How to Capture Your External Translation Spend

One of the most common questions asked by localization vendors when assisting clients with their translation needs is “how much do you spend on translation?” and the most common answer is “I have no idea”.

If you are one of these organizations, please know that you are not alone. However, finding out how much your company spends can be extremely difficult, depending largely on how localization is currently managed. Most organizations who struggle with this question run localization in a highly de-centralized manner. Each region or business unit is responsible for managing the cost of their translation needs, and there is little documented process or symmetry in how each performs the task. This blog will focus on these types of organizations, since a majority of them are the ones struggling to find out their annual spend. For example, one region may send work out to a localization vendor that is contracted, while another may request translation ad-hoc when the need arises. Still further, some regions may have in-house staff perform translation as part of their normal duties, so not to incur any cost for their translation needs. If this sounds like your company, then here are three things you can do to go about collecting an idea of the “spend” your organization does as a whole.

First, ask the regions/divisions/business units how they are currently handling translation. Find the main translation stakeholder in each and ask them for their process. Specifically, ask them:

• How do they bill for localization?
• Do they have written processes?
• Do they maintain existing contracts with translation vendors?
• Do they use a specific code on POs for translation?
• Do they use existing staff for translation, or are their specific FTEs designated?
• Do they maintain any assets?

What these questions will help you discover is how each group operates, and where to start looking for the money they spend on translation. In some cases, you might find a relatively well-managed process and determining the specific spend will be much easier. In others, especially where there are no processes, or dedicated FTE count the “spend” will be much more difficult to determine.

Second, look at the products that are from each group, and in what markets they are currently engaged with. Ask these questions:
• Do you translate written material for each market your products are in?
• What written material do you put in to each market? Do you have a document/page count of what each group in your division creates and sends to the markets you currently engage?
• If you are not translating content currently, do you have plans to start in the next FY, and if so, for what markets and which content.

What these questions will help you determine is where the translation is coming from for each group. This is helpful when a group has no documented process and/or uses existing FTEs for their translation services. Additionally, it gives you an idea of what content is going out the door to end-users in a localized format.

Finally, you can just do the math. While each company’s localization “spend” will vary significantly there are constants in localization that can be used to determine a rough idea of localization “spend,” such as:
• Typical translators can translate 1500-2000 words per day, not including leverage
• Quality Review is normal accomplished at a rate of 10,000 words per day
• Desktop Publishing is normal performed at 5-6 pages per hour
• Web content normally has 200-250 words per page
• User documents average 250 words per page

If you have done your due diligence in the first two steps, you have an idea of what documents were translated in which groups. Knowing this will let you find the amount of pages and the number of languages for each. For groups that use existing FTE count to translate content on the side, the first two metrics will give you and idea of how much time is truly spent translating content. Now you have a better idea of what your company translates, ask the localization vendors for the average cost to localize each language on a per word basis. Put the numbers together and you have a rough estimate to deliver to the executives. While this process is not the most efficient, it is effective in providing numbers and equally effective in showing the executive team members exactly how inefficient the localization process really is at your company.