Marketing and Advertising Translation Services Singapore

marketing-advertising-translation-services

It’s reasonable to imagine that big global brands and marketing companies with large advertising budgets and big research budgets would launch their products flawlessly into the international market. However, it seems that even the biggest brands make the simplest mistakes, and launching a product without using professional translators is simply a recipe for disaster.

Consider these examples for large, globally known brands who you would expect to get their advertising right. Hair brand Clairol launched a curling iron called Mist Stick in Germany even though “mist” is German slang for manure. Mercedes-Benz entered the Chinese market under the brand name Bensi, which means “rush to die.” Pepsi’s slogan “Pepsi Brings You Back to Life” was debuted in China as “Pepsi Brings Your ancestors Back from the Grave.” Even the biggest companies with the biggest budgets can make the most basic mistakes when it comes to marketing and PR translation services.

Professional Marketing and PR Translation Services

Choosing your marketing message is one thing, but the time, energy and budget it takes to make sure you’re expressing exactly the right sentiment for your product is a lot more significant. Once your message is created and launched into the market, you get to enjoy that sweet sensation of a perfectly executed campaign. Or maybe you won’t. Imagine how quickly the joy will fade if your launch into the international market makes your brand a laughing stock, just as it did with Clairol, Mercedes and Pepsi.

These are all classic examples of how translation has been completed just by reading the words alone, without an understanding of language nuance, language construction and the cultural contexts of the original language to the translated language.

A simple misunderstanding or lack of expertise in the choice of language, tone and intent of your marketing, and the audience to whom it is targeted may be lost to your business forever.

For any brand wanting to launch into a new language market, there is an opportunity to work with marketing and PR translation service in the first instance, to test the name of a brand, the names of products and even ideas for marketing collateral, before you move through to production. Talking a translator through your press release will iron out any potential errors and a little time spent time up front can save you lots of time and money fixing your mistakes down the track. Simply understanding the difference between a business to business campaign versus a business to consumer campaign can completely change the way language is structured and used.

Most marketing businesses aren’t running global campaigns the size of Mercedes or Pepsi, but there are still plenty of marketing services available to meet the needs of most businesses. Popular translations include brochures and other marketing collateral translation (leaflets, and flyers), translating websites, labels, packaging, and translating slogans and taglines. For multinational businesses, translating of marketing strategies and plans is sometimes required and can be easily achieved by expert translators with good business knowledge.

Public relations translation services include press releases, media plans and launch events.

Marketing and PR Translation Services in Singapore

In searching for the best marketing and PR translation service, the first thing you need to look for is translators who work in their native language; this is the first major step in any professional translation. The subtleties and shades of a language and tone can be easily lost if the speaker isn’t native. Cultural norms, idioms, metaphors and other aspects also play their part in delivering the message successfully and clearly. Importantly, marketing language is often delivered through play on words , double meanings and language tricks. In some ways they are as tricky to translate as detailed legal documents, because the meaning is easily lost in words that lose their pun or punchline.

As with language, terminology is also important. That is not to say all marketing translators need to be expert marketers, but some familiarity with the terminology makes the difference between an average and an excellent result. Good translation take time to understand the intended target audience; this isn’t only about language tone, but also style.

Other important features of a translation service include authenticity, the tone of the translation should always match the intent of its original writer, and accuracy to all technical terminology is of course crucial, as is timeliness. Often marketing campaigns work on tight deadlines, and lingering with translations can cause major challenges to business outcomes.