Are you looking to get content translated from an agency?
And perhaps you were told you need language localisation services?
Your first question might be…
What do you mean by language localisation services?
Localisation simply means that you adapt your service or product to local conditions.
This includes adapting to the culture, language, legislation and population of the market of where you’re launching.
The goal is to keep the same meaning across countries and regions. And delight your local customers!
You need to know your audience. And adapt to it! This way you can maximise impact, and stay clear of errors.
Literal translations (where you translate word for word or translate a word directly without looking at the bigger picture) carry a big risk. So all translations need certain adaptions.
Big companies that can afford to pay a higher price might adapt their go-to-market strategies and translations and localise all content to all markets.
But not all organisations have this type of budget to spend on their products or service.
Let’s look at some localisation examples
Here’s a real-life localisation example we commonly inform our customers about.
Perhaps you’re looking to translate a user manual from English to Spanish.
Looks easy enough, right?
There are 20 countries where Spanish is the official language.
One key market is Spain.
But Spain has co-official languages too, apart from Spanish.
And each language comes with its culture, history, political background and traditions.
1. Localisation in Spain
If you truly want to reach and resonate with your customers, or future customers, you might want to localise and translate your documents into:
- Catalan (spoken by 17.5% of the population)
- Galician
- Basque
- Occitan/Aranese, etc.
If you or your wallet is freaking out, remember that 98.9% of Spaniards speak Castillian, aka Peninsular Spanish.
Now let’s further complicate the story – and the localisation costs involved.
We’re continuing with the same Spanish localisation example:
2. Localisation in Latin America
If you’re launching the same product in Latin America, the language changes.
There is no “main” Spanish here, as there is in Spain.
Here’s an example to illustrate the diversity, using clothes pegs, or clothes pins:
Though considered dialects, both grammar, vocabulary and expressions are different in the countries and regions.
Sometimes dramatically different!
There are many funny translation mistakes where a word considered innocent in one region has let’s say a sexual connotation in others.
An experienced translator knows to stay clear and localise accordingly.
3. And what about the Spanish in the US?
Yep, it gets even more complicated to localise Spanish if you want to launch in the US.
The Spanish used in the US is also different compared to the LATAM versions.
And Spanish isn’t an official language in the US, so it’s not included in the 20 countries we previously mentioned.
However, it is the second most spoken language in the United States.
Roughly 13% of the American population speak Spanish at home.
The difference between localisation and translations
Translations are easier in the sense that you “only” translate texts from one language to another.
The goal is to maintain the same meaning of the text in both the source and the target language.
Localisation looks at the bigger picture and transforms everything related to the product or the service, as mentioned above. It’s less important to stay true to your original text.
Localisation also means you have to take into account elements like
- Images
- Graphics
- Packaging
- Characters (if you translate from English to Spanish the translation will consist of roughly 25%-30% extra characters thus impacting your design and content)
- Etc.
Do I need a translation or should I use a localisation service?
Based on the information we provided above, by now you should now have a clearer idea about if you need a “traditional” translation, or if you need to localise.
If you localise your content or not really depends on:
- your brand
- your product and/or service
- your budget
- your competitors
Where and how should you localise when translating to Spanish?
Let professional translators guide you.
Localisation prices
At Nativos Language consultants we compete on quality, not price.
This means our localisation prices are probably somewhere in the middle, compared to other translation agencies.
Our localisation prices don’t have any hidden costs.
Many of our new customers find us via recommendations from other companies.
To maintain high-quality localisations we only work with native translators who have more than 10 years experience.
Hiring linguistic experts is not cheap when you’re translating, but we like to see it as more an investment than an expense.
What’s the cost of a bad translation that turns you into a laughing stock as your content makes your product looks ridiculous..?
An example of the cheapest type of translation that makes your business look ridiculous.
Translation cost based on words
Our translation rates for localisation are based on words.
We can quickly give you a quote if you have your homework done and know what you’re looking for, and where you need it for.
Localisation quote example
- 6000 words
- Localising the texts from British English to Castilian Spanish
- The target market is Spain
- Technical translation
Getting started
If your business is only starting your internationalisation, our professional translators will sit down with you to see how we can best assist, and send a quote.
The price obviously depends on the scope, if it’s a one-of thing, or if it’s an ongoing collaboration.
We also offer discounts for bulk translations and when you need to translate documents into many languages.
We also like to offer special prices to businesses that are already using our language courses.
Here’s what some of our clients have to say about our localisation services:
Helpful, customer focussed and accurate translation services - exceeded expectations. Keep up the good work!
Jim Mc Laughlin
Jim Mc Laughlin is the founder of Nativos Language Consultants.
He's been teaching Business English in Barcelona since 2000 and translates from Spanish, and Catalan. He frequently shares his favourite translation tips on LinkedIn.
