Marketing materials are usually hard to translate due to its intrinsic high requirements. Marketing materials involve company profile, intranet news, website events, advertisement and campaign brochure etc. When translating such materials, the clients generally require copywriting and copyediting. Word for word translation is never allowed.

Here are some tips for translating the marketing materials:

1. Title is of the most importance and it should be short and attractive.

It is easily understood why the titles are so important. That is because the target readers will firstly read the title when the advertising materials appear in front of their eyes. If the title is too long or bland, they will lose the interest in reading through the materials, and then the advertising effects will not work.

For example:

Source: Your partner for productivity and profitability

Translation: XXXX — 帮助您提高生产效率和获利能力的首选合作伙伴

The translation is not good enough due to its length and flat expression. We need shorten the length and make it more attractive and persuasive. The revised one is

“携手xxxx，相伴高效成长”

2. The tone and expression is different for various genres.

We always bear in mind that the different styles of text have the different requirements for the tone and expression due to different target readers.

For the intranet news, for example, the target readers are in-house staff and the tone and expression should be inspiring, positive and motivating, while for the advertisement, the target readers are the existing and potential customers, so the tone and expression should be informative, attractive and persuasive, especially for the title.

Read Also: Tips for Translating the Marketing Materials (Continued)

For example:

Source: He met more than 200 team members in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and Hong Kong, reviewing the successes of the past year and sharing his vision for 2011.

Translation: 他会见了来自北京、上海、广州、香港等地的 200 多名员工，共同回顾了公司在过去一年的成就，并与大家分享了其对 2011 年的发展愿景。

The translation is correct but the tone is not appropriate. In the commercial presentation, it is improper to use the third person pronoun at the beginning of the sentence, so the revised one is:

“xx先生会见了来自北京、上海、广州、香港等地的 200 多名员工，共同回顾了xxxx在过去一年的成就，并分享了 2011 年的发展愿景。”

-to be continued-