Translation Services - Buyers Guide

Translation Company - How to Choose

The sea of translation company services available may even confuse the experts, when trying to make a wise choice. Well, first of all you should sum up your individual expectations and define the type of work you need at the end of the day. Of course budget limitations would also be a main consideration, yet you should not fall into the trap of choosing a ridiculously cheap service because it would usually be reflected in the poor quality of the work. Anyhow, before voting for any kind of translation company, it is strongly advised to do your homework and find out whether the service provided is in correlation with your needs.

No matter what type of translation your quest entails, a wide variety of language translation services is a good initial sign that might imply the competence of the translation company. Most translation companies would be keen on including at least the following popular language combinations: Chinese-English translation, American English-Spanish translation, Russian-English, Arabic-English, Portuguese-English, French-English translations and the list could go on. The translation company should have a basic background in the industry the translation is involved in. This would ensure that the vocabulary used would be familiar to the target readership. A decent translation company's profile should spell out such information on their website or in their information booklet. At the same time, they should be able to understand and implement company phrases, special terminology and even play-on-words that you might want to see reflected in the translation.

In the electronic age we are living in, it is standard requirement that the translation company involved would have access to the Internet with file-sending capabilities via E-mail or other electronic facility. Besides easy transportation of the work the translation company should also consider appointing a contact person to the given project, who would keep you updated at all times.

Another important matter to consider is the professional background and approach of the translators. Was there a selection criteria for the translators hired at the translation company? Is a second translator proofreading the target text? In addition, a crucial element, that translation services are starting to comprehend nowadays, is the need to employ translators, who are native speakers of the target language - or at least have been living in the destination market long enough - and at the same time have full command of the source language. Such thorough background work might seem like a hassle in the beginning, but will certainly save you from lots of headaches when negotiating expected quality and price-range.

If the quality of the result is significantly important to you, do take the time to double-check the work completed! If you have knowledge in the target language you could personally examine the text to make sure that no important subject matter was overlooked. Furthermore, a professional way of detecting errors or omissions in the text is by doing a so-called 'back-translation' i.e. getting the text re-translated to the original language, by another translation company. One could argue that this is not a very cost-effective method. Well, "if you pay for peanuts - you get monkeys!". Remember, a poor translation can seriously harm you and your company’s image, while a polished, accurate one could make all the difference in today’s foreign language-oriented international world.

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