Transcreation is a form of translation with its own objectives which come with different rules. While translation usually consists in translating the message of a text, transcreation is rather focused on translating the effect of this text. Let’s take an example. If you want to translate “On ne fait pas d’omelette sans casser des oeufs” by “One doesn’t make omelettes without breaking eggs”, an English-speaking audience might get the idea but it wouldn’t sound very clear either. But if you get to know the proper equivalent, which is: “You must lose a fly to catch a trout », it will definitely ring a bell.
Transcreation is all about that, “ringing a bell” in people’s minds. No matter how you translate the text as long as you manage to trigger the action intended by the original text. As a result, it is not necessary to translate the words exactly.
Now, in this article, I would like to lay emphasis on a specific area inside transcreation, which is localisation. Localisation is the transcreation of commercial texts. The mantra of the profession is: how do I rephrase or recreate a product’s advertisement to make it a bestseller?
It is not an accurate science; let’s just say that it’s a sort of art with no fixed rules, masterpieces and daubs. The purpose of this article is to learn from the mistakes of others and draw three lessons of localisation from unsuccessful attempts. Let’s go ahead and see!
1. To Transcreate or not to Transcreate, that is the Question…
It appears that sometimes, not transcreating at all is an efficient marketing technique. A famous M brand of fast food and a Swedish brand of furniture chose not to translate their products’ names, why is that so?
In a way, in the process of translation, you lose part of the original identity. On the other hand, by keeping the original name and pronunciation, you can arouse curiosity. People could think that they are about to buy something very uncommon, something hype! It might be why this M fast food brand decided not to transcreate its bestsellers. Thus, in Russia, if you know the sounds of the Cyrillic alphabet, you won’t be disoriented whenever you cross the door of this junk food temple: [Биг Тейсти] = [Big Tasty]; [Биг Мак] = [Big Mac]. Here is a last one for you to guess: Чикен Макнаггетс. Do you have it? Right! Chicken Mcnuggets, you see, learning Russian is not so hard in the end…
Likewise, a Swedish furniture-selling brand decided to keep its original denominations even though they ares hard to pronounce, remember or even get the slightest idea of what they could refer to. I mean, what does “Landskrona” evoke to you? To me, nothing, and certainly not a comfortable sofa. But at the same time it gives a special feature to the product, it appears different even if you don’t know how. This might very well be the secret of the brand’s success. With these odd names, they give a new shine to very common products that are not of the greatest quality and still manage to sell them massively.
The bottom line of this first part is that it is not always necessary to localize a product to make it a bestseller. Let’s bear in mind though that this rule tends to apply to very big companies who have been building a strong clientele over the years.
2. Giving a Failed Name to a Product You Shall Not
Indeed, in other cases, it can go wrong. It’s fun to play the sorcerer’s apprentice in the marketing department and be like “Hey mate, hear this one: grönkulla! Sounds terrific, don’t you think? Oh! What about this one: smörboll!” The magic can only go so far. Sooner or later, they run the risk to stumbling upon a word that means something inappropriate in the target language. This occurred with “Fartfull”, a workbench whose name meant “full speed” in Swedish … I guess they did not get Godspeed for this one. This lame denomination did not give much chance of success to this product. That is a risk one ought not to overlook.
It’s funny to notice that car constructors have often suffered from poor translations of one of their car models. It is all the more so a pity as cars usually stand for an extension of people’s pride. What a shame to call a car “Nova” in a Spanish-speaking country. “What is wrong with this car? -Pues no va [doesn’t work]…” Some argue that this car couldn’t sell because of its name.
What about this one, Mazda launching the « Laputa » minivan claiming in the ads that « Laputa is designed to deliver maximum utility in a minimum space while providing a smooth, comfortable ride » and « a lightweight, impact-absorbing body.” Hm-hm, let’s not get carried away here. As people tend to identify themselves in their cars, they want a car that bears a glorious name! This leads us to the second lesson: certain products -cars in this example- cannot afford not to have a proper localisation of their original name.
3. Beware of Slangs not Snakes!
Sometimes, though, it is hard to lay full blame on the marketing team. They can’t always know that a word will translate into something inappropriate. Take this one for example: a car was named “Pajero” which happens to mean “self-pleasure enthusiast” in Spanish. Too bad, but how could they know? This is not an official meaning; it comes from Latin American Spanish slang. That is when the translator comes into place; he can be the only one to spot this potential linguistic breach. Indeed, translators usually know something about slang languages as they often travel to the country whose language they know. Third revelation: when localising, know about slang words to avoid bawdy meanings that could ruin the reputation of the product.
Conclusion
If you ever consider specialising in localisation, I hope that these examples will have raised awareness on a few risks and key considerations. So feel free to elaborate your own successful localisation!
Picq Arnaud
La Traduction de A à Z 