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The #1 Mistake Made by Most Translation Teams (And Four Examples of Why It Matters)
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Marketing oriented translation work is beset with potential hazards. Whether you are concerned with packaging, signage, ad copy, or an international website’s user interface, you know that the path is challenging. (Those compliance and training people don’t know how good they’ve got it.)
There is a single mistake that marketing-oriented translation teams make in porting their message to a new market. And if you avoid that mistake, your likelihood of developing a successful campaign goes up dramatically.
The #1 Mistake Most Translation Teams Make Is Concentrating on Translation over Transcreation
What is transcreation? Most simply put, it is the process of taking a current brand or message and:
- assessing its meaning and significance in its home market,
- analyzing the target market with an eye towards discovering if that meaning resonates and is culturally significant there, and
- developing a lexicon, set of guidelines, and body of concepts that will govern the usage of that brand in the target market.
A competent transcreation team:
- Works first to understand your brand,
- Then researches the target market using native speakers and residents,
- And finally proposes a modified or new brand identity and guidelines together with launch alternatives.
This makes transcreation a deeper consultative process than localization. Localization assumes that a base level of appropriateness is already in play for a brand. Then, it intends to make sure that any translation efforts are executed in a way that respects local market behavior. Localization also strives to offer up translation that is both technically correct and rich in nuance – using idioms and slang (where appropriate) to convey an already determined message.
Strict translation (whether human or machine-based) is then reserved for the types of content that either don’t rely heavily on context, like ingredients, technical product descriptions, or assembly instructions.
Clients come to us with a variety of different translation needs, and we often need to tease out whether or not the most appropriate approach begins with transcreation or whether we can move straight to localization and translation work.
Emerging translation programs (those that are just getting off the ground in porting content to a new market and language group) need a firm foundation of transcreation. Much of our work in the online games space falls into this category. They are young companies with new products are preparing to enter international markets for the first time.
When we encounter more mature programs, there is less need for the deep dive implied by transcreation (unless we need to come to rescue a mature program that is in deep trouble). Instead, we work within existing, well-conceived international branding guidelines to provide localized, audience-appropriate content. This is the type of work we do for brands like Nike in providing on-the-fly translation for World Cup videos.
What’s at Stake in Ignoring the Transcreation Process?
1. Failure to communicate brand attitude/promise
KFC (formerly Kentucky Fried Chicken) is now the largest restaurant chain in China with over 4500 outlets. It also had the distinction of being the first Western fast food company in China, opening in 1987. Unfortunately, KFC’s slogan at the time was “Finger Lickin’ Good” – intending to convey the idea that their food was so tasty that you would ignore good table manners and lick your fingers clean rather than lose even a smidgen of the Colonel’s secret blend of herbs and spices. The slogan (and the brand) meant to convey both a “down home” sensibility and a sort of guilty pleasure richness.
2. Failure to understand what kind of product you are selling
In the United States, dishwashers are a common appliance in the majority of home kitchens. In fact, more than 90% of homes built since 2003 are equipped with them. Thus, in the US, dishwashers are marketed as a suburban commodity with appropriate imagery.
However, marketing dishwashers in Asia using a similar strategy is doomed to failure. In Pacific Asia, dishwashers are a luxury good that can cost more than the monthly salary of a full time maid in countries like Thailand, Indonesia, and the Philippines. And these are countries with a known preference for employing domestic workers for household chores. Pitching dishwashers as a commodity rather than a luxury for these markets is the kiss of death. It’s also one reason why global adoption of dishwashers has been so sluggish.
Manufacturers like Bosch and Whirlpool continue to market on the basis of features. But purchasers in this case are most likely not the end-users and are more concerned with fewer features and simpler instructions – and opt for hand-washing instead.
3. Failure of imagery to communicate the brand message
When Pampers wanted to launch its disposable diaper line in Japan in the early 70’s, the company’s advertising team wanted to use a campaign that had been very successful in the US market. Baby boomers will remember the television add of a stork delivering diapers to a happy home. The image worked great in the US market because the legend of the stork bringing babies cemented the idea in consumers’ minds that disposable diapers (and the convenience that comes with them) were an integral part of modern baby care. Unfortunately, in Japan, the image made no sense and new parents had no idea what the ad was supposed to convey.
A bit of transcreation work would have done the trick, though. A legend going back to the 14th Century in Japan has it that babies arrive in giant peaches, ferried to deserving parents down peaceful streams and rivers.
4. Failure to respect local buying norms and conventions
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