Translating a brand name into foreign languages is expensive, and risky. However, with Translia Open Translation, the story will be totally different.
Brand name translation by any translation firms or marketing agencies is expensive because it involves more people for communication and coordination than translation itself. It is even more difficult and expensive if the project involves a dozen languages.
Brand name translation is risky because it requires not only linguistic knowledge but also cultural expertise. The languages and cultures are so diversified in the same country that even a group of so called "branding experts" may not do well. See the below story about the translation of "Bing" of Microsoft.
On Translia, a mass of professional translators will participate in your brand translation project. You can price the job from 0 to several hundred dollars for each language. But your highest cost will be much less than a translation or marketing firm may demand.
Saving your money is not the only benefit. More importantly, you will get perfect translation with minimum risk. Why? The final translation is based on the contribution of a lot translators and any possible problems can be identified and eliminated. Any single or small group of branding experts can never make it.
Considering the fact that launching a brand translation project on Translia requires just a tiny budget, and the superior outcome it may bring, why not have a try?!
On June 8, 2009, Yusuf Mehdi, Senior Vice President of Microsoft announced 必应 (Biying) as Chinese brand name for their search engine Bing. The following quotes are from his letter to New York Times editors.
This is why: "...Bing, suggests a negative connotation with the Bing brand in China. ... we were aware of this one possible interpretation that we chose to select a Chinese character to pair up with Bing to form the brand. This approach enables us to ensure appropriate pronunciation for Bing in China."
This is how: "...We underwent a comprehensive process to arrive at a Chinese brand for Bing, including customer research and consultation with Chinese-language specialists. We think we arrived at a good result."
What's wrong: Biying sounds more like "contraception" than anything else, to people who live in South of China.
The possible cause: They hired a group of language specialists but they unfortunately didn't include any people from South of China.