Realizing the need for a TMS
Jerome Translations specializes in French-to-English business and legal translations. Within these areas, they encounter a wide range of specialized and technical vocabulary. In the beginning, they could rely on Microsoft Office software when assignments were small and clients were few. However, as their business and team grew, they started looking for a translation management system that could speed up their processes via automation and make their work more efficient, profitable and enjoyable.
In 2006, Jerome Translations started testing SDL Trados, but it helped only with half of their projects. They worked with many official documents at that time, such as birth certificates, and they could complete their translations in Microsoft Word faster than in Trados. However, their situation changed a couple of years later. When they had to quote the translation of a 100-page training manual, they knew that it was time to evaluate the available translation management systems.
Evaluation
By the time Jerome Translations started working on larger and more complex projects, they were already in the phase of testing various translation management systems. Their business model was evolving, which required them to work with external subject-matter experts – who would revise their translations. They were considering buying licenses for them, but for this to happen, they needed an affordable solution.
In 2012, they shortlisted four products for evaluation: memoQ, Fluency, OmegaT, and Trados. Their primary criterion was compatibility with Trados so they could continue serving existing clients working with Trados-compatible files.
They eliminated OmegaT early as its interface was too challenging to learn and wasn’t straightforward enough, and later Fluency, as they had to call the technical support line several times to resolve bugs and minor issues while prior translations were not recognized and were not presented in the target pane.
“By contrast, our experience with installing and using memoQ was extremely smooth. It seemed very straightforward compared to the competing products we had tried. While our test documents were short and we didn't have much translation memory to leverage, memoQ consistently performed as expected. Prior translations were recognized and presented in the target pane. Every button and feature functioned as advertised. The new features were easy to learn. The product stood up to our testing and we felt confident that it would support us as our team, our practice, and our client base grew.” shares Jacqueline McClure-Zerbe, owner and Editor-in-Chief of Jerome Translations
Features/modules that help Jerome Translations the most
- Proprietary database (TMs and TBs), safely stored in their private instance of memoQ cloud
- Custom term bases for a range of clients/subject areas
- Statistics, run on each new document to estimate effort and prepare a quote
- Pre-translation and integration with DeepL
- Concordance to maintain consistency within a document and across multiple documents
- LiveDocs to leverage a corpus
- memoQweb to work with revisers
- Quality assurance to catch errors before delivery
- Integration with Antidote to make French revision a cost-effective process
Results thanks to memoQ
The above-mentioned 100-page training manual from 2013 was a great success story for Jerome Translations. Using memoQ, they were able to complete the project on time, eventually gaining a repeat client.
“Thanks to our first large project with memoQ, we were able to refine our project methodology.
We are also proud of our 8-year (and running) relationship with Procurement Assistance Canada’s Indigenous Engagement Centre of Expertise. Based in Vancouver, this center works with federal government departments across Canada to develop policies to support Indigenous business owners and contribute to the economic development of Indigenous communities.
For the past eight years, the IE-COE team has relied on Jerome Translations to deliver French-language information to its stakeholders across Canada. We regularly translate event advertisements, meeting agendas, meeting minutes, project summaries, instruction manuals and annual reports. Thanks to memoQ, the documents we produce for the IE-COE are of consistent quality.”
About Jerome Translations
Jerome Translations is a globally oriented translation service provider catering to the needs of business and institutional clients around the world.
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