If there are already documents translated with key company terminology or with which you must be consistent, it is also important that you provide them to the translator. You will not only facilitate the terminology research work; you also make sure that the translator uses the key terminology of your business. There are translators who are perfect and cannot be ignored .
Provide original documents in an editable format
We often receive requests for translation of a PDF. The problem with PDF files is that they are not meant to be edited. As its name suggests, it is a portable document format literal translation from English Portable Document Format. It is therefore designed so that we can view any document, regardless of the program with which it was created. Who says PDF says the original document. It is advisable to make it available to your translation service, your translation agency or the translators you have used. If it does, it means more work for translators and, in case you need a document with the same layout, more work or expense for you.
Provide original documents in an editable format
This problem is even more important if the PDF contains non-editable text, as is the case for documents scanned or converted into vector images. Modern professional translation involves the use of translation assistance tools or CAT computer-assisted translation tools which facilitate the work of translators by organizing the text in two columns. This way, the translator has the source text in one column and writes the translation in the other. These programs create a database with the translations made by the translator, allowing him to search if a term has already been translated and if so, how. They also make it possible to detect repetitions or similar texts, which make the work easier and allow translation agencies to offer discounts based on this technology.
Take advantage of your company’s specialists or your distributors
No one knows your company’s products as well as you do. This is why it is important if your company has subsidiaries abroad or distributors with which it collaborates or intends to collaborate, to involve them in the translation process in order to use the terminology most appropriate for your company. This will represent an additional time for everyone, but it is a process that will strengthen the quality of your translations and allow you to have feedback on the quality of the work of the translation service, the translation agency or hired freelance translator.
Take advantage of your company’s specialists or distributors
If you do not have this opportunity due to the size and infrastructure of your business, be proactive to get feedback on the quality of translations from customers buying your product and to let them know if they disagree. Vis-à-vis certain terms used. For example, WPML acronyms of WordPress MutiLingual, one of the most popular plug-ins for managing multilingual websites, offers a module for asking website users their comments on the quality of the translation.
Provide all relevant information regarding your target market
Often, the characteristics of the target audience can influence the translation of your documents. English does not make a clear distinction in this regard, while languages like German or French retain these formalities, unlike Spanish. Giving such information to the translator can lead to a different, more informal, word processing when translating to Spanish.
