In today's international business climate companies faced cultural and linguistic challenges that can rarely be handled by internal staff.  Given the low entry barrier for establishing a translation or interpreting business the market is flooded with providers of such services. Selecting a partner in this myriad of providers can prove to be a daunting task, especially if you do not possess relevant industry experience. As with most things, you usually get what you pay for.  We offer you some tips and guidelines for selecting a language service provider that is right for you.

1.     What do you need?

First thing you will need to asses are your needs. What is the scale of your project? Is it a large, multilingual task, with high word volumes? Will you need non-language services such as DTP or multimedia production? Are you handling special subject matter like law, medicine or technology that can only be reviewed by qualified editors and translated by specialized translators? Do you need a service provider that will also act as a partner in risk management? Are there any provisions in case something goes wrong? What is your budget? Do you have internal staff that can coordinate the project or help define the language style or terminology?

Once you have defined these parameters you can get a better idea of what kind of partner you need. In some cases where the translation is simple, relatively short and you have time, a small company or even a freelance translator might be the most appropriate choice. However, if the scope of your project is complex, you have long term needs and are new to translation or localization and are learning on the job, an established translation company might be a better choice. The role of your translation partner is to provide added value to your project by adding scalability, reliability and quality assurance and to share the risk by providing assurances.

2.     Where will you find your translation company ?

If you are new to the industry, and especially if it is your first time in choosing a provider for these types of services you are not likely to have any recommendations. Hence, most will search the Internet and this is fine as long as you take notice of the search results. Is your provider a company that pays for advertising or do they come up naturally in search results? Those paying for advertising might need the money whereas those that come up naturally in the search results have been established a long time and might not need to pay for advertising.

3.     Questions to ask your Language Service Provider?

The first question you should ask your translation company is to provide you with financial statements and the number of their staff.  Upon seeing their annual reports you will be able to gauge their commercial and market position much better.

Usually, the translation company will provide you with a list of references from their previous and current clients. Take some time and investigate these references so you can get a better idea of the company's experience in your area and of their general work performance, their competencies and their past clients.

Clients often make the mistake of not asking for the capacity of their provider. Potentially, this can be a minefield of hidden costs. For example, two companies will offer different prices and clients make the mistake of automatically selecting the one with the lower price thinking that price is the only requirement that really matters. It may turn out that the company with the lower prices has a really low daily turnaround and everything else that is over their daily turnaround is charged with an additional urgency surcharge. Hence, you should be wise and ask your provider about their daily, monthly and yearly turnarounds. You might realize that the provider with higher turnaround and somewhat higher prices  is  actually more cost effective. Asking for a sample quote is also a good idea as you will get a general idea about the prices of your provider and you will be able to compare services that are similar by their specifications.

Quality of the language service provider or translation company is another thing you should focus on. Certification to any recognized international standards by reputable certification houses like ISO 9001 and EN 15038 can be a sign of their commitment to quality and can increase the likelihood that your service or product will be delivered in a way that guarantees it.  Another sign that your company keeps up with the market can be membership in relevant professional associations.  Number of staff is also an important question. Does your translation company have its own internal production office or do they outsource everything?  You should know who will be in charge of your account how they intend to ensure quality and will they provide you with certain quality assurances and guarantees. Ultimately, we can conclude that a translation company should be chosen on the basis of their areas of specialization, quality, daily turnaround, prices and speed of service. It is essential to pre-select and narrow down the suppliers so you can compare similar offers and not apples and oranges. 

Establishing a long-term partnership with a translation company that can accommodate your future needs and demands s vital as it will ensure a long term reduction in cost and time needed to deliver your product or service, increase your quality and enable you to focus on your primary business activity and remaining flexible as the translation needs of your company change.

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