Quality assurance is a crucial part of the localisation process – premium-quality localised content shows you think highly of your customers and take the time to communicate with them effectively in their native language. This strengthens brand loyalty and trust, and can have a huge impact on building your positive reputation overseas. Conversely, when errors are missed, this can lead to reputational damage, dissatisfaction among customers and even legal issues.
But what is quality assurance exactly and what does it look like in today’s increasingly technological translation and localisation industry? We spoke to Isabel, QA specialist at ecls translations, to find out how her role has changed over the years, what processes are involved in quality assurance and how these processes benefit ecls’ clients.
Q: First things first, can you tell us what quality means to you when it comes to localisation projects?
A: I think there are many factors that define the quality of a localisation project. The meaning of the source content should be conveyed accurately but in a way that reads naturally to the target audience, taking any cultural nuances into account. There should not be any linguistic errors like spelling or grammatical mistakes. Dates, numbers and measurements should be localised correctly for the target market and any client-specific instructions, glossaries or style guides should be followed. Technical terms should also be localised accurately and consistently. I could probably go on, but they’re the main things I look for!
Q: Can you talk us through the processes involved in quality assurance at a Language Services Provider like ecls and what a typical day looks like for you?
A: The quality assurance process starts right at the beginning of any localisation project when a suitable linguist is assigned and reference material, such as glossaries, are gathered from the client. Technology plays a big role as well. Translation memories, for example, store previously translated content to ensure terms are translated consistently. There are also quality assurance checks built in to computer-assisted translation tools.
Once the initial translation is complete, the QA specialist will read the localised text against the source text to check for accuracy, as well as things like omissions, inconsistently translated terms, incorrectly localised measurements and terms that don’t adhere to the client’s style guides. After making any necessary corrections, they will do a final check of the entire content to ensure it reads well before any final formatting takes place for delivery to the client.
A typical day can be very varied. I might be checking another linguist’s work or a text produced by a non-native speaker, or I might be post-editing machine translation output. The end goal is the same but post-editing tends to require additional checks, as the output is not at the same standard as a human translator’s work yet, for example machines tend to overlook cultural nuances and might not take client preferences into account.
Q: You mentioned post-editing machine translation output, which seems to have become a more frequent task for human translators these days. Can you tell us a bit about how your role has changed over the years?
A: Previously my role was mostly proofreading translations that had been produced by human linguists. This meant that I could liaise with the translator where necessary to understand why they had made certain decisions in a particular project, and they could pass on any comments to me that they felt were necessary to explain their choices. While I do still check other linguists’ work, these days a lot of clients have strict deadlines or tight budgets, so they might ask for an MTPE (machine translation post-editing) service instead.
This means that the content is run through a translation tool and I then edit the output. I still check the same things – spelling, grammar, accuracy, consistency, terminology translated in line with the client’s preferences and reference material etc. Post-editing can often involve re-translating some of the machine translation output though, for example a machine will usually follow the punctuation of the source, but a professional human translator might split up a sentence if this improves readability. A machine will also not have a full understanding of the context in which the localised content will be used, which can mean that amends need to be made.
Another task that I sometimes work on these days is machine translation output evaluation. A client might ask me to check content that has been produced by AI translation tools and to give it a quality score. I then need to flag any errors and categorise them, so the client can see where the tools have got it wrong. The categories might be things like omission, mistranslation, terminology or spelling. Sometimes I receive two translations that have been produced by two different pieces of software and I need to assess which is better and requires the least editing.
I enjoy doing tasks like these, as it’s something a bit different and I feel like I’m using my brain in a slightly different way!
Q: Finally, what are the benefits of quality assurance for your clients?
A: There are so many benefits for our clients. Firstly, they receive localised content that is accurate, consistent, fit for purpose and culturally adapted for their target audience. They know that the final content is ready to be used and won’t require any further checks from their side. This saves our clients time and money in the long run. They will also see other benefits for their business, whether this be in the form of increased sales thanks to the product descriptions on their website now being available in other languages, or a decrease in support requests due to professionally localised instruction manuals, for example. It also goes without saying that high-quality localised content increases customer trust and satisfaction. Just think how you feel when you read something that’s full of linguistic errors or cultural faux pas on a website – it doesn’t make you want to put your trust in that company!
Thanks for your time, Isabel. It’s fascinating to see how the translation and localisation industry is changing.
If you’d like to discuss your localisation, AI editing and cultural consultancy requirements and plans for international growth with us, please do get in touch at info@ecls-translations.com and we’ll be happy to help.