Client Confusion
I was going to blog about some translation consulting I did last week, but two events that happened in quick succession today are going to make my point even clearer.
First I received a phone call from a business owner who is planning to introduce a product to a French company. About 10 minutes into the conversation, he asked for my rate, and when I told him, he said that he had another offer, at a quarter of my rate, and another offer that was even higher than mine. OK, why not? I understand his concern, he wants to pay less. Fine. But my question is: when you are approaching a new client in another country, do you go for the cheapest interpreter? When at the same time he was assessing my English as being of superior quality… Such clients learn by trial and error, and they are very confused as to the proper use of interpreters. However he said I was of a higher caliber… Wow.
Next… I received an e-mail from someone for whom I did some consulting work last week. They had (well-founded) doubts about the quality of some translations they were getting from a translation agency. They have decided to stay with their supplier. That’s their decision, and again, it’s fine by me. However, because I work for other departments of the same organization and am praised for the quality of my work, they are now asking me to produce a glossary in order to ensure the quality of the other supplier’s translations… Another confused client. Each translator/supplier is responsible for compiling their own glossary, but far more importantly, for applying the proper approach to translation. Clients are very fond of glossaries as a kind of metrics. In my opinion, glossaries are one-dimensional tools that account for only one part of the quality of the end-product. To get a good translation, you need a translator who is doing the job well.
So… two confused clients in a matter of minutes. What kind of a day is this?
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March 1st, 2008 at 6:50 pm
“What kind of day?” A normal one for a professional translator perhaps.
Advising clients is part of our job, and sometimes that includes client education. Not all are savvy buyers of translation services, and most are very receptive to useful information.
Having those types of exchanges is a win-win situation, even when one does not land the job on the first go.
Have fun!
Patricia
March 6th, 2008 at 10:08 pm
Patricia, thank you for visiting and leaving a comment!
I find that more and more clients decide to get translation on the spur of the moment, often within a fixed, usually low budget. It’s difficult to educate them on the virtues of professional work, when they have a dollar sign blinking in their minds at the same time.
As you say, education is the key word, here as in many other fields. Those two cases were extremes and happened within 30 minutes of each other, but they are also representative of what happens in our world of fast communications and quick transactions.
That’s why I called it Client Confusion. In a world where translation has become a commodity, who could blame them?