Understanding Transliteration And How It Works For A Brand

[:en]Transliteration is the process of translating a language from one to the other writing style. The same is true for transcription. It is also the conversion or rewriting of the characters from one style of writing to another style of writing.

Transliteration And Transcription – What Are They?

Transliteration and transcription are a process when a word or phrase is conveyed in a language with a different writing system. It is like writing words in say Japanese using Latin letters. The methods do not render the word into a new language. It just is a new format. The reader will not understand the transliterated language if he does not know the original language. It is only when the word is translated into the language that the reader knows will he be able to understand what the word means.

Basically, when a text in a foreign language is transcripted to a language that you know, you will only be able to read the word in the source language without understanding its meaning. It only lets you pronounce the word correctly in a foreign language.

Transliteration and transcription make the foreign language accessible to those who are not aware of foreign alphabets. They focus on pronunciation and do not convey meaning. This is used when you need to discuss foreign places, people, or cultures.

The Difference Between Transcription And Transliteration

• Transcription – It converts characters of one particular language to another as per the target language’s pronunciation. The use of transcription is that everyone who speaks the target language can read the word converted from the source language correctly.
• Transliteration – Here, every character in the source language gets assigned to a different and unique character used in the target language. So this allows a one to one inversion. If there are more characters in the source language as compared to the target language, then the combination character can be used.

Transliteration and transcription both are processes that convert text from one to the other script. Transliteration, however, represents the graphemes of the source script and transcription focuses on representing the phonemes.

Who Uses Transcription Services?

Transcription is mostly used to convert oral files, video, and audio into text format. Paralegals and law firms, healthcare providers, market researchers, and video production firms make use of the transcription services.

When Is Transliteration Put To Use?

When you read any international news, then it is transliteration that lets you understand the context. This especially can be seen in the reference section. Here the foreign language is transliterated to let you understand the source of the news.

They are also used in restaurant menus and libraries. In libraries, transliteration allows the processing of textual data. When the user searches for index content, it is transliteration that helps him find the information. It is written in a different alphabet, and this gets returned in the script of the user.

Transliteration is also used in keyboards with a particular script to write the text in another script.

Can Transliteration Help A Brand?

Yes, it can. Transliteration plays a major role in helping your brand put the best face forward to the global audience. The way you localize your brand’s name plays a pivotal role when you enter the global market. And to localize it well you need brand transliteration services.

Brand transliteration is crucial. When companies venture and expand into foreign markets, they target customers whose primary language is different from the native language of the brand. Localizing the name of the brand into the local language using the local alphabets will let the customers accept the brand. It shows the brand’s objectives and signals that you are approaching the customers with warmth and seriousness.

Transliteration thus works to create a human perception of your brand. It is also important for SEO in the international market. Some countries make it mandatory for every foreign company to translate its brand name, which is a legal requirement.

Brand Transliteration Is Not As Simple As It Looks

Transliteration covers the words from one to the other script. Transliteration tries to preserve the original sound of the phrase or the word. It also targets to capture the spirit of the brand but not its precise meaning.

Transliteration may sound to be simple, but it is not so. Transliterating the name of a brand could create pitfalls if done wrong. However, if done in the right way, it creates a wealth of opportunities.

So what may go wrong with transliteration? Transliteration could result in a meaningless name, and this makes it confusing to remember. In certain cases, transliteration could also resemble an offensive or negative word in the target language.

The Right Way To Do Transliteration

Transliteration done right is much more than avoiding any mishaps. If the brand name that is transliterated looks meaningless and portrays a name that is just a clutter mix of syllables, this will not harm your company, but it will not do anything good for your brand either. A great way to do transliteration is to combine the similarity to the brand name phonetically with a local connection that is evocative and resonant.

The key focus is:

• On the characters that are written individually and are used in the name that is transliterated
• The quality or the meaning that the transliterated word evokes when it is represented along with the other characters
• Effective transliteration considers the need to create fluency in the brand name even when there is a cultural difference.

Professional Transliteration Service Providers

Here are the steps that a professional transliteration service provider takes. They are educated well in the right way to transliterate the brand name.

• The first step is to investigate how the target market talks and perceives your brand. This is done through the target market local search engine like any local customer to know how your brand ranks in the regional search engine.
• The professionals then visit the forums and blogs where your brand is discussed.
• They then visit the retail websites in the market to understand how the local resellers market your brand.

All the above steps are carried out to get useful insights, and then the professionals carry out the transliteration of your brand name and your website content for the target market.

Conclusion

Your brand’s name is crucial, and this is the first impression that consumers get of your business. Your brand name lets them relate to the services and products you have to offer. The brand name is what is going to be a mark of the relationship between you and your customers.

Getting your brand name transliteration done by an expert is important. They do not just understand the right way to translate your brand name so that it immediately connects with the global audience but also knows how to make it optimized for SEO. They understand the nuances of how to translate your brand name to become immediately relatable to a foreign audience.

Hire experts to offer globalized solutions and to evaluate the vast options for your brand.[:]