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Five signs you need to work with a transcreation agency

Transcreation adapts your message to evoke the desired response from audiences of a different language and/or cultural background. You will often find the meaning of your content is lost through direct translation – especially where creative, subtle or stylistic language is used to convey meaning.

The harder you work on creating a message in one language, the more of its meaning tends to be lost when you simply translate it without any thought of the broader meaning beyond individual words.

In this article, we look at five tell-tale signs that you need to work with a transcreation agency to get the right response from audiences in overseas markets.

Does my content need transcreation or translation?

For content that’s very literal and direct in meaning (think instruction manuals, scientific studies, legal contracts etc.), translation is the perfect language service for your needs. However, when it comes to translating a video advertising campaign or adapting your brand story for overseas markets, simple translation often fails to convey the broader meaning of your messages.

Here are five key signs that your content needs transcreation instead:

  1. Marketing translation: Marketing, advertising and branded content are prime candidates for transcreation.
  2. Creative language: The creative language used in marketing and advertising is often lost in direct translation – as with other highly creative works.
  3. Message delivery: Content that has a message beyond the literal meaning of words requires transcreation to recreate this message in the target language.
  4. Linguistic distance: The greater the difference between two languages, the greater the need for transcreation becomes.
  5. Cultural distance: The greater the difference between two language cultures, the greater the need for transcreation becomes.

Any marketing content that uses slogans, tells stories or has meaning beyond the literal use of words (metaphors, indirect comparisons, implied meaning, irony etc.) will generally lose all of this through direct translation. The same is true for any content that uses creative language to convey a mood or evoke specific emotional responses from an audience.

Essentially, we are talking about message delivery that is designed to generate a specific response from audiences. A transcreation agency prioritises this target response and uses liberal adaptation and translation to redefine your message so it captures this response from audiences in each language market, even if it means recreating the entire message.

We have previously provided a number of transcreation examples in a separate article to show how major brands use transcreation in their global marketing efforts.

How can a transcreation agency help?

By working with a transcreation agency, this will guarantee that your message is never lost when you take it to overseas markets. A lot of time, money and other resources are often invested into building the perfect brand story and marketing campaigns for the English language. Even more finances are invested into taking your message overseas further down the line and there’s a high chance that huge losses might occur if your campaigns fall flat because they simply don’t translate.

A transcreation agency is therefore a valuable resource when it comes to getting your message across with every piece of content – whether it simply needs translation or whether it requires something a little more advanced such as localisation, adaptation or transcreation.

If you’re still unsure if you need to use transcreation or just simple translation for your upcoming global projects, get in touch with one of our Sales consultants today.

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