Localisation of a Political News Website

The solution

Even with a pool of more than 100 Russian translators, we had to urgently hire more professionals who could manage the project. We chose our best translators with fluent or near-native English (such as Russian-speaking translators currently residing in the US or the UK), hired more translators who could fit the project, and gave them all test translations which were then checked by our native English-speaking editor.

Meanwhile, our managers analysed the content for translation and compiled a style guide and glossary to ensure consistency of translation throughout the website. The style guide included the requirements for the English version of the site, preferred translations of typical phrases and structures, a standard style for the translation of dates, numbers, currencies, titles, company names, geographical names, institutions, political parties, personal names, organisations and so on. The glossary included the most used terms and phrases from the existing content. Given the two-million-word volume, we managed to achieve this using such tools as SDL Multiterm Extract and Apsic Xbench.

Once the team was ready, we started translation. In order to provide high-quality translation despite the very tight budget, we worked almost without profit on the first stage. We involved an English-speaking editor for quality spot-checks of translations and for consulting with translators. Our Russian editor and QA manager with fluent English as well as good knowledge of politics in Ukraine reviewed the translations in detail.

To solve technical challenges, our IT engineer set up filters for the CAT tool SDL Studio to process the tags within the files correctly. Thus we could provide translations with the same tags in the same places, allowing the translations to be published immediately.

Our project management application allowed us to automate the work process and exchange files among the client, suppliers and managers.

We set up an API to synchronise our application with the client’s website in order to receive new tasks quickly and easily. Once a new article was published in Russian on the client’s website, it was automatically sent to our application. Our translators, assigned specifically to this project, received the files for translation in the same instant and could start translation right away. Our project manager monitored whether the translations were accepted by the translators. Once the translation was completed, the translator uploaded the file into our system and it was sent to our editor. The editor did his job before uploading the file to his account. The file was automatically sent to the client’s website and published there without losing precious time and without requiring any human interaction.

Thus we managed to meet both of the customer’s requirements: high quality and very quick turnaround times.