from Localization - By: Terri L. Kent

Creating websites in English only is no longer the standard for businesses, thanks to globalization and the ability to easily connect to the internet from almost anywhere in the world. Numerous U.S. companies obtain as much as 50 percent of their revenue from international sales, and this would not be achievable without reaching out to target consumers in a method that they can comprehend with the help of a website translation service.

In order to capitalize on international profits, website translation must involve more than just converting a word in English to another language. Instead, business translation must integrate localization in order to optimize a company's reach as well as avoid pricey and embarrassing mistakes.

Translation

The process of translation converts written text into a different language. A good translation is an accurate rendition of the original text that maintains not only the language's grammatical rules but the culture's style and nuance. Companies often use business translation for legal documents, manuals, policies or technical publications.

Localization

Localization expands on the process of business translation by integrating localized linguistic nuances to achieve the most accurate and relevant result. A localized business translation is more culturally sensitive and thus has a better reach to the local market.

A website translation service that also uses localization delivers a product that is culturally acceptable and reads as if a local individual produced the materials. When localizing a website, the website translation service takes into consideration a target culture's local currencies, date formats, number formats, units of measurement, typeface, accepted colors, date formats and the use of graphics.

Localization is particularly important when a company uses puns or idiomatic expressions. For example, the Chinese equivalence of the saying, "like father, like son" is "tigers do not breed dogs." While the words are not the identical, the implication remains intact. Business translations that use localization also take into account geographic factors, the names of products and the cultural appropriateness of slogans or taglines.

Essential Components of Localizing a Website

Localization in website translation should include culturally minded marketing materials, advertisements, manuals and videos. A website translation service can help increase international revenue by providing internationalization. Internationalization relates to the function within a website that allows it to operate and/or display in different languages.

In addition to the localizing a website's code and architecture, spelling and symbols are an important component to business translation. Several countries might speak the same language but spell words in a different way or use different words to describe the same thing. For example, a national insurance number in the U.K. and resident registration number in South Korea are the same as a Social Security number in the U.S.

To successfully enter into the international market, a company's website translation must include website content localization, style localization, multimedia localization, SEO considerations and website structure localization. When a website translation service implements localization successfully, the products and services offered will be considered more customer-minded, which can help increase the company's international revenue.

About the Author

In order to avoid embarrassing translation mistakes and achieve globalization, a company should integrate localization in with their business translation. For more information, take a look at Affordable Language Services, a quality provider of interpretation and translation services, at http://www.AffordableLanguageServices.com.

Article Directory Source: http://www.articlerich.com/profile/Terri-L--Kent/198442

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