a data driven approach to translation outcomes
TRANSCRIPT
Using Technology & Data to Improve Translation Outcomes
Translation Outcomes
Smartling Supports Leading Brands Across All Industries Smartling By The Numbers
Billions of Words Processed Smartling By The Numbers
Translation Outcomes Traditional Translation Focus Is On Speed, Quality, & Cost
Speed Quality Cost
+ +
Quality Drives Translation Option Choices
High Cost
High Speed
Transcreation Professional
TEP
One-Pass Translation
MT Post-Edit
Machine Translation
Adaptive MT
Quality Drives Translation Partner Choices
OR
OR
OR
Agency A Agency B
In-House
Agencies
Outsourced
Freelancers
Quality Drives Translation Process Choices
Should I have internal reviewers?
How should I provide context to translators?
How often should I build and update glossaries?
Translation Quality is Top of Mind for Buyers…
of customers say translation quality is the most important factor in their decision
making
...Yet the Least Understood Outcome
of customers say
translation quality is
the most important
factor in their
decision making
of customers
understand how to
measure, track, and
improve translation
quality
Translation Quality Management: Current State
Quality Management Greatly Dictated by Translation Maturity
Ask for certified translators
Quality Management Greatly Dictated by Translation Maturity
Ask about vendor quality assurance
process
Quality Management Greatly Dictated by Translation Maturity
ISO Certifications
Sample TranslationsError reporting
Quality Management Greatly Dictated by Translation Maturity
Data-driven quality measurement
Quality Management Greatly Dictated by Translation Maturity
ü Variety of frameworks based on content types,
industries and use cases
ü Error Typology Framework: most widely used
ü Standardization of error categorization, weighting,
reporting, and benchmarking
TAUS DQF Gold Standard for Quality Measurement
The Challenge with Today’s Gold Standard
Reactive Resource Intensive
Sampling Driven
Delayed
A Reactive and Manual Approach to Quality is Growing Increasingly Impractical
More content
More languages
Less time
Less budget
Status Quo
Manage translation quality in a black box
OR
Compromise speed and cost to partially measure quality
Traditional Approaches Have Forced Stakeholders to…
Translation Quality Management: A New Approach
Defining the Ideal State
Predictive Automated Real-time Census
Reactive Resource Intensive
Sampling Driven
Delayed
What Factors Predict Translation Quality?
People
Content
Process
People
Content
Process
• Number of (and time spent in) workflow steps
• Engagement (issues raised and answered)
• Mechanical errors corrected
What Factors Predict Translation Quality?
Content
Process
People
• Past performance of translator/editor
• Industry expertise
• In-country presence
What Factors Predict Translation Quality?
People
Content
Process
• Length/complexity of string(s)
• Presence of visual context
• Extent of TM leverage
What Factors Predict Translation Quality?
Translation Quality Factors
75+ DATA POINTS
Glossary
adherence
Placeholder
use Visual
context
available
Edit
distance
Linguist
rating
String
length
Target
locale
Spell
check
Grammar
check
Translation
re-use
Time
spent
Content
type
Smartling’s platform automatically compiles
and analyzes hundreds of metrics, in real-time…
Smartling’s Solution Quality Confidence Score
QCS: A multinomial logistic regression model that uses 75+ variables collected during the translation process to predict the probability of a translation achieving a professional quality
threshold
QCS
Glossary
adherence
Placeholder
use Visual
context
available
Edit
distance
Linguist
rating
String
length
Target
locale
Spell
check
Grammar
check
Translation
re-use
Time
spent
Content
type
… to provide a single, unified metric of translation quality
Quality Confidence Score in Action Sample QCS Calculation
The Quality Confidence Score…
Is predictive, automated and real-time
Focuses on the causes of good/ poor translation quality, not the effect
Distributes the burden of translation quality between buyer and supplier
Compliments existing quality evaluation frameworks
Tying Quality Confidence Score to Translation Outcomes
Leveraging the Quality Confidence Score An Objective Measure of Translation Quality Across Locales & Projects Over Time
Improve Quality Outcomes
Understand root causes of low
quality resulting from content,
people or process 96% Percentage of translations published without requiring correction
Leveraging the Quality Confidence Score
Leveraging the Quality Confidence Score Accelerate Time To Market
6x Improvement in time to market since implementing Smartling
Workflow changes and velocity
reports allow you to bypass
unnecessary internal review
steps that are not improving
overall content quality
Leveraging the Quality Confidence Score Reduce Costs
Remove agency steps that are
incurring additional expense and
delaying content delivery but not
improving quality 33% Reduction in annual expense within one year of implementing Smartling
Leveraging the Quality Confidence Score Establishing measurable SLA around quality
A Quality Confidence Score is calculated for every translation job
Smartling offers Quality Confidence Score SLAs with money-back guarantees
Key Takeaways
What data does our process and software offer as leading predictors of translation quality?
Are we appropriately sharing the responsibility of translation quality with our vendors?
Is our translation process dynamic enough to respond to and benefit from real-time indicators of translation quality?
Key Takeaways Translation Buyers
What information are we providing customers to objectively understand translation quality over time?
Do we have visibility into our own supply chain to identify drivers of translation quality?
How do we move from reactive error correction to proactive quality measurement?
Key Takeaways Language Services Providers
