I can give you lots of good reasons to translate more of your content, but it’s obvious that in today’s climate many are having to deal with the reality of a reduced translation budget – at least in the short term. We’ve got quite a few customers in this situation, so if this applies to you here are some top tips for working with a lower translation budget.
Make the most of Translation Memory
Hopefully you already know about Translation Memory, but if not check it out. One thing we find is that customers may have several TMs – different departments or group companies for instance may have their own TMs. You may also have more than one translation services provider, each holding a separate translation memory. Move to one, centralised TM to maximise your savings. And if you’re working with multiple vendors, make sure they check in an updated TM regularly so you can combine them into your central TM.
By the way, if you use the PureFluent Customer Portal, you can download your TM any time. You can also upload a TM and we’ll automatically combine it with the TM we hold for you.
Top Tip 1: A central Translation Memory is vital to reduce overall costs and improve consistency
Consider Machine Translation for some of your content
Done right, with the right language combinations and well-suited content, Machine Translation can deliver amazing results and save you a lot of money. We can train a custom “Machine Translation Engine” (MTE) using your Translation Memory and Termbase so that you get an automatic translation result which is as close as possible to full-quality human translation.
Top Tip 2: Ask your language service provider about Machine Translation and evaluate the results.
Build a translation strategy that fits your reduced translation budget
Remember that you don’t have to make a binary choice between human and machine translation. You can choose Machine Translation for some content and human translation for your most important content. And you can enhance Machine Translation with human post-editing to eliminate errors and improve style. Talk to us about smart approaches to optimise your translation strategy.
Top Tip 3: Ask your language service provider to give recommendations on the suitability of your contents for Machine Translation
Do some translations in-house
There are drawbacks to carrying out translations in-house, but it can make sense if you’ve got the right resources available. Your team may understand your products, services and culture better than an external translator so there can be advantages, too. A reduced translation budget may mean this is the only way to get the job done. If this is you, make sure you’re leveraging your Translation Memory and allowing your team to be productive using a professional CAT tool. You can make use of the PureFluent In-house Translation solution giving your team on-demand access to our professional translation platform, allowing them to benefit from previous translations and ensuring that their translations are captured in the TM for future use.
Top Tip 4: If you have suitable language resource in-house, use them for translation but always in combination with professional translation tools and your central Translation Memory.
Consider a WordStore translation subscription
PureFluent is leading the way with translation subscriptions. A WordStore subscription not only makes life simpler with a single monthly payment. WordStore subscriptions also provide automatic volume discounts and an allowance for express projects at no additional cost. Even if the subscription model isn’t right for you, most translation companies will value a longer–term commitment from a customer, so you should be able to negotiate a discount in return for a 1- or 2-year commitment.
Top Tip 5: Make longer-term commitments and get volume discounts. A subscription will also reduce administration.
Automate to make your translation process more efficient
If you’re trying to get the job done with a reduced team, do yourself a favour and try to automate as much of the workflow as you can. We’ve got lots of ideas to help with this from automatic website translation to cloud storage integration.
Top Tip 6: Avoid manual file handling, exports and imports as much as you can. Use connectors and plug-ins instead to reduce errors, time and cost.
So those are a few of our top tips to making the most of a reduced translation budget. If you find the prospect of meeting expanding expectations with a shrinking budget, have a chat to us – we’re here to help!