Many people who want to translate their content into different languages require transcreation or transadaptation. In this piece, we will discuss both, the differences between them and other things that make them unique.
Transcreation – What is it?
At its core, transcreation is a procedure that translates messages or content made in one language and conveys it in an entirely different tongue, while maintaining the emotion, intent and the tone. Often known as a creative way to translate, transcreation essentially helps you recreate any content into a foreign language. While commonly used in advertising and marketing, transcreation can come in handy in several other areas.
This language translation process involves adapting and revising material to ensure it preserves the original concept’s message and intentions, which help the target market understand it completely. You have to make sure that the message you are planning to launch in a certain market looks and feels as if it was originally written in their native language. This is incredibly important, especially when you consider that more than eighty percent consumers gauge the authenticity of content to determine if they will stick with a brand.
Companies must choose only the best transcreation services to ensure their message does not loose authenticity and resonates with different target audiences.
Translation and Transcreation
If you break translation down to simple terms, it means to translate phrases, words, articles, poems, sentences, etc. to different languages. The translation process involves a group of bilingual and native translators who help convert the message without compromising the original content’s meaning.
On the other hand, transcreation is a combination of creative writing and translation for capturing a region’s essence while talking to target audiences in their parent language. More often than not, transcreation is done by utilizing Copy Editors (in-country) who excel at adding perspective and the right flavor absent in regular translation processes.
Needless to say, transcreation ensures the converted text retains its meaning while delivering the right message. Often times, this means adding certain words, idioms, making adjustments to figure of speech etc. are coming things used in transcreation processes. It would be fair to say that transcreation is far more in-depth than regular word by word translations as it considers every aspect of the language you are converting your content to.
Transcreation experts offer a lot more than regular linguists. Their job requires high standards, with excellent copywriting and creative writing skills. It is a major reason why many translators and copywriters collaborate in transcreation projects.
Understanding Transadaptation and Why It’s Different from Transcreation
The language industry has loads and loads of technical terms, which includes a variety of translations, along with similar services for converting content in various languages. While you may know about transcreation and localization and the differences between them, let us discuss another type or translation known as transadaptation.
To understand transadaptation properly, let us start by taking a quick look at translation. Translation helps convert content to a different language. The main objective of translation is to ensure the translated content matches its source. As discussed before, many companies utilize this approach, especially for things like studies, safety warnings, instruction manuals, etc.
That said, choosing translation services may not be the best option if you are not worried about delivering the exact meaning of the original content. For instance, if you have a marketing campaign and want to inspire people and get an emotional response from your content, translating content word for word is the last thing you want to do. The same goes for the translation of creative content such as a video game or a novel. Direct translation often fails to capture the essence of creative content, making it look dull and incomprehensible.
In cases like these, using transadaptation for adapting your content would be a wise choice. Doing so will ensure your content is relevant to your target audience’s cultural and linguistic background. With transadaptation, you can capture the gist of the source content, while making it relevant to the target audience’s culture. Once your audience resonates with your content, they are more likely to be loyal towards your brand.
Transadaptation is quite unique because of its ability to elicit the content’s emotion. This form of translation can capture the humor, metaphors and nuances of different cultures.
The Transadaptation Process Takes Time
Compared to a variety of translation procedures out there, transadaptation processes require time because of its attention to details and high accuracy. While this translation type is time consuming and slightly costly compared to others, the investment pays off, especially if you have the right expert by your side. The professional translators overseeing your content’s transadaption can help content creation teams follow the best practices, ensuring they don’t miss anything. This also ensures that companies do not have to worry about paying extra money for lengthy revisions later on.
How Transcreation and Transadaptation and Different
While the main objective of both translation types is the same, which is overcoming cultural and linguistic nuances), the specifics and process are a bit different. The most notable difference between the two is that transadaptation processes find the closest match possible to the original material, similar to translation. It would be fair to say that transadaptation often comes in handy when translating content just does not cut it. On the other hand, transcreation is not too strict when it comes to matching the source content’s meaning. Instead, takes more liberties when translating content and focuses on eliciting a response from the target audience.
The Importance of Transcreation and Transadaptation
Ultimately, the main purpose of transcreation and transadaptation is to deliver the message to target audiences in different countries while ensuring it does not lose its authenticity. Due to this objective, companies avoid choosing regular translation services. More often than not, the content that translators have to convert doesn’t have the same meaning that the source content does, which audiences find hard to understand.
What’s more, merely hiring translators and copywriters often does not work, mainly due to their inability to capture the original message’s authenticity. Since more and more companies are focusing on globalization, transadaptation and transcreation will undoubtedly play a massive role in helping them expand. Regardless of the brand or company you want to take to new heights, connecting with your audience is undoubtedly the best way to move forward.
If you are looking for high quality transcreation and transadaptation services, we at Green Translations can help you. Our experts have the right certifications and experience to translate your content for audiences across the globe, ensuring they understand the message your brand is trying to deliver.