I’m particularly encouraged about the Hispanic internet marketing services we introduced in an announcement dated today. Online marketing is a special interest of mine. It’s a big emphasis in the way we promote the services of Affinity Spanish. As a fact it’s responsible for bringing in thousands of dollars to the company.

There are numerous forms search engine marketing can take. Initial Affinity Spanish services include: 1) keyword research, both Spanish and English, 2) Spanish language PPC advertising management, 3) bilingual keyword-rich news releases, 4) landing page creation, 5) of course Spanish website development, and 6) bilingual blogs. It’s a powerful lineup of content based SEM tools and we’re looking forward to putting these to work for companies interested in targeting the Hispanic market in the US and/or Latin America. We’ll be introducing even more search engine marketing services in the weeks and months to come. More information on this topic is available at Hispanic Internet Marketing.

What is the ‘next big thing’ in the business of translation … in particular Spanish translation (since this blog is dedicated to the topic)? Is it technology? Is it a new process that gives superior results at lower cost? Is it the combination of translation with other service offerings to produce new service categories? What is it that will propel the language services business forward, create opportunity for translators and agencies alike?

The organization or individual that figures this out will be in a position to distinguish themselves in an industry that on the surface looks rather homogenous. It’s ironic because as any language professional will tell you, translation is in reality anything but a commodity (i.e., distinguished only by price). Rather, translating and translations are as unique as the processes that support their creation.

What is the next big thing? Ideas?

How can the language based services industry achieve growth? If you work in the field of language based services, how can you grow your business in particular? Societal trends such as immigration, government policy, and global economics may combine to affect the demand for language services such as translation and interpretation. Yet such things as these are well beyond the ability of individual translators or even large agencies to affect.

The path to growth may be to first put aside traditional (and therefore potentially outdated) ways of  thinking about the business of translation and associated services. Language based service providers might be well advised to seek to combine their skills with those of other disciplines in order to offer more complete ways of solving problems … those problems that people and organizations care about.

Experiment with this concept by asking yourself what additional complementary service or value added component might be added to the language piece to make the combined offering more valuable. If you have specific ideas, please consider sharing them. I’ll do the same.

A recent visitor to this blog commented that the US Spanish translation market is ‘saturated’. Despite the fact that I attended business school and have a sense of what the word means, I found myself wanting a formal definition of the term ‘market saturation’.

A Wikipedia query and two minutes later I’m back to my own understanding of the term. Basically, in my own words now, saturation tends to describe a market that’s highly competitive. At the extreme the description could be said to portray a condition where new entrants (translation companies) can only succeed at the expense of others already in the market.

At our company we receive calls every day about new projects. Why is this? For one reason demographics are on our side. A recent CNN headline proclaimed the US as already ‘an Hispanic nation’. True enough … 1 in 7 people in the country are considered Hispanic. The ratio is expected to increase to 1 in 6 over the new few years. Language is part of the mix associated with this trend. Market saturated?

Another reason customers come to us is because we do more than provide linguistic support. It sounds almost cliche to say, but customers want ‘solutions’ often times, not just services from a standard list of offerings. Companies that probe a bit into customer requests will uncover the unspoken interests and motivations for language support services. Provided the company has the qualifications, opportunities are often larger than straight translation services.

Last but not least, we work really hard on marketing. It’s surprising how many companies don’t take even the most basic steps to promote their business. A website with solid copy, well-designed, and professionalism at each customer touch point … a little bit goes a long way. The best qualified translators will never have an opportunity to apply their skills if customers can’t find them.

Is the market for Spanish translation services saturated? I say no, though whether it is or isn’t, I also say there’s always room at the top.

Yesterday I was reading the blog of a translator whose view of translation agencies was rather unfavorable. Among the general complaints expressed was that agencies under pay, or take a long time to pay, and in essence give little ‘love and respect’ to the language specialists they work with.

While I hope this view is not generally held among translators and other language specialists, I suppose I can only know the true feelings and beliefs of translators by asking. So translators … what have your experiences been? Do you have success stories in working with agencies, horror stories, or some of both?