• Building a stronger team by gathering Keylingo associates from Canada to Argentina together in one place
• Increasing efficiency by sharing success stories and best practices from across the organization
• Identifying challenges and developing effective solutions through collaboration
• Benchmarking and learning from experts in other industries that will deliver presentations during the conference
• Energizing the organization through other fun events and social gatherings during the conference

Through continuous improvement Keylingo is looking to maintain the momentum it achieved during the last year.

About Keylingo

Keylingo Translations is one of the fastest growing translation companies in the world. Now with 27 locations spanning North America it also among the largest. Founded in 2004 and headquartered in Atlanta, GA, Keylingo is the only translation company to offer both local industry expertise and a best in class technology platform run by engineers and Project Management Institute certified project managers. Says Keylingo’s CEO, “We saw a need in the professional translation services industry for a new kind of company. The vast majority of companies have historically fallen within two categories. One category includes small companies in local markets that are strong at building long lasting relationships with their clients, but limited in the scope of services offered. The second category consists of large corporate translation firms that offer a broad scope of services but consistently deliver those services in a manner that is well below the customer’s expectations. Through it’s unique structure of highly trained local owner operators supported by a sophisticated technology platform and PMI certified project management staff, translation buyers can now have the best of both worlds. Keylingo Translations is truly committed to helping businesses everywhere do business anywhere.”

In a meeting last week with DBN’s founder, Courtney Betty, the two organizations discussed synergies including:

• Exclusive translation supplier to the DBN membership
• Translations required for IQMH which represents all labs in Ontario and Atlantic Canada
• Translating the DBN website
• Providing translation services for the upcoming Pan Am Games
• Developing translation support for Canada’s aboriginal communities

From left: Frederick Marx, Courtney Betty, Steve Klein

Leading Keylingo’s effort in this area are Steve Klein, Can Ubell, and Peter Knee.  All three are Managing Partners at Keylingo and represent an important part of Keylingo’s growing presence in the Canadian market.

About DBN

At DBN we address the changing dynamics of supply chain diversity in Canada, and work collectively to integrate diverse suppliers into Canadian corporations and governments.

About Keylingo Translations
Keylingo Translations is one of the fastest growing translation companies in the world. Now with 27 locations spanning North America it also among the largest. Founded in 2004 and headquartered in Atlanta, GA, Keylingo is the only translation company to offer both local industry expertise and a best in class technology platform run by engineers and Project Management Institute certified project managers. Says Keylingo’s CEO, “We saw a need in the professional translation services industry for a new kind of company. The vast majority of companies have historically fallen within two categories. One category includes small companies in local markets that are strong at building long lasting relationships with their clients, but limited in the scope of services offered. The second category consists of large corporate translation firms that offer a broad scope of services but consistently deliver those services in a manner that is well below the customer’s expectations. Through it’s unique structure of highly trained local owner operators supported by a sophisticated technology platform and PMI certified project management staff, translation buyers can now have the best of both worlds. Keylingo Translations is truly committed to helping businesses everywhere do business anywhere.”

Jim Peskin has joined Keylingo Translations as Managing Director of the company’s first office in Vancouver. Originally from New Jersey, Jim comes to Keylingo following a long and successful career in the arts. Serving in roles such as PR/Communications Director as well as Executive Director for various arts organizations, Jim brings skills to Keylingo that are directly transferable to the translation services industry. Keylingo is very excited about both Jim and its new location on the west coast of Canada. Our presence in this important market will better facilitate our ability to address the translation needs of businesses in Vancouver and represents an important step in the overall growth of the Keylingo organization.

About Keylingo Translations
Keylingo Translations is one of the fastest growing translation companies in the world. Now with 27 locations spanning North America it also among the largest. Founded in 2004 and headquartered in Atlanta, GA, Keylingo is the only translation company to offer both local industry expertise and a best in class technology platform run by engineers and Project Management Institute certified project managers. Says Keylingo’s CEO, “We saw a need in the professional translation services industry for a new kind of company. The vast majority of companies have historically fallen within two categories. One category includes small companies in local markets that are strong at building long lasting relationships with their clients, but limited in the scope of services offered. The second category consists of large corporate translation firms that offer a broad scope of services but consistently deliver those services in a manner that is well below the customer’s expectations. Through it’s unique structure of highly trained local owner operators supported by a sophisticated technology platform and PMI certified project management staff, translation buyers can now have the best of both worlds. Keylingo Translations is truly committed to helping businesses everywhere do business anywhere.”

Jim Dulin has joined Keylingo Translations and in his role as Managing Director will be leading the business development and relationship management efforts in this important market. Jim joins Keylingo following a 34 year career in banking at Wells Fargo. In his last role, Jim served as Senior Vice President – Head of Fixed Income Trading. The entire Keylingo team is excited to have Jim on board and Jim is anxiously looking forward to completing his training this week so the he can begin exceeding the expectations of translation buyers in his home state and beyond.

About Keylingo Translations
Keylingo Translations is one of the fastest growing translation companies in the world. Now with 27 locations spanning North America it also among the largest. Founded in 2004 and headquartered in Atlanta, GA, Keylingo is the only translation company to offer both local industry expertise and a best in class technology platform run by engineers and Project Management Institute certified project managers. Says Keylingo’s CEO, “We saw a need in the professional translation services industry for a new kind of company. The vast majority of companies have historically fallen within two categories. One category includes small companies in local markets that are strong at building long lasting relationships with their clients, but limited in the scope of services offered. The second category consists of large corporate translation firms that offer a broad scope of services but consistently deliver those services in a manner that is well below the customer’s expectations. Through it’s unique structure of highly trained local owner operators supported by a sophisticated technology platform and PMI certified project management staff, translation buyers can now have the best of both worlds. Keylingo Translations is truly committed to helping businesses everywhere do business anywhere.”

Types of Translation

There are two basic forms of translation – human and machine.

The vast majority of translations are still performed by human translators. While one might think that anyone able to speak another language is capable of performing translations, this is absolutely false. Translators are professionals whose training goes far beyond language fluency. First and foremost, professional translators are great writers. This is due to the fact that translation requires a rewriting of the original text in order to capture its meaning and intent in another language.

Machine translation, in contrast, is translation software that performs the work that human translators would otherwise do. There are various producers of these translation tools and they have been around for decades. These translation tools represent an alternative to human translation when speed and cost trump the need for translation accuracy. While speed and cost are important for every translation project, most translations are still performed by humans because translation quality is the most critical issue.

Basic Industry Structure

Stakeholders

The Buyer

First and most importantly, you have the client. Because translation is so ubiquitous in today’s business world, translation buyers are found in countless industry verticals (i.e. law firms, marketing agencies, manufacturers, government, medical devices, retail etc.) wearing numerous hats (project managers, paralegals, researchers, procurement professionals, etc.). Similar to legal and accounting services, professional translation services are now among those services essential to doing business in today’s global economy.

The Professional Translation Company

The professional translation company is the entity that most often interfaces with the client. These firms have staff such as Managing Directors, Account Managers, and Project Managers that are trained and capable of handling the countless tasks, administrative issues, and the inevitable challenges involved in delivering high quality translations on time and on budget.

These firms will also house all the technology necessary for the secure and efficient management of translation projects. This is more important than many realize because each time a translation is performed intellectual property is created. Professionally managing this IP is among the more important roles played by a professional translation company. And if done so well, the added value will appear in shorter turn around times, reduced costs, and more consistent/accurate translations.

Professional translation companies will also tend to offer many services so that most buyers can source all of their translation needs in one place. These additional services would include but are not limited to multiple languages, translation/editing/proofreading, quality assurance, and interpretation.

Finally, professional translation companies offer buyers a source of accountability. Because many have local offices the buyer has someone to turn to when challenges inevitably arise. Receiving quality translations delivered on time and on budget is important to many businesses, thus dealing with a professional translation company will be a strong fit in those cases. This is opposed to dealing with an on-line, off shore, or less sophistication organization, none off whom will likely have the infrastructure to deliver the type of partnership offered by a professional translation company.

The Translators

The profession of translator is obviously not new. Despite this fact, most business people either do not know or understand much about this global population of language professionals. Intuitively, most understand the importance of translation throughout history. However, in a professional business context, the profession has evolved extensively and the role of the modern translator is relatively unknown.

Translators are obviously the “humans” in human translation. Specifically, they are the ones translating text, content, documents, etc. from one language into another. How they go about this varies greatly depending on whom you are dealing with.

At the most basic level, freelance translators are individuals working from home, either full or part time, performing translations on their computers. Next, there are groups of freelancers that work together. This is more sophisticated insofar as there are multiple translators working on the same project thus adding editing and/or proofreading which leads to a higher quality output. Still more refined is when a larger group of translators join forces and start a company. These organizations will not only offer in-house quality control, but will tend to specialize in one or more industry verticals such as legal, technical, or medical texts.

Finally, the translator’s skill set has also evolved. It is no longer sufficient for a translator to only possess language translation skills. The ability to manipulate the technologies that facilitate the translation process is now essential as well. Successful translators also tend to focus on one or two specialties. For example, Spanish Translator is an incomplete professional description. Spanish Legal Translator or Spanish Technical Translator is what professional translation companies will be looking for when recruiting new talent.

Dynamics

From an industry structure perspective it is important to understand the distinction between the professional translation company and the translators. Furthermore, it is key to be aware of how the two work together and do/do not work with the buyer.

As stated above, it is the professional translation company that works directly with the buyer because they have the infrastructure and personnel to do so. In addition, professional translation companies offer a breadth of services that make the process of procuring language services simpler and more convenient for the client.

Next, professional translation companies work with translators on a contract basis. This is a very important point as many sometimes think that professional translation companies employ the translators. This does not work for several reasons. First, translation projects are just that, projects. It is not a defensible strategy for professional translation companies to work with translators on a full time basis because projects require expertise that only multiple teams can provide. Thus, a contract relationship makes the most sense. In addition, even the most sophisticated group of translators is not set up to deal with client issues. They prefer to focus on translation, their core competence, and the leave the client issues (e.g. project management, administrative tasks, relationship management, case resolution, work flow management, marketing, etc.) to the professional translation companies.

Conclusion

Translation is something that most professionals encounter frequently whether they realize it or not. Whether the impact is direct or indirect, translation is a rapidly growing component of modern business. A better understanding of the basics described above will at worst be interesting, hopefully, and at best help professionals find a translation partner should the need for one materialize.

Frederick Marx is the CEO of Keylingo Translations™, a multi-language translation company with offices across the US and Canada. Keylingo Translations™ provides exceptional local service combined with global technology and infrastructure.

How can you assure me that the service is any good? i.e. Quality

How long is this going to take? i.e. Quickness

How much will it cost? i.e. Cost

The same holds true for translation services. If you’ve purchased translation services for years or you are about to do so for the first time the following information will be helpful to ensure you choose the best option for your organization.

Quality

There are two main types of translation – human and machine.

Human translation means that a professional translator will rewrite the document requiring translation (source document) into the requested language (target document). Most likely, however, you do not know the target language and so you still do not know whether the translation is accurate. The best way to ensure accuracy in human translation is to work with a professional translation services provider that has the infrastructure in place to recruit, vet, and test professional translators. Further, professional translation service providers will have a process where up to three separate translators – a translator, editor, and proofreader – will translate the document thus further reducing the likelihood of errors.

Machine translation is computer software that performs the translation. Generally speaking, machine translation quality is very low. However, it is useful for certain types of projects. Internal documents (e.g. emails) are a perfect example of where machine translation can be useful.

Bottom line: If there are consequences associated with your translation being wrong, human translation is the way to go.

Quickness

First of all, it is important to understand that there is an inverse relationship between speed and quality in translation. In other words, the faster you go, the worse the translation becomes, generally speaking. Here are some numbers to help you understand. A strong human translator can translate around 2,500 words per day. So if you have a 10,000 word project it will be a challenge to get that turned around in 24 hours with any level of quality. There are ways around this, however, and it goes back to dealing with a professional translation services provider. If you are working with one, they will have access to multiple teams and can divide the work among them in order to shorten the turn around time (TAT). This is not optimal from a quality perspective, but it is still much better than machine translation. You could still go the machine translation route, but there you really risk quality.

Bottom line: Speed is important, but if there are consequences associated with your translation being wrong, use the numbers above to budget enough time to allow a professional translation team to complete your project.

Cost

Virtually all professional translation companies will calculate the cost of a translation project based on the number of words in the document. This is because they use industry specific technology that analyzes a document based on the number of words it contains. I’ll save it for another post, but the technology does other interesting things as well which make it important to work with a professional translation services company. If you request a quote from a service provider and the quote comes back with costs broken down by the hour, by the page, or a flat project based fee, that is a big red flag. In rough numbers, per word costs for most translation projects should range between $0.15 and $0.30 cents per word. The range includes factors such as volume, subject matter, language pair, and turn around time which can all have an impact on price.

Bottom line: You get what you pay for in translation services. If there are consequences associated with your translation project being wrong, have a substantive conversation with your provider about costs and budget accordingly.

Frederick Marx is the CEO of Keylingo Translations™, a multi-language translation company with offices across the US and Canada. Keylingo Translations™ provides exceptional local service combined with global technology and infrastructure.

The latest addition to Keylingo’s rapidly growing team is Peter Jensen. Through Peter’s new Keylingo office in Toronto, Canada he will be able to locally address the translation needs of the many global companies throughout the Greater Toronto Area as well as throughout the Province of Ontario. Peter joins Keylingo following a successful entrepreneurial and executive corporate career. His latest role prior to joining Keylingo was with Microsoft as a High Performance Computing Business Development Manager for Canada. With Peter’s solid business background he is prepared to continue exceeding the expectations of what will soon be a growing roster of companies seeking a comprehensive solution to their translation services needs.

About Keylingo Translations
Keylingo Translations is one of the fastest growing translation companies in the world. Now with 25 locations spanning North America it also among the largest. Founded in 2004 and headquartered in Atlanta, GA, Keylingo is the only translation company to offer both local industry expertise and a best in class technology platform run by engineers and Project Management Institute certified project managers. Says Keylingo’s CEO, “We saw a need in the professional translation services industry for a new kind of company. The vast majority of companies have historically fallen within two categories. One category includes small companies in local markets that are strong at building long lasting relationships with their clients, but limited in the scope of services offered. The second category consists of large corporate translation firms that offer a broad scope of services but consistently deliver those services in a manner that is well below the customer’s expectations. Through it’s unique structure of highly trained local owner operators supported by a sophisticated technology platform and PMI certified project management staff, translation buyers can now have the best of both worlds. Keylingo Translations is truly committed to helping businesses everywhere do business anywhere.”

Keylingo Translations California – Cheryl Hines is heading up the newest Keylingo Translations office in California, based in Manhattan Beach. Cheryl joins us after a successful career in the commercial real estate industry, having worked with shopping mall developers for many years. She is a thorough and dedicated profession, and will be working hard to build the Keylingo brand in Southern California. Cheryl looks forward to bringing our outstanding professional translation services to her clients!

Keylingo Translations Georgia and South Carolina – Keylingo is proud to have Carla Cox joining us in the Georgia market, and she’ll also be operating our first South Carolina location. Carla was formerly an executive with Coca-Cola and will now bring her business acumen, enthusiastic attitude and dedicated work ethic to the Keylingo Translations team. Carla looks forward to bolstering the Keylingo brand in the Georgia market, as well as bringing our services to the Palmetto State!

Keylingo Translations Ontario – We are excited to have a great trio of business leaders joining Keylingo in the Toronto area. Steven Klein, Cam Ubell, and Peter Knee have all come from long, successful, executive careers and are excited to combine their experience and vast professional networks to build the Keylingo brand in Canada. We are very excited to watch as Keylingo’s Ontario offices establish our organization as the leading provider of professional translation services in the Canadian market.

Keylingo Translations Ohio - Keylingo is excited to have Jay Van Winkle join the team in our first Ohio location! Jay’s background in non-profit fundraising ‘translates’ into excellent client-facing skills along with exceptional strategic planning performance. He is a strong leader with the experience, dedication and solid judgment to help take Keylingo to the next level of success.  Jay looks forward to bringing Keylingo’s professional language services to the Ohio market.

Keylingo Translations Georgia - Keylingo welcomes our fifth office in Georgia, headed up by Bernie Colacicco. Bernie joins Keylingo following a successful career in sale/sales management in the media industry. Prior to that, Bernie served in the US armed services as a Naval Flight Officer for eight years.  His years of experience in the military and a business-to-business environment give him all the skills needed to create lasting relationships with Keylingo clients. His enthusiastic attitude and dedicated work ethic make him an outstanding addition to the Keylingo Translations team and Bernie looks forward to bolstering the Keylingo brand in the Georgia market.

Keylingo New Jersey - Keylingo now has three offices in the Garden State! With the addition of Elisa Rivero in Northern New Jersey and just outside of Manhattan, we are excited for opportunities to tap several exciting verticals in need of translation services, including the pharmaceutical industry.  Elisa’s background as a financial liaison within this industry means she can leverage her existing network and skills to provide professional language services to new clients in this important market.  With Elisa now officially part of the Keylingo Translations team, we are looking forward to expanding our presence in the North East.