The Advantages of Translation Software for Enterprises

As essential as translation and localization may be for your global goals, it can still be hard to persuade the C-suite to spend big money on big solutions. True, there are relatively cheap options available, but you get what you pay for. And you don’t want to be standing behind a system that leaves your company flat on its ass while the competition is charging ahead.

It’s time to get a clear sense of what you need from translation services so you can shop around with careful cost-benefit analyses. For lasting and scalable global success, you’re going to need to invest time and money from the start. But the advantages of translation software more than pay for themselves—when you know what to look for and you choose the right localization partner.

The Major Advantages of Translation Software for Your Business

First of all, don’t underestimate how many people will be involved in your localization efforts along the entire life cycle of your content. You will absolutely need to include your developers, UI and product teams, marketing, documentation, support, managers, translators, in-country reviewers, and perhaps even more stakeholders. Then, consider how much content could be potentially streaming through your localization systems right now—let alone, in the future as you expand your markets.You need efficient systems and strategies. Here are some of the major advantages of having the right translation software in your corner:

Save Time

You’d be surprised at how much time actually goes into translation, considering how many stakeholders and variables are involved. But only a small fraction of that total time goes to the act of translating.

The rest of the time is spent emailing, file formatting, tracking down terminology best practices, and waiting—for the other players in the pipeline to respond or to catch up or for assignments to drop.

You also need to budget time for quality management of your content translations. And it’s good to budget time for troubleshooting when problems inevitably arise.

But problem-solving and QA both benefit from solid translation software that can help you leverage valuable data with the touch of a button in order to improve translation quality and workflow alike. And, speaking of workflow, an automated, centralized platform can also greatly reduce all the time spent wrangling emails and file formats and the time spent waiting. Many of these tasks can be automated, freeing up localization players to apply their talents where it really matters.

The amount of time saved by any individual on any given project may be only a few minutes. But if you look at the project as a whole (or all the projects in a single year), you see significant time savings. And time is money.

Save Money

Great translation software does require a significant upfront investment, but over the long term, it’s recouped manyfold. One of the biggest ways to save is when you eliminate multiple vendors because the marketing department is on their own localization track, separate from the documentation and product and support departments.

There may be some differences in the departments’ translation needs, but there are certainly a lot of overlaps, and you would do well to capitalize on this opportunity. Otherwise, you’ll end up repeating work as different departments translate the same things; you’ll lose out on consistency as the translations diverge at critical points.

Translation software helps you to centralize resources and to merge workflows when it’s of benefit.Cutting-edge localization software also allows you see exactly where your expenses are going. So, you’ll be in a much better position to answer to C-suite once things are up and rolling.

Where, before, you may have had to uncover translation costs from the expense reports of individual departments and track a flurry of small payments going in a variety of directions—on a centralized system, you can have your spend divided in any way you see fit with automatic tracking. You can also gain valuable insights by comparing costs among departments or comparing the costs of leads, conversions, and incomes in different markets. This allows you to make informed decisions about the level of localization you implement in different locales.

Manage Workflow

The transparency inherent in a centralized system is an undeniable advantage. You can be confident in your QA because no one is guessing. Even if you don’t speak a certain language in order to verify translation quality, you have language managers and perhaps in-country reviewers who are best suited to the task anyway. You can see the status of any project at a glance and locate a piece of content without having to rely on others to produce it for you.

With an automated localization platform, you won’t have to touch the workflow unless you identify a specific need for troubleshooting. Meanwhile, all stakeholders can be incorporated into the system with easy access and new ones can be added while still maintaining transparency, accountability, and efficiency.With such a streamlined workflow, you’ll have an easier time identifying bottlenecks, inefficiencies, and opportunities for improvement. And you can feel more secure in the fact that you’ll meet your launch dates.

Manage Assets

As you approach translation and localization, some of your most important assets include translation memories, term bases, style guides, and other important linguistic resources. Without a centralized repository and easy access, you’re unlikely to see the consistency and efficiency you and your higher-ups would prefer.

You’re also more at risk for delays and brand damage without a single source of truth with these linguistic assets that are kept perpetually up to date.Fortunately, another advantage of translation software is that it can manage your linguistic assets just as it manages workflow, users, and expenses.

Any stakeholder can and should have access to your term bases and other critical resources to ensure consistency with translations. On the other hand, only certain people should be given clearance to make changes to these assets, and the critical responsibility of updates can even be set as an assignment so your source of truth doesn’t fall behind your company’s progress.

Find the Translation and Localization Solution with the Biggest Bang for Your Investment

Thanks to increased speed, accountability, and tight quality assurance, the right translation management system delivers an ROI well beyond your minimum expectations. These advantages of translation software provide a strong argument to justify its upfront expense. Just make absolutely sure you’re selecting the right technology for your needs.An LSP that is as transparent as their management product can help you to assess the right fit. And the right partner can magnify all of the benefits we’ve identified by proactively tailoring the software to your existing ecosystem and your specific localization challenges.