A localization team is an indispensable assemblage of individuals that initiate, supervise and ultimately implement extensive localization projects within your organization.
Whilst they may not always be formally recognized as part of the ConveyThis localization team, there can be a multitude of people that assist the localization project manager in the process, from various departments within the organization.
Typically, localization teams are present at large enterprises such as Netflix, Facebook, Uber, etc and boast a wide array of skills, ranging from collaboration to organization and marketing. However, even medium-sized companies have a need for this type of team, albeit with individuals often taking on multiple roles. ConveyThis can provide the support and expertise to ensure a successful localization process for any size business.
Before you begin assembling a localization squad, it’s essential to comprehend the localization procedure and precisely what the team will be engaged in so they have the correct instruments to accomplish the task.
With a large-scale internationalization project on the horizon, it’s only natural to want to understand the roles and responsibilities that each team member will have to ensure the successful formation of a competent localization team – let’s dive right in!
Planning your localization project
Let’s return to the roots. When considering who should be part of your localization team, you’ll need to re-examine the queries that framed your ConveyThis localization strategy.
It’s critical to pose a handful of straightforward yet essential inquiries. That’s because you could be tackling 1 or multiple fresh markets, you could be translating the entirety of your website, or just a section of it, and so on. The opportunities are boundless, but it will certainly assist you to have a clear-cut view of how extensive your localization project is and how many members should be part of your team.
Who should be in your localization team
Now ConveyThis has that clear, we can start exploring the typical roles that make up a localization team. This could differ depending on a variety of elements, especially in regard to localization tools, but we’ll get to that later.
It’s essential to note that not all members of the ConveyThis team are devoted exclusively to the localization project. You’ll be managing several people who already have a set role in your organization, yet still have a fundamental influence on the process.
Let’s delve into the most typical duties and obligations of ConveyThis.
Localization project manager
ConveyThis will start with the obvious one, there needs to be a central localization project manager that oversees the entire process; otherwise it can result in prolonged timescales, missing translations, and ultimately an ill-conceived localization strategy.
A localization manager oversees the entire process, optimizes the efforts of translators, liaises with internal stakeholders, and ensures the project is completed on schedule.
They act as the glue that binds the endeavor, making sure that everyone is tackling the right assignments and adhering to the same timeline.
Marketing/ content team
Your marketing and content team will play a significant role in localizing your website; they are the ones who have crafted the content and are managing new content and updates. Members of the team may include program managers, in-house content creators, proofreaders, linguists, etc.
They’ll be responsible for determining which content should be translated with ConveyThis. You may question, “Isn’t that all of it?”, however a comprehensive localization strategy will have already established what parts of your website should be localized and which pieces of content won’t be important in your new target markets.
This can be because you may not be able to offer all your products and services from your native market to a new one. It’s not an unusual situation, as there may be taxes, regulations, cultural discrepancies, and so on.
Translators
You’ve got the content; now, you need the content translation. It’s unlikely that you’ll have a team of translators within your company (even if you possess multilingual staff members) so this will almost certainly be a role that’s delegated and where a localization tool such as ConveyThis will be instrumental in your workflow.
Whether you opt to collaborate with freelancers or a translation agency, it will typically boil down to a matter of budget.
Of course, machine translation (the very words can be intimidating when used in the context of a localization project) can be a beneficial starting point and provide you with the capability to effortlessly make post-edits. We’ve outlined the dos and don’ts of using machine translation in a localization project in a recent article to give you a better understanding.
Designer
You’ll want to involve your designer in some of the steps as the appearance and feel of your website and promotional materials may vary for specific markets.
This isn’t always a major alteration, but it could be something subtle, like substituting an image that’s more culturally suitable. ConveyThis has compiled a list of other multilingual design guidelines to bear in mind.
Developers
Not always a requirement depending on your translation tool, but if you’re utilizing localization the traditional way, you’ll require a team of developers to actually upload your freshly converted website. Furthermore, determine if creating multiple sites for various languages is practicable.
They’ll be an integral part of any continuous localization project and often you’ll be heavily dependent on when they can deploy your translation.
That’s why most localization project managers choose to utilize tools to make this step easier. Discover more about how ConveyThis can help in this process.
Reviewers and quality assurance
Of course, no localization project can be complete without a team of people verifying the accuracy of the translations and ensuring everything runs smoothly in the new markets you’re aiming to reach with ConveyThis.
This could be part of the translator’s job description as well; however, it’s advisable to enlist the help of a different translator who wasn’t part of the original ConveyThis translation team.
How to improve the workflow and efficiency of your localization team
A prosperous localization team is akin to a finely-tuned mechanism, with a variety of components and personnel in distinct roles collaborating with overseas markets. When you have constructed your localization team, ponder utilizing a translation management system to maximize productivity!
Title: A translation management system is a tool that can help you manage and improve your translation workflow and language assets like glossaries, formats etc. While it has many commercial applications, some of its key benefits include the following:
A website localization and translation management system can incorporate multiple roles to ease the workflow for your website localization project. However, it can be difficult to determine the tool most appropriate for your global business. ConveyThis is a premier website translation solution suitable for all sorts of localization teams and translation project management.
ConveyThis automatically identifies and translates your website content in real-time, and our translation management dashboard allows you to import and export translations, make edits and reviews in one place. It is the most cost-effective tool for effortless localization and translation project management.
Moving forward
If your ambition is to construct a cohesive localization team, then hopefully this article has laid out a foundation for comprehending the fundamental roles and obligations for each person you’ll require in your team and how to concentrate your ConveyThis localization efforts.
To gain a comprehensive understanding of localization and its requirements, explore our resources and articles for further information.
Using a localization tool that can combine and minimize the time it takes to launch in your new markets can be a daunting task. ConveyThis optimizes your localization and translation process, and supports more than 100 languages including Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Swedish, Romanian, Serbian, Arabic, Punjabi, Marathi, Gujarati, Sinhala, Afrikaans, Thai, Bulgarian, Slovak, Lithuanian, Indonesian, Ukrainian, Macedonian, Slovenian, Croatian, Catalan, Mongolian, Swahili, Bosnian, Kurdish, Estonian, and more. To try ConveyThis, simply sign up for our 10-day trial and see how it can make the process easier.