Our Analysts' Insights

When people think of changing their lives, they might put up a map of their country or the world and throw darts at it, trusting that chance – or their favorite deity – will guide them to a better life. Unfortunately, they usually discover that this approach plants their new home firmly in the middle of the ocean or an undeveloped forest rather than a desirable neighborhood or vacation destination. However, when it comes to selecting the next language to add to a website, many enterprises do e...

One of the most common questions that we field at CSA Research is the evergreen topic of how to convince doubtful executives to fund language investment at optimum levels. Whether it’s a new CEO facing multiple urgent initiatives or the yearly race for resources, localization managers and directors must approach their function as just another business process that their companies monitor, measure, and improve. Being an effective manager requires winning the contest with other functions for budg...

Buying a translation management system (TMS) is like finding a new home. Seriously, both are big investments and exceptionally large commitments. You want to get it right.

CEOs in every kind of company often observe that they have the loneliest job. Shared experiences with people who work for them are limited because of internal politics and because they must deal with issues that no one else in their organizations face. CEOs periodically meet with their boards of directors or management, but those sessions often reinforce the singular position that the CEO occupies. In esoteric sectors like language services, CEOs must manage an array of process, technology, and ...

The Holy Grail of the language industry has been to standardize the transfer of jobs between the various tools and content management systems – and thus improve the outcomes. Linport, the latest initiative in this area, was born as the Container Project in 2011 at the final meeting of the Localization Industry Standards Initiative (LISA). Despite early promise, Linport has yet to make major inroads into the language industry. Other prospective standards, such as Translation Web Services from OA...

Artificial intelligence has become the new buzzword in the language services industry, with countless technology vendors and LSPs proclaiming that their AI efforts will revolutionize the field. Providers are scrambling to keep up with the fast pace of development to understand how it will affect their business and how to remain relevant in a world full of automation. Buyers are trying to figure out what it means for both their own processes and when they purchase services from vendors. Humans at...

When you clicked on the link that brought you here, you might have thought that someone spoofed Common Sense Advisory’s newsletter and hijacked you away from our blog. No worries. You are indeed at CSA Research, the company formerly known as Common Sense Advisory. This is part of our total redevelopment of our advanced research platform, brand identity, and corporate website.

Regardless of its size, vertical, or headquarters location, your organization can benefit from implementing a framework for globalizing business processes to guide your global strategy. The clarity it provides will enable teams responsible for mainstream functions and operations to align their work in home markets with the company’s international goals.

Looking for a new job? Here’s today’s bad news. Nobody is employing a localization engineer or an internal CAT specialist, at least not when you apply with those titles on a resume/CV. They might be hiring for globalization – but that’s for someone who understands biostatistics, not languages. In today’s world of automated recruitment technology, job titles common in the localization industry seem meaningless. Why? And how can you succeed despite a lack of a common hiring language? 

Based on an examination of more than 5.5 million individual webpages from major brand websites, CSA Research has identified the languages with the greatest depth of localization. Depth follows economic opportunity, with major European and Asian languages leading the listings, but partial localization is the norm, with most brands localizing only a small portion of their content. The results provide guidance for localization groups in formulating their content strategies.