Not sure if this is interesting to others here, but I've been studying Japanese as a hobby for years and have visited a couple of times. Having the chance to launch a product there is really a bit of a dream come true. :)
This was possible with the help of a friend who agreed to translate the site and help market it there in exchange for a commission on the sales there.
Unfortunately, this translation is too direct. There is no culture in the text and it feels weird.
Do you have a Japanese person manning your telephones? You list a 1-866 number on the site, but be prepared to answer the phones in Japanese.
Japanese people are very tolerant of the outside world and English -- you would be better off working on PR in Japan and keeping your site in English than translating into mediocre Japanese.
If you make the jump to support the Japanese, they expect that you support them in every means possible or else they will not even attempt to contact you. If you show yourselves in English, they will be more kind and understanding.
If I were you I would immediately take this site down and work on PR in Japan. Come over here and meet with folks.
Japanese people love foreign technology and would be happy to accommodate you. Be careful to not offend Japanese people by using their language and culture incorrectly.
The translation was written by a native-Japanese friend who was born, raised, and currently lives in Japan. (I'm sure he'll see the feedback here.) If you've got more specific feedback on the translation or copywriting, I'm sure he would appreciate it and it would help our efforts.
We'll have a direct support line in Japan soon. In the meantime if a Japanese-speaker did call the number we've got listed, we should be able to solve any problem or answer any question they have the same way we would for our English-speaking customers.
I'll take your advice about coming over there. :) I'd love a chance to meet more developers over there. I actually just missed a chance to come back over recently to visit one of our consulting clients in Yokohama because the meeting was too soon after my daughter's birth. Let me know if you can think of any events in particular that would be good to attend.
To your point about PR, though: Publishing the site in Japanese (even as a work in progress) is a part of our efforts to do PR in Japan. Launching the site enabled us to get coverage on Penn-Olson (http://www.penn-olson.com/2011/10/20/limelight/) which I'm hoping will help lead to some Japanese-language coverage as well.
Again, thanks so much for the time you took to provide the feedback!
Trust me when I say that you should take down the JP site immediately. Your friend might be "native-Japanese," but he or she is only directly translating your text from English.
The biggest part might be simply that you are not incorporated inside of Japan. It's fine to state your fondness of Japanese culture to the JP press, but if you want to get serious about Japan, get incorporated and let your Japanese 代表 ("daihyou") take care of things for you.
The worst thing you could do in Japan is release a (in your words) "Work in Progress." Keep things that are incomplete in the labs and refine them until they are ready for society to enjoy. Japanese society is all about keeping risk low for oneself, one's partners and especially the general public.
If you are really serious about Japan, feel free to drop me a line. If you really think that directly translating English to Japanese will add value to your company, you are gravely mistaken.
Remember to manage your customer's expectations. If they expect you to be a Japanese company and you are not one, you are in for a world of hurt.
I have to agree that, there is no mistake when translation became a degree in many universities all over the world. It's not something that could be mastered simply by knowing two languages (even native speaker of both)
I think for the 代表 part of things, it applies to any places in Asia, almost. You can't pretty much get around anything if you don't have a local to sort things out for you. Either partner with one or hire some for this matter.
- I don't know if "ショーケースサイト" will be understood. Actually the most I learned what Limelight is was by mousing over the tab and reading the title in the tooltip.
- If you click "blog" you get English.
- If you click "mailing list" you get English.
- The pricing plan is in US dollars.
- I wanted to follow your Japanese twitter account, but there were no tweets.
Thanks so much. I had the same thought on ショーケースサイト but ultimately left it up to the translator. (He'll see the feedback here.) I'll update the pricing to be the rough equivalent and address the other concerns, too. Please do follow us on Twitter, we'll be posting there in the future. (I've just added a Tweet now.)
9 comments
[ 3.6 ms ] story [ 36.2 ms ] threadThis was possible with the help of a friend who agreed to translate the site and help market it there in exchange for a commission on the sales there.
Unfortunately, this translation is too direct. There is no culture in the text and it feels weird.
Do you have a Japanese person manning your telephones? You list a 1-866 number on the site, but be prepared to answer the phones in Japanese.
Japanese people are very tolerant of the outside world and English -- you would be better off working on PR in Japan and keeping your site in English than translating into mediocre Japanese.
If you make the jump to support the Japanese, they expect that you support them in every means possible or else they will not even attempt to contact you. If you show yourselves in English, they will be more kind and understanding.
If I were you I would immediately take this site down and work on PR in Japan. Come over here and meet with folks.
Japanese people love foreign technology and would be happy to accommodate you. Be careful to not offend Japanese people by using their language and culture incorrectly.
The translation was written by a native-Japanese friend who was born, raised, and currently lives in Japan. (I'm sure he'll see the feedback here.) If you've got more specific feedback on the translation or copywriting, I'm sure he would appreciate it and it would help our efforts.
We'll have a direct support line in Japan soon. In the meantime if a Japanese-speaker did call the number we've got listed, we should be able to solve any problem or answer any question they have the same way we would for our English-speaking customers.
I'll take your advice about coming over there. :) I'd love a chance to meet more developers over there. I actually just missed a chance to come back over recently to visit one of our consulting clients in Yokohama because the meeting was too soon after my daughter's birth. Let me know if you can think of any events in particular that would be good to attend.
To your point about PR, though: Publishing the site in Japanese (even as a work in progress) is a part of our efforts to do PR in Japan. Launching the site enabled us to get coverage on Penn-Olson (http://www.penn-olson.com/2011/10/20/limelight/) which I'm hoping will help lead to some Japanese-language coverage as well.
Again, thanks so much for the time you took to provide the feedback!
The biggest part might be simply that you are not incorporated inside of Japan. It's fine to state your fondness of Japanese culture to the JP press, but if you want to get serious about Japan, get incorporated and let your Japanese 代表 ("daihyou") take care of things for you.
The worst thing you could do in Japan is release a (in your words) "Work in Progress." Keep things that are incomplete in the labs and refine them until they are ready for society to enjoy. Japanese society is all about keeping risk low for oneself, one's partners and especially the general public.
If you are really serious about Japan, feel free to drop me a line. If you really think that directly translating English to Japanese will add value to your company, you are gravely mistaken.
Remember to manage your customer's expectations. If they expect you to be a Japanese company and you are not one, you are in for a world of hurt.
I think for the 代表 part of things, it applies to any places in Asia, almost. You can't pretty much get around anything if you don't have a local to sort things out for you. Either partner with one or hire some for this matter.
Localization is much more than a simple translation. The title of this post should really read: "Launching my product in Japanese"
Good luck to the OP!
- I don't know if "ショーケースサイト" will be understood. Actually the most I learned what Limelight is was by mousing over the tab and reading the title in the tooltip.
- If you click "blog" you get English.
- If you click "mailing list" you get English.
- The pricing plan is in US dollars.
- I wanted to follow your Japanese twitter account, but there were no tweets.