5 Reasons Why Your Business Needs Professional Localization Services in 2022
CiklopeaWhile the challenging climate of the 2020s may bring a lot of changes and uncertainties to the way businesses operate, it also provides a good opportunity to focus on the things that don’t change and that may help in overcoming the crisis. In this article, we take a look at how and why professional translation/localization services are one of the anchors that can help your business thrive in any environment.
1. Localization is an investment, not an expense
One of the things that never changes in business is that people will always opt for a product/service that they can understand and relate to, with this consideration taking precedence over all others, including price.
Localization is a tool that enables cross-cultural understanding and the development of a relationship with global audiences. Its ultimate goal is always to integrate a product/service into the target culture by means of linguistic, technical, legal and, more often than not, creative adaptation of the source materials.
Language service providers have the know-how, the teams and the means to perform this operation seamlessly, and this is one of the reasons why localization is never an expense, but a smart investment.
2. Localization builds customer trust
In the age of content explosion, we are more likely than ever to stumble upon poorly translated/localized content. We’ve all experienced this – we search for certain information on the internet, and the search engine takes us to a website with awkward, machine-translated content.
Should we really trust this source and the information it provides?
Of course not. The party that produced such content made little or no effort to make it understandable to the target audience, which is always a telltale sign of an untrustworthy business.
Things like this also happen in the real, offline world, with the same effect. Consciously or subconsciously, people react to language, and language is an important part of how your products/services are presented. This is why all translation-related tasks should be handled by professionals – at least for business purposes.
3. Localization is a safety device
The localization process is designed to prevent certain issues, and the fact that these issues are rarely talked about only testifies to its efficiency.
Localization prevents problems in the legal and technical adaptation of products and services, enables smooth communication with any local regulators and authorities and, of course, helps build and preserve a positive brand image on the target market.
Poorly translated product/service documentation and marketing materials may mislead, offend and even harm customers on the target market. Localization is a safety device designed to prevent precisely this kind of thing from happening.
4. Localization builds authenticity
When done right, localization enables seamless integration of a product/service into the target culture. When done really well, localization enables the product/service to stand out on the target market with carefully localized and transcreated content that showcases a brand’s image in an authentic and appealing way.
Achieving this effect takes a lot of effort and combined and coordinated work from individuals with a wide variety of skills and talents. Luckily, this is exactly the kind of thing that language service providers do.
5. Localization means business
It’s always easy to forget that the origins of writing, translation and localization are related to business and economics. The earliest writing systems were developed in ancient civilizations for taxation purposes, while the first translators were ancient merchants.
What this means is that localization is an organic and universal business requirement: the key to business success is in exports, and exports are unimaginable without the adaptation of a product/service in accordance with the target market environment.
Times are always changing, but certain aspects of human activity don’t change; they’re simply adapted to the technological standards and requirements of their day and age. Localization is one of these aspects: ancient Phoenician businessmen had to learn foreign languages and do their translations themselves, while modern businesspeople leave this task to professional language services providers.
We help life sciences, IT & software and technology and manufacturing industries communicate their messages to international markets and secure a positive presence at the global level.