Asavari Tamhane Secretary |CITLoB Editor | Indovox More about her here Dear readers, I hope all is well at your end. Here’s wishing you all a very very Happy Diwali and a Prosperous new year. May all roads lead your career to success and prosperity. Life is definitely back to normal and businesses are picking up […]
I hope all is well at your end. Here’s wishing you all a very very Happy Diwali and a Prosperous new year. May all roads lead your career to success and prosperity.
Life is definitely back to normal and businesses are picking up slowly. At CITLoB we ended the month with our Annual international conference which was well received and appreciated by one and all. We hope to bring more such meaningful and industry relevant events to you soon. This month’s issue is crisp but interesting. Do read the article written by our member, Ms Madhu Sundaramurthy from Summa Linguae, on “Maggie Maggie Maggie”.
In December we will soon have our Quarterly members meeting. Please feel free to reach out to me if you have an idea or perhaps a solution to a problem that plagues us all. Your knowledge and expertise could benefit others and this can definitely increase your credibility and visibility amongst your peers and add value around your personal and professional brand.
I have one more request. IndoVox is the face of CITLoB that reaches national and international platforms every month. I would like to invite you to strengthen the spirit and contribute articles. Your rich experience and understanding of the industry, your strong points, achievements and learnings all of this in a nutshell can really benefit others. It’s time to give back to the industry and go ahead together. This will also help you increase your visibility in the language industry. Please write to editor @citlob.in if this interests you.
Madhu Sundaramurthy Managing Director APAC – Summa Linguae Technologies More about her here Maggi Maggi Maggi…. -by Madhu Sundaramurthy It was 2015 and India was buzzing with the news of Maggi 2-Minute noodles being tested for toxic levels of lead. Some States took the product off the shelves, whereas some were directed to impose a temporary […]
Madhu Sundaramurthy
Managing Director APAC – Summa Linguae Technologies
It was 2015 and India was buzzing with the news of Maggi 2-Minute noodles being tested for toxic levels of lead. Some States took the product off the shelves, whereas some were directed to impose a temporary ban by the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India.
I belong to a generation which grew up on Maggi and the 2-minute noodle Ads and for that generation it came under the category of “soul food”. Having resided in a hostel where we were not allowed to cook in our rooms, I remember thinking of ways on how to cook the noodles during a late night study session. I am sure my seniors will fondly recollect the night when we juniors cooked Maggi for them in our water kettles during one of those all-nighter study sessions. Be it at home, college or even during travel, Maggi has always been a fixed companion.
I remember searching for Maggi Noodles in 2003 in Munich and was surprised to see that there were more soups than noodles available in the store. After some questions in my broken German, I did manage to find a pack of Maggi noodles but it did not taste like the Indian counterpart. Disappointment and gloom set in until I found an Indian store which stocked my soul food. Even when I travelled to different parts of the world I realized that the only source of Maggi Masala was the local Indian store. This is when I realised that Maggi 2-Minute Noodles has been localized in many places to suit the popular flavours in those countries. In some countries even the name has been adapted to suit the local trends. In several countries, it is known as “Maggi mee” (mee is Indonesian/Malay/Hokkien for noodles). In Malaysia, fried noodles made from Maggi noodles are called Maggi Goring. In Mexico they are called Instant Maggi Ramen noodles. In Australia, Maggi noodles are available both dried type and precooked type.
There are many popular flavours like curry, chicken, tom yum, and asam laksa. In Pakistan, Maggi Noodles are available in six flavours – Chicken, Chatkhara, Masala, Lemon Chaska, Karara and Bar-B-Q. In South Africa the most common flavours are beef, chicken and cheese. It is also available in packaging made from animal free fats for the vegetarians. But the Indian made Masala flavour is the most exported flavour and that is because of the Indian population based in different parts of the world.
In India the Noodles were introduced in five flavours Masala, Chicken, Capsicum, Sweet & Sour, and Lasagna. Then there was the launch of other flavours like Curry and Tomato, Sambhar (for South Indian consumers), Lemon Masala, Chilly Chow and Shahi Pulao (for North Indian consumers). With time and new eating trends even the ingredients used to manufacture the noodles were localized to match the “healthy food” standards. Now we can choose between Wheat flour, Multi-grain flour, Atta and Rice and Oats noodles. Then came the Maggi Cuppa Mania – Maggi on the go with the tagline “Just add garam pani and carry on Janni” (Just add water and carry on). Everything Maggi has done to promote the product in India indicates that they want to sell Maggi as an Indianized product. The Marketing team understood the importance of localization and trans-creation. Not only did they study the target audience well, they also changed the tagline from time to time to attract the buyers – they never used any fancy English or translated European taglines to sell the product in India. The scheme of getting toys and gifts in return of empty Maggi packets was so close the Indian buyer’s mentality.
“Me Aur Meri Maggi aksar yeh baatein kiya kartein hain ki…. (Combining the current Maggi campaign with an old Hindi film song) Me and my Maggi often have this discussion about what will happen to the fun of slurping the hot, spicy and tasty noodles if they are taken off the shelves forever? The future of Maggi Noodles was unsure in India but with its return it is back to being the soul food for this and many generations to come.
Sandeep Nulkar President |CITLoB More about him here Dear friends, It has been an extremely eventful year for our industry. Sheer grit and determination have seen many of our members stay afloat, while some have scaled newer heights. In that sense, a deserving pat on the back to Himanshu Sharma and his team at Devnagri for […]
It has been an extremely eventful year for our industry. Sheer grit and determination have seen many of our members stay afloat, while some have scaled newer heights. In that sense, a deserving pat on the back to Himanshu Sharma and his team at Devnagri for raising $600k in seed funding. This news came within weeks of another CITLoB member, Rian.io, raising money. What is particularly gratifying is how these companies have managed to stick their neck out even in these turbulent times. There have been more success stories and we will try and cover each of those through the various features in IndoVox in the days to come.
At CITLoB, buoyed by the success of our first annual conference, we have wasted no time in getting down to planning more activities and you will hear from our Secretary in due course of time. As usual, I would like to urge each one of you to reach out to us if you have any specific topic in mind that you would like us to cover. It will help us tailor sessions, speakers and experts that give you the kind of knowledge, information and support that you are seeking.
On a completely different note, November is also the month of FICCI-ILIA’s flagship event, Bhashantara. CITLoB will be supporting this event and you can reach out to me if you want to get involved in any capacity. It is a terrific platform make new connections and put your brand in the spotlight. I will share more information on that front soon.
In the meantime, do take care of yourself and your families and stay safe. Happy reading and happy CITLoBing.
Sandeep Nulkar President |CITLoB More about him here Dear friends, What an immensely gratifying month this last one has been! From merely a dream of getting all the stakeholders of our industry on one platform to starting the association and to now having successfully organised, Samvād, our first ever annual conference. It has been one amazing […]
What an immensely gratifying month this last one has been! From merely a dream of getting all the stakeholders of our industry on one platform to starting the association and to now having successfully organised, Samvād, our first ever annual conference. It has been one amazing journey and I cannot thank each one of you enough for all the support. We could not have done this without each of our members and well-wishers.
Apart from the fact that we received an overwhelming response with nearly 150 registrations with a record 85% attending a session at one single point in time, it was also encouraging to see the demographics of the attendees that came from all across India, Europe and the Americas. We were also very happy to have received the support of our partner Associations in FICCI-ILIA, EUATC, GALA and the India Chapter of the Women in Localisation. Support also came in the form of our sponsors. A heartfelt thank you to our title sponsor Reverie Language Technologies and our silver sponsor Fidel Technologies and all the premium sponsors – BITS Language Technologies, Brahmaam, Crystal Hues and Rian and also our Exhibitors – Arth Shikshan, EUATC, FICCI-ILIA, LinguaSol, Media Wen, Native Ninja, Nihon Global, Translation Panacea and Women in Localisation. Such support speaks volumes of the trust stakeholders are willing to put in our Association.
I can assure you that we are only getting started and there is so much passion and enthusiasm in the team to create a bigger impact for the betterment of our industry and those who constitute it. And that will surely happen, over time, as we continue to grow financially and have more members come on board. Until then, I would like to urge each one of you to help spread the word about the association and the work we are doing and motivate more freelancers and language services companies to become members. This little help will go a long way in strengthening our cause.
The new month will bring newer activities and events and I hope all of you can spare some time to be a part of those. I am looking forward to your support. In the meantime, do take care of yourself and your families and stay safe. Happy reading and happy CITLoBing.
Vidula Tokekar Director | TranslationPanacea More about her here The “Meet the Member” section has been a platform that helps us provide excellent visibility to our members. This month we have the privilege to listen to Ms Vidula Tokekar from TranslationPanacea. Translation Panacea is a certified leading language translation company providing a broad spectrum of language […]
The “Meet the Member” section has been a platform that helps us provide excellent visibility to our members. This month we have the privilege to listen to Ms Vidula Tokekar from TranslationPanacea. Translation Panacea is a certified leading language translation company providing a broad spectrum of language solutions.. Listen to Vidula as she takes us through her exciting journey
Asavari Tamhane Secretary |CITLoB Editor | Indovox More about her here Dear friends, At CITLoB, we couldn’t have been happier. The entire team worked relentlessly towards one single goal and we achieved it! Meticulous planning, timely execution and support from each one of you ensured that SAMVĀD was a huge success. Thank you so much. Life […]
At CITLoB, we couldn’t have been happier. The entire team worked relentlessly towards one single goal and we achieved it! Meticulous planning, timely execution and support from each one of you ensured that SAMVĀD was a huge success. Thank you so much.
Life seems to have gone back to some sort of normalcy and there surely seems to be an atmosphere of growing hope and enthusiasm within our industry. SAMVĀD surely made a mark locally as well as globally and will open up multiple opportunities for each one of us. If you would like to know how you could benefit, do reach out to our President and he will be more than happy to talk in this regard.
About this month’s issue, we have an article written by our member, Ms Nikita Agarwal from Milestone Localisation, on “Marketing – How LSPs should market themselves on their website”. Pick up tips and tricks to know more about how your online presence can be crucial to the success of your business.
The “Meet the Member” section has been a platform that has helped us provide excellent visibility to our members. This month we have the privilege to listen to Ms Vidula Tokekar from Translation Panacea.
I hope you enjoy this issue as much as we did putting it together. I would like to end by requesting each one of you to contribute to our newsletter, IndoVox. Apart from giving you visibility, it will help improve the credibility of your brand while helping us strengthen the spirit behind this effort.
CITLoB also organises a series of webinars. Do let us know about the areas that interest you or topics that would enhance and educate us as an industry. So also feel free to suggest or recommend resource persons and we will see how we can benefit from their knowledge and expertise. Should you wish to conduct a webinar on any topic that is close to your heart, that is something we can discuss too. Basically, get involved 🙂
Director at Milestone Localization More about her here Your online presence has a massive impact on the success of your business. Every business, regardless of industry, needs to have their information available online to grow and acquire clients. A good website helps build credibility, defines your brand and lets potential clients find information about your […]
Your online presence has a massive impact on the success of your business. Every business, regardless of industry, needs to have their information available online to grow and acquire clients.
A good website helps build credibility, defines your brand and lets potential clients find information about your business.
For language companies, an informative website showcasing your work, services, language capabilities and contact details is essential for marketing and lead generation.
I head Milestone Localization and our marketing team spends hours examining our website metrics, visitor behaviour and website leads. We make changes and add new information to our website every week. Our website is one main source for new leads- both organic and paid.
I’ve learnt a lot from building our site. Here’s 10 simple things you can implement right now to increase conversions from your website:
Make sure visitors know what you do within 3 seconds When someone visits your website, there should be no ambiguity about what your company does.
A shot from our home page
Many language companies have vague wording and imagery. For example, some companies write ‘grow your business’– this could be used for a marketing company, a global compliance company or even a web development company.
Many companies have an image on their homepage of people saying hello in different languages. This could give the impression that you are a language school, your company has a global presence or that you provide language services.
The ‘first screen’ or ‘first look’ is what a person sees when they open your page. It is the section of your page visible without scrolling.
The first screen of your home page should convey what kind of languages services you provide. Within a few seconds, a visitor should know that a) you provide languages services and b) what type of language services you provide.
To do this, make sure you include the words translation, localization or interpretation in your copy. This makes your purpose clear and visitors know what step to take next
Have a clear CTA A clear Call-to-Action or CTA lets visitors know what they need to do next. If your site doesn’t have a CTA, visitors will likely leave without accomplishing what you want them to.
Here are some examples of CTAs for language companies:
Book an interpreter
Order translations online
Get a quote
Contact us
Subscribe to our newsletter
Request a call
CTAs should stand out on your page. They are typically big buttons on a contrasting background. Most websites place CTAs on the header of their page on the top right corner.
Once a visitor has finished their research and wants to take the next step, there should be an obvious one in the form of a CTA.
Milestone Localization uses ‘Get a Quote’ as a CTA. It’s on the top right corner of our floating header with a bright pink background. This means that it is present on every screen of our site and visitors can click on it when they’re ready to speak to us.
Multiple channels for communication It should be incredibly easy for website visitors to get in touch with your company. The easiest way to achieve this is to have multiple options for communication.
We offer phone, whatsapp, live chat, email, form submission and a book a meeting option.
You can also add Facebook Messenger, text message and website bots. Just make sure that you’re able to attend to enquiries from all these channels!
Different people prefer different forms of communication based on their age, location, type of enquiry and urgency of request. With more options for communication, you can increase conversions from your website.
Have a separate line of communication for translators and jobseekers Translation companies receive several enquiries from freelance translators and jobseekers every week.
Have a separate email, form or phone number for these types of communications. This makes it easier for your sales team to focus on client enquiries. Linguists also find the right person to send their details to for future assignments.
Include testimonials and case studies from clients
Adding client logos, testimonials and case studies to your website helps build credibility. Getting testimonials and creating case studies can be time consuming, but it’s completely worth it.
Add client logos and testimonials to your home page and landing pages. You can even create a separate page with client testimonials so you can send this to people who ask you for references.
Logos are intellectual property- so make sure you have permission from your client to display them on your website!
Make sure you cover the basics of SEO If you want potential clients to find your website. You need to optimise it for search engines. This process is called SEO or search engine optimization.
SEO is a long term investment that can take 6 to 18 months to pay dividends. You might need to work with a specialist to cover all bases, but there are some simple things you can implement.
Cover these basics so people can find your site:
Using relevant keywords on your headings and text
Business listings on key websites
Robots.txt files so search engines can crawl your website
H1, H2, title and alt tags
Update your site with new content often
Avoid adding too much text- use images, videos and graphics instead Don’t make your pages too text heavy- use images, videos and icons to convey your message. Visitors aren’t going to read long paragraphs of text explaining your services.
The most popular format is short informative headings followed by icons or videos. Save long text form content for your blogs, case studies and reports.
Add social proof Social proof, especially a link to your LinkedIn profile is a must for building credibility. Customers want to see that you are a real business with an online presence on different platforms.
Translation companies can include links to their ProZ profile, add membership badges for industry bodies as well as ISO certifications.
Make sure your social profiles are updated regularly! We post at least two times a week on all our social media accounts.
Check your site speed If your website doesn’t load in 4 seconds, more than 50% of visitors will abandon your site. A fast website is essential for a seamless browsing experience.
Speeding up your site often requires technical expertise. Invest in a professional developer to speed up your site- all your other efforts will be in vain if clients abandon your site because it is too slow.
Ensure it looks good on mobile Most users, and especially users in India will visit your website on their mobile. Make sure your website looks great on screens of every size.
The process of creating a seamless mobile experience is called Mobile Optimization. You can test your site’s mobile optimisation score here.
If you use a CMS like WordPress or Wix, the templates are usually already fully mobile optimised. Every time you build a new page or add new content to your website, review it on a handheld device to make sure it works well everywhere.
This is just the bare minimum for a good online customer experience. Once you’ve implemented these changes and see a difference in website traffic and leads, you can move on to bigger (and more complicated) things.
Asavari Tamhane Secretary |CITLoB Editor |Indovox More about her here Dear readers, These are exciting times at CITLoB with not a single dull moment. This month was both challenging as well as rewarding. The preparations for our upcoming first ever ‘Annual International Conference Samvād’ are in full swing. CITLoB hosted a webinar on “Defining Translation & […]
These are exciting times at CITLoB with not a single dull moment. This month was both challenging as well as rewarding. The preparations for our upcoming first ever ‘Annual International Conference Samvād’ are in full swing.
CITLoB hosted a webinar on “Defining Translation & Understanding Translation Workflow” by Duscan Matic from MCIS Canada. The webinar was very well received by all our members and it was extremely interactive too. In case you have missed the same you can watch it now on our Youtube Channel.
This month’s issue has an article written by our member, Ms Vidula tokekar from Translation Panacea, on “ Translation of Legal Content: Diligence and Deadlines”. Please do read the same and take away some useful insights from it.
The “Meet the Member” section has been a platform that helps us provide excellent visibility to our members. This month we have the privilege to listen to Ms. Vidushi Kapoor, Co- Founder of Process9 Technologies one of India’s leading language localization technology company.
Samvād is round the corner and we all at CITLoB would like to extend you a warm welcome to sign up for this first ever Annual Conference of CITLoB.
Sandeep Nulkar President |CITLoB More about him here Dear friends, I hope you all are doing fine and are up for the exciting line up of activities that started with the recently held Quarterly Members Meeting. Himanshu Sharma, Founder of Devnagri, spoke with passion about how “Less is more”, sharing his views on how one can […]
I hope you all are doing fine and are up for the exciting line up of activities that started with the recently held Quarterly Members Meeting. Himanshu Sharma, Founder of Devnagri, spoke with passion about how “Less is more”, sharing his views on how one can go about increasing productivity and efficiency. He even threw light on some tools we could use in the process. In case you missed it, do not forget to watch it on CITLoB’s YouTube.
September also happens to be one of the busiest months at CITLoB as we partner with Reverie Language Technologies to host a series of events to celebrate the International Translation Day. These events will culminate with CITLoB’s first ever Annual Conference, Samvād, on the 30th of September. There are plenty of opportunities to make your brand more visible, not only in India but across the globe, and I urge you to get in touch with the Secretary of CITLoB, Asavari Tamhane, and the Secretary of CITLoB-ALP, Rasika Gumaste, to know more about the sponsorship options we have for every need and budget.
While on the topic of the conference, I would also like to appeal to all of you to keep an eye on all the posts on CITLoB’s LinkedIn page. If each one of us could reshare these posts with our network, we could easily reach over a hundred thousand people and that would do wonders to our visibility and what each one of us stands to gain from that.
There is going to be a lot of interest in our conference within the language community globally and especially because it is one of the first conferences to be organised by an Indian association in a long time. We will be making an official announcement very soon and I am looking forward to your active and proactive support to help us make this event a grand success.
You will hear from the team soon. In the meantime, do take care of yourself and your families and stay safe. Happy reading and happy CITLoBing.
Vidula Tokekar Director | TranslationPanacea More about her here Translation of Legal Content: Diligence and Deadlines Agreements, wills, court rulings, MoUs and other legal content are peculiar for translators due to their distinct features. When approached properly and methodically, the content can be translated well and serves the purpose. Translators often come across variety of […]
Translation of Legal Content: Diligence and Deadlines
Agreements, wills, court rulings, MoUs and other legal content are peculiar for translators due to their distinct features. When approached properly and methodically, the content can be translated well and serves the purpose.
Translators often come across variety of legal documents for translation. It can be a First Information Report (FIR), minutes of meetings, Government registrations, notifications, court rulings, legal correspondence between parties, appeals, charters of demands, MoUs and agreements, wills, patents and others. For this article, we are considering only written content.
Let’s see what makes translation of legal content so special.
Commissioned by law firms or either party of the subject matter, with good knowledge of law, a specific purpose and timeline for translation.
Complex and crisp language, typical expressions or clauses.
Users of translation are well conversant with the typical legal language, long complex sentences.
Tight timelines
High stake content – involving not just money, but also reputation, relationship, inheritance, rights, even life.
Besides correct translation, presentation of translation is also important.
Often a certificate is asked from the translator about the accuracy of translation.
These characteristics make the translation process very interesting. As some elements are common for translation of any content, let’s focus here on those elements peculiar to this genre.
Understand – Correct comprehension of the subject matter and the content of the given document is utmost important. One should read and understand the document first and then start the actual translation. Chronology of events, parties and their relations, subject of the document, purpose of translation and timelines of delivery have to be very clear before one starts the translation.
Tools of translation – As there are repetitive and common terms and clauses in many legal documents, CAT tools help a lot for speed and consistency in the translation. Creating own glossary of terms and translation memory also helps a lot. Where laws of two different lands are involved, the translator may have to confirm the meaning of some terms or expressions. Checking and confirming it online is advisable in such cases. There are a number of legal terms dictionaries available online and offline for various language pairs. One should remember that for some clauses, there is an equivalent term already available and used in the target language, and translation of those words may not serve the purpose. The existing equivalent term or phrase should be used.
Formatting – The translated document must look like the original document. Apart from the most obvious elements like margins and spacing; header/footer, citations, various stamps on the page, stationary (letterhead, emblem etc.) also form the visual references. These should be present in the translation at the appropriate places. Creating your own formats for various government forms, certificates is a good idea to save time.
Certification – The client relies completely on the translator for translated legal documents. It is often expected from the translator to certify the correctness of the translation and/or own the responsibility of translation by putting a stamp and signature on the translation.
With due care and understanding of legal terms, translation of legal content can be smooth and to the satisfaction of the client.
