General or Specialized Translation

A company or business is a very intricate piece of machinery, and its wheels are the employees and all service suppliers. When it comes to suppliers, what do you prefer, a generalist or a specialized translation company?

In what language will you translate Happy New Year?

First let us distinguish a generalist translation agency from a specialized translation.

• A generalist translation agency is able to supply it’s customers with almost all linguistic services. This includes all types of translations and proofreading, all types of interpreting, localization and globalization, desk top publishing (DTP), etc.
• A specialized translation company usually takes only one specific part of the LSP world and specializes on it, like translation companies that specialize in legal translations, or website translations, some translation companies specialize in a specific language, like English or Nordic languages. Some LSP providers specialize in Localization or DTP, some provide only telephone interpreting.

General or specialized translators?

As general translators have a wide area to cover, they need to have experience in a lot of those areas to give away the best quality content to the clients. On the contrary, the specialized translation company takes an area and gains expertise in that area to provide the best services confined to that particular field. There are a lot of parts that a translation company has to cater, the specialized company has to a lot to offer but separately, like the general translation companies.

The clients have to choose what is appropriate for them; they must consider their project, the amount of work, the budget, the quality they require and the nature of their documents. Not every company can cater to every kind of document and translate it with ease. As a client, you will have to pick and choose to keep in mind you needs and requirements and the things a respective company can offer.

And what is the best fit for you?

That usually depends on the type of projects your company usually has. It is considered that companies that usually have large projects are more compatible with generalist translation agencies, because all departments can come together and work on the project. And, if the company has very specific projects, from the same field, almost always in the same language combination, than a specialized company would be preferred.

But these considerations may not always be accurate. Many specialized translation agencies are able to complete larger and more complex projects, and even two or more agencies can collaborate. On the other hand, a generalist translation agency does not limit their expertise to large projects, they do accept smaller projects.

The choice is yours and no matter what you choose, we provide both general and specialized translation for any document.