Marketing Translation

We value your company’s global image and want to help you bridge the gap into new cultures.  Public Relations and Marketing Translation involve creative and highly nuanced communication. We understand the cultural needs of an international marketing campaign and are able to apply our local knowledge and experience to help you reach your objectives.

We can also help you in assessing your materials as you develop them so that we can advise on imagery, text expansion, or copy which may not translate well or need transcreation (keep reading for a more detailed explanation of transcreation).  We work with many of our clients in this development stage of marketing translation so that when it is ready for translation, it will be more effective.  We’re here as a resource for you….your back end localization department!

An effective global marketing campaign starts with a solid foundation. Let Language Solutions’ cultural consultants help you craft your global marketing campaign.

Marketing Translation Services include:

• writing international copy
• transcreation and marketing/advertising translation services
• cultural marketing research and reporting
• graphic and website localization
• linguistic screening of product names
• multilingual typesetting and graphic design

Our marketing translation strategy involves a team of certified, professional translators who are current with trends in your target markets. We train our teams on your specific objectives so that they really understand the key points you want to convey and that provides further context for translation which is not a literal process.  This is such an important step and one that is overlooked by many translation companies because it does incur additional time but that time is an investment into the quality of the translation.

Our preflight process is also an important step in the beginning of the project process of any marketing translation.  We actually read through all of your material. We do not just send out to translators.  We come back to you with questions such as needing further context on areas in the text, asking about references in the text that may not apply to the intended reader, finding inconsistencies and clarifying with you, etc.  The preflight process in any translation project is essential.

Most marketing material also requires typesetting of the translation into your design file.  We typically provide this service for our clients rather than have you do it in-house.  Many languages are expansive and require fitting them into the design while maintaining the integrity of your design files.  We also have access to multiple font libraries and the translator for the final proof of the files. Read more about our typesetting and graphic design services here.

 Transcreation

Transcreation is the process of adapting a specific brand message for a local market (localize), using original writing instead of the traditional translation process. The purpose is to create a message that is unique to the target market, while maintaining the intent, style and context of the original message. Transcreation is ideal for global brand creation and taglines, but it can also be used with any copy that requires considerable adaptation for the local market. Clients that make use of this service are in marketing advertising, pharmaceutical drug naming, retail and internal communications (HR).

Transcreation of a tagline for a new line of shoes. Creative briefs were used along with a visual deck for review. French and Spanish taglines were chosen based on 4 different options along with backtranslation.

Typical Process:

1. Review of Creative Brief:

Transcreation starts with a creative brief that explains the messaging in detail. We make use of the same inputs that was used to create the original message. This brief provides the foundation for the brand messaging and is crucial in order to control the brand messaging.

2. Creative Writing Process:

Transcreation is a creative and original writing process. Our team of writers use cultural, linguistic and local market demographics to frame the messaging for the local market. It’s an open and collaborative effort where ideas are shared. Clients should be aware that transcreation is a creative process that is longer than the traditional translation process. It is also a process that is based on time, rather than word count.

3. Backtranslation and selection:

Several options are provided with backtranslations and background as to why this particular message works both in the local market as well as retains the intent of the original message.

4. Layout Review:

If the brand message has design elements, those elements are taken into account in the final layout. Imaging and colors need to match the messaging, as well as cultural appropriateness of the local market.