Optimize your translation business with bundle and split strategies

Have you been on a plane recently? Have you experienced the difference between traditional airlines and budget airlines?

Low-cost carriers have successfully reduced their production (indirect costs) costs, which gives them a low price advantage. But sometimes, just low prices are not enough . This short-term cost-cutting strategy may be successful, but in some cases it may be counterproductive.

Traditional airlines, on the other hand, are reliable and transparent, and most of them have a better customer service experience. Yes, if there are special requirements (such as extra legroom or extra baggage), they may charge an extra fee, but with a comfortable service experience, the price is still competitive. They may not include those optional purchases in the base price, but they will not boast zero-cost flights simply because they do not show airport fees and taxes as separate additional fees. This price strategy is twofold, for example: Bundle & Split .

Bundling strategy

Let's start with the bundling strategy. In this example, the bundling strategy corresponds to the package service provided by the airline to the passengers, including not only the ticket, but also the baggage check. However, if the passenger does not need to check in the baggage, then the package may end up costly because it contains services that the passenger does not need.

Split strategy

The split strategy mentioned here basically means that the customer has the right to choose the service . This is good for the company and its customers, who can choose to enjoy any service that is convenient and useful to them. In the former case, the airline may split the baggage consignment service separately.

Bundle and split your translation service

Implementing a bundling and splitting strategy for translation services can help you split a service or set of services into smaller services and create value for your customers without having to create new things. A good example of a bundling and splitting strategy is that you can choose to buy only one article instead of the entire digital newspaper, buying only a single track instead of the entire music album. The cost of the entire newspaper or the entire album may be lower than the sum of several articles or songs, but you will have the things you want.

Your company's bundling and split strategy must be based on customer needs and requirements. You may have to look at the business data first. You may have several questions: Who is your customer base? What services will they buy from you (translation, localization, translation)? If you haven't researched yet, but already know the answers to these questions, it's best to conduct a customer survey to better understand the customer base.

Now let's think about it: How do you break down the translation workflow into multiple services? You can focus on basic business: translation, revision and quality checks. You can also choose a more granular split, such as: source text checking, source content authoring, creating a terminology database, reviewing by industry experts, and even different pricing standards for different content types.

Once you've created a list of all the building blocks in your workflow, customers can use these modules separately and profit from them, and you can start bundled these modules to package sales .

The following are just a few examples of translation combinations , which may provide a good resource for a brainstorming session with your team.

Basic service

QA automated translation is like the use of a low-cost airline tickets at the cheapest price to the destination. Automated QA quality checks can help you quickly eliminate inconsistencies in translation. If your company offers machine translation , it may initially include some simple post-editing and automatic quality checks.

Building module

Revision

A translation with a complete revision and automatic quality check is like a passenger using a cheap air ticket to enjoy a more comfortable service during the flight. The first round of revisions can be completed by reviewers and the second round can be done by industry experts. At the same time, automatic quality checks will help you eliminate all the exploitable vulnerabilities in the translation. If you use machine translation, this level can include a round of post-editing (sampling or all) followed by proofreading steps.