3 Things for English speakers to take into account when learning a new language

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So you have decided that you want to learn a new language, first of all well done to you. As someone who speaks English and just like many other English speakers, the truth is we expect everyone around the world to know our language with a fluency of the Royal Family! Although English is generally accepted as the ‘universal’ language of the world, the majority of the world doesn’t actually use it instead communicate in their own various different languages and dialects and it would be arrogant to go traveling around the world without some sort of translation service to help.

So do give yourself a pat on the back for considering putting effort into learning another language, whether it is for a need, hobby or just something for you to tick off the bucket list but there are a few things to take into account before you embark on this journey

It takes time/patience

Learning a new language, especially a language that is on a separate branch of the language tree is going to require full attention and a lot of time and patience. It is estimated that for an English speaker to achieve a basic fluency in a new language could take between 480-720 hours of learning depending on the difficulty and intensity of learning. So if you are heading on your travels in a weeks’ time and you think a couple minutes of your English to Mandarin translation book will help you, think again!

Forget your language rules

Forget every grammar rule you know, well at least just for when you are trying to comprehend your new chosen lingo. The mistake that many people make when they are learning a new language from English is that they apply the same rules that the English language consists of for the language which they are learning. Save yourself a lot of time and frustration and remember, most languages just have different rules and you have to adapt yourself to them accordingly. You will find that some languages are affected by male/female words, some languages where a different tone of voice will change the meaning and so on. You will also discover that some words and phrases might not have a direct nor fast translation into English.

Immersing yourself is key

This last point really is an important one because like any growth skill actively engaging in your subject will lead to quicker results and this applies to learning a new language. If you were to constantly speak to a native, read literature, watch films or even live in the country of the language you are learning you will find yourself becoming more fluent at a quicker rate. For example if you were learning Romanian, a good idea would be to live out in Romania for a while and with the help of Romanian translation services of some type or English speaking locals you would then be able to encounter the Romanian language on a day to day basis, thus picking up the language even quicker as well as learning some informal expressions used by native speakers.

Are you an English speaker that has learnt a new language? Share your experiences below or if you have learnt English as a second language let us know your thoughts!

Image: © Thomas Williams/Crossroads Foundation

How interpreting and translation services influenced Brexit

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One of the most if not the most talked about event in the UK this past year has been that of the Brexit vote. The drama of the vote has seen the British public show their translation of their lack of faith in the European Union which they then decided on a vote to end ties with the EU and the agreements.

By voting to opt out of the EU with a view of an independent UK in control of their own borders and able to set up new trade agreements has led to a major split within the countries that make up the UK as the vote was a close one. Brexit had even seen former Prime Minister David Cameron, who previously campaign against the EU step down from his position which has since seen Theresa May take over as PM. Not to mention the financial translation the Brexit vote has had so far for the pound (GBP).

This major split has been highlighted in the way the media have gone about reporting the story and can be clearly seen in how the major newspaper services interpretation of the stories surrounding Brexit.  Of the major newspapers in the UK the Daily Mail and The Telegraph are pro Brexit whilst The Guardian is pro remain and this is clearly seen in their articles which has been underlined by Francesco Guerrera for Politico.eu, he compared both the Daily Mail’s and The Telegraph’s headlines in a recent speech by German chancellor Angela Merkel implying that Merkel had given in or softened her stance to adhere to the British government’s requests regarding immigration, with the main focus on the story being that she stated the EU will need to further discuss the laws on freedom of movement.

Angela Merkel did indeed say that but with headlines of “Merkel Hints at New Migration Limit” you would think its 1-0 to the UK. When in fact she went on to explain that freedom of movement within the EU is not negotiable as it is one of the four fundamental freedoms and rather than stop that Merkel was indicating a discussion on clamping down on “benefit tourism” which is where migrants abuse a countries welfare system. So you can clearly see the way these outlets influence their readers, perhaps it’s just isn’t professional German translation services they are using who knows.

But translation agencies beside, The Guardian themselves have admitted that 56% of their articles about Brexit have been led with headlines such as “the pound will weaken”, “unemployment will rise”, and “racism will increase”, to name a few but as you can see these extreme headlines are obviously put in place to have an influence of readers opinions.

It’s well known that media outlets are used in manipulating views and opinions; do you think you have been swayed by this? What do you make of these interpretations?

Three online marketing strategies new websites must follow

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Setting up a website and maintaining it is no walk in the park. There’s initial brainstorming, choosing which colour scheme you want to use, choosing which widgets go with your product/service or which images to use for your home page etc. Once you have gone past these stages and are ready to launch your website it is imperative to understand that just having a website live is nowhere near enough to get you found online by your intended audience. You have to remember that you are competing with millions of other websites for search engine rankings after all the majority of website traffic for the majority of businesses comes via search engines with Google being the largest. For example you are looking for professional translation services, you most likely will go to a search engine and type your key word and choose which translation agency to go with based on the results you find. Even via word of mouth often times people will browse your website before actually contacting you making your website a powerful first impression for your potential clients.

Below are three must follow online marketing activities you will need in order to rank well online and maximise your website success potential.

Blogging

When it comes to blogging many people have this misconception that blogging is just for individuals who write about their life experiences and occasionally review products they have somehow either received for free or they have been paid to advertise.  Well that’s not the case; if you look at most websites they will have a section that states blog or news. This section can allow you to elaborate on your business activities and keep your customers informed on industry news highlighting your know-how of market trends. Blogging allows you to produce high quality content which is a key player for search engine rankings today.

Social media

Well social media is not just for the Kardashian brand although they are one of the most if not the most popular figures on social media amassing more than 250 million followers between their social media accounts. Social media is a high ranking factor for search engines and is a must to get your business active on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube and more. These platforms are a great tool to share your website content to reach a wider audience.

Email marketing

When it comes to email marketing many people frown upon this type of strategy because of the bad rep this activity has achieved over the years. Let this not put you off as doing this right can increase your business returns. When you decide to perform email marketing you need to be clever about your approach. One way to do this is to link your other online activities to your email marketing so as to emailing people who have actually shown an interest in your product/service. We all receive junk mail at least several times a day however some so called junk mail is actually relevant to us and we end up reading on and sometimes even doing further research and purchasing a product or making use of the advertised service.

Image by: Sean MacEntee

How this confusing translation led to a ‘heated’ argument

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In the world of languages, translation services and professional translation agencies there is always going to be some difficulties as are the complexities of languages. For every one flawless translation example there is most likely going to be a few erroneous, problematic and mistake riddled translations. These you would usually find are DIY, google translated types of translations which are completely fine when it’s not for professional use for say any business or organisation of any reputation because these mistakes will have an inevitable effect on how clients or potential clients will view your professional image and operations.

We have already shown you how a bad translations has negatively affected a company such as Tesla here, however on the other hand we have also shown you some terrible examples of Mandarin translation services to hilarious effect here. But very rarely these translation fails could have such a comedic effect that it becomes viral and is reported around the world, which in turn could actually help boost a business/organisations audience to reach more people more than anything else.

This is exactly what happened in Japan recently in an episode of localisation services gone wrong as reported by twitter user Domoboku whose real name is Akiyama Kojiro from Tokyo. It all started in a Japanese convenience store when a non-native man took a bottle of lemon iced tea off the shelf and started to drink it without paying; as you can imagine this resulted in a heated argument between the man and the shop’s cashier, with neither speaking the same language before Kojiro intervened.

You will probably be thinking the shopper was in the wrong but in his defence he was not to blame but rather the miscalculated Japanese to English translated brand name on the bottle. The reason why the man was not to blame was because the drink which is produced by Pokka Sapporo had in clear English words ‘FREE Tea’ on the bottle, (See image below) other than that everything else was Japanese. It turns out that this is just the brand name and not an offer, which according to Kojiro anyone could easily confuse as given the amount of freebies you receive in Japan. A quick look on the website explains that the drink “encourages people to be free from a stress-filled society,” hence the name.

localisation services

Image credit: @domobuku

Kojiro’s account on this ironic incident has seen his post attract over 34k retweets and more than 19k likes, leading to a discussion of people sharing their own translation fail stories. A lesson for everyone to take from this is whether you need English, French, Spanish or Hebrew translation services make sure it’s done professionally and localised too or if you are going to make a mistake, make it so funny and bizarre that it leads to a viral sensation to reach a massive population.

Why being a hard worker isn’t enough

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Which other skills do you need to be successful?

Whether you run a business or are an employee of an organisation there is no doubt that each respective role involves a high level of competition, graft and perseverance which translates to success. In spite of this there is something that seems to stand out when people think of success which is attributed to being a ‘hard worker’! When you ask most people what the key to success is, the first thing that comes to thought is hard work. This is also something that is instilled in us from a young age by our parents and teachers, as children we are taught that if we work hard we will be successful and be able to afford all the things we want in life. Although that is very much a big part of becoming successful it is without saying that hard work only gets you so far.

As we get older it becomes clearer that hard work simply isn’t enough to get you to the top of the chain when it comes to career or business. Whether you are in the translation services business or are a medical doctor you have to be able to communicate with different levels of stakeholders, be able to plan and meet deadlines for projects, be willing to sacrifice sleep to get stuff done, be able to network with different people, be a good leader and the list goes on…

Leadership

Having good leadership skills will surely help propel you to get further in your career after all if you look at any organisation often times the leader delegates and the workers perform tasks assigned to them by the leader/supervisor and in most cases the leader earns a substantial amount more than their juniors so if you want to become successful in whatever you do it is important to develop your leadership skills. Although some may argue that some people are natural born leaders there is nothing stopping you from becoming a good leader. So next time your boss asks you to participate in a leadership training programme at work take that with two hands and learn as much as you can.

Networking

Being able to network is very important not only in business and career wise but life in general. Now we have all heard the saying it’s not what you know but who you know. Sadly in most cases it is! Statistics show that hiring managers are more likely to hire someone who is referred to by a family or friend before they select others. If you are looking for new business opportunities or a new career network the life out of yourself until you meet the right people that can help you achieve your goals. Here’s a great piece of advice from Forbes about networking.  

Having been taught that hard work is the key to success many find later in life that all these other skills are vital, take for example you have a manager who works hard but does not know how to lead or communicate with their team, chances are they will probably not last long in that role. Another example could be a hard worker who settles to work in a supermarket warehouse but has talents that can enable them to be successful in the business world. In that case they are not harnessing their full potential and although they might be happy and feel successful and some may argue that success differs from one person to another which is true, they are not living up to their full potential.

Taking from this remember hard work will get you far in life but life skills and your network will take you even further.

Image by: Go Fish Digital