Unlike human translators, who understand the nuances of language, idioms, and geography, online translators only translate literally. When businesses try to appeal to a global audience by using translators, they often run into trouble. A company will sometimes use Google Translate to translate an ecommerce website into many languages, hoping to attract customers across the globe. Unfortunately, the results are often inaccurate and even undecipherable. In some cases, readers in other languages cannot understand what an online translator has translated for them. This makes it actually harder to connect with potential clients across the globe. And in almost all cases, such automatic translations don’t look very professional.

For example, Google Translate cannot tell the difference between “Georgia” the US state and “Georgia” the country (which is also sometimes spelled Grusia). If you use Google Translate for your company website and translate the word “Georgia” the online translator can place your business in the US state in some languages and in Grusia in other languages –  that’s sure to be confusing for customers and embarrassing for you!

If you are writing a holiday card to your aunt and want to write “happy holidays” in another language, free online translators are a perfectly good choice. If you are creating a website – especially a business website – you need translations that are accurate and that reflect the professionalism of your business. This means that you need professional, experienced translators who can give your website the attention it deserves.

The reality is that translation is a time-consuming process, and there is no way to really speed up the process. A professional, full-time translator can translate between 2000 and 2500 words per working day, on average. In many cases, translation agencies use a statistic like this when setting rates. Any translation that requires more words than a translator can complete in a day is usually changed an additional or rush fee, as a rush translation requires the translator to work extra hours, increasing the overall cost of the translation.

In situations where a translation needs to be completed on a very tight deadline, there are in fact a few options:

1) Complete the translation at a regular rate but have the translation late;

2) Have one translator complete the translation on time;

3) Have several translators working on the translation to complete it by the deadline.

Each approach has its advantages and drawbacks. If you need a translation completed by a specific time, you have the option of having one translator work around the clock to complete a translation. The advantage of this approach is that the final product will be congruent and consistent, as it will be translated by one professional. The main disadvantage is that the translator will need to charge additional fees for the many hours of work and the stress of the assignment. Additionally, the translator will typically have less time for editing the final product in rushed assignments.

Another option is to have several translators working on an assignment at once. Initially, this may seem to be the less expensive option, since several translators working together can charge the typical (non-rush) rate. However, when several translators work together, a reviser and editor are often needed to go through the final product in order to ensure that the final product is consistent. Since different translators may use different nuances and have different vocabularies, the reviser is needed to ensure that the final product is coherent and congruent. This can add to the time or the cost of completing a translation as well.

The truth is that having additional time to complete a translation allows a professional translator the freedom to do the best job possible. In cases where a translation must be completed on a tight deadline, it is imperative to understand the different options possible and to discuss the options available with your translation agency. Vedia Translations, for example, never rejects assignments and is willing to find a solution for you, no matter what your needs are. All you need to do is to communicate with Vedia Translations about your needs and expectations when you call.

When one document has to be translated into several different languages, a team is usually assigned to the project, but few translation agencies coordinate their efforts. Instead, typically one translator is assigned to the project for every target language. This can be a big problem, as it can mean inconsistencies in style, terminology, and layout. If your document is being translated from English into Chinese, Japanese, Spanish, and French, for example, four translators with very different backgrounds and understandings could be looking at your document and the resulting translations could be very different from one another. A simple phrase or idiom could be understood equally accurately – but differently – by each translator, so that you end up with four translations that have very different connotations.

To combat this problem, Vedia Translations has adopted a unique approach: when a large assignment requires multiple translators, Vedia Translations arranges for an online conference between all translators to work out a common terminology and a common understanding of idioms. This ensures that translations of phrases such as “silver lining” are translated accurately – and not literally – into the intended languages. This online coordination ensures a clearer, more consistent final product for you.

The problem is that this “friendly” bit of advice can lead to serious inaccuracies and errors in your translations. No matter how talented and skilled your co-workers and friends are, they are probably not professional translators. They may make mistakes in your text. If they are expats, they may not be aware of the latest grammar changes and other changes in their own native language. Language changes all the time, and professional translators and linguists at Vedia Translations work many hours to ensure that they are aware of all these changes. As well, just as you may not have perfect grammar and a perfect vocabulary in English, your expat friends and coworkers may have their own language problems – problems which can then end up in your translated document.

There really is no substitute for a professional translation. After all, would you entrust anyone with a toolbox to fix your home’s plumbing or allow anyone with a stethoscope to prescribe you medications? While a non-professional translation may not mean a leaky pipe or a misdiagnosis, it can have severe consequences. Poorly translated legal or immigration documents can mean costly legal delays or the loss of a court case or visa. Errors in marketing or business translations can mean significant losses in profits or in business opportunities.

Getting professional results in any field means choosing to work with professionals; that’s why clients turn to Vedia Translations for their translation needs.

Unlike individual translators, translation agencies hire teams of professional translators. This ensures that your documents are reviewed by several eyes, which reduces errors and produces more reliable copy. Multiple translators at translation agencies also mean faster turn-around times, even on larger projects. As well, translation services can help you find the most qualified translator possible. You can pick and choose a Korean to English translator, for example, who is not only familiar with the language, but also has linguistic and translation training and education as well as experience with a specific industry. If you need legal documents translated from English to Spanish, for example, by working with a translation agency your document will generally be translated by a highly trained translator with legal experience. Plus, translation services usually take pains to find and train qualified translators who have extensive experience and a high
level of professionalism.

In fact, this selection process is one of the most important factors when selecting a professional translation agency. The average client does not know exactly how to test or vet a freelance translator. In fact, even after a completed translation, it is difficult for the average customer to evaluate the accuracy or reliability of the translation. Professional translation services, on the other hand, are staffed by language experts and can hire and evaluate the most qualified translators. The translators at Vedia Translations, for example, go through an extensive and thorough process to assess their qualifications, ensuring that Vedia Translation clients get the the best product possible.

Sure, you might save a little bit of money initially, but before you take that step, it’s important that you have a clear understanding of what you’re putting on the line, not to mention the added expenses you could incur later.

What could possibly go wrong? To answer that question, I’ll take a time-honoured English expression and translate it into Russian with one of those online services:

“Вы получаете то, для что Вы платите.”

My Russian readers are no doubt aghast at this clumsy sentence.

But bear with me. I’ll translate it back into English, again using machine translation.

“You receive that, for what you pay.”

You still get a rough sense of what the original expression was meant to convey (“You get what you pay for,”) but as you can see, something gets lost along the way.

Not only has the punctuation been distorted, you’re now left with something that sounds awkward and, well, foreign.

Understand what you are putting at risk

To be fair, machine translation can be helpful in certain situations. For example, it can help you when you need to ask for driving directions when travelling to a foreign country, or if you’re pressed for time and are struggling to understand the meaning of an expression in a language that you’re unfamiliar with.

But are you really prepared to take your company’s carefully crafted message and your hard-earned reputation and entrust it to a language robot?

Do you want to take the risk that your readers in a second language are prepared to accept that you’re treating their need to understand your message as secondary…versus your desire to save a few dollars?

Word sense disambiguation

That’s just the start of the troubles that you will face with machine translation. You’re bound to have even bigger problems with what language experts call “word sense disambiguation,” in which translation without context mutilates the true meaning of a word or expression.

This is a common risk with English, because it is a language that is rich with metaphors and synecdoches. Many expressions suffer greatly with machine translation. For instance, a sentence that includes “a piece of cake” might refer to an actual cake, or it might refer to a figure of speech designed to express simplicity. Machine translation can’t tell these apart, but a professionally trained translator can. They’ll even go the extra step of finding an expression that is culturally appropriate while protecting the meaning of a phrase in its language of origin.

An even greater risk than of just looking awkward

Let me share with you another example—one that illustrates how a poor translated expression can lead to embarrassing results.

When the Protein Research Institute within the Russian Academy of Sciences sought out to translate the name of their organization from Russian into English, something really went wrong.

What was once “Institut Belka” became “The Squirrel Institute.”

All it took was simple mixup between the words “belka” (белка) and “belok” (белок) and the word protein became squirrel. In their defence, the Russian government recently pledged that more of its officials will be required to speak a second language as part of their professional duties. A valuable lesson was learned.

Mistakes do happen. And machines, for all their time-saving benefits, can’t be counted on to handle the ambiguities that exist in every language.

That is why professional language translation services offer a return on investment that can reap benefits many times over. Not only do you gain the peace of mind knowing that your message is going to be well understood in other languages, your customers will notice the difference, too.