In today’s mass communications world, many companies are resistant to using translation. Why? 

The answers are connected with the complexity of today's corporations, and the different mindsets of two key departments: marketing and IT. These departments often conflict in their priorities, making the distribution of translations for mass communication difficult to implement.  Specific examples include:

1. The marketing manager simply wants the document delivered to multiple language populations. The IT manager, on the other hand, has numerous tasks to implement for all departments, and a marcom request may conflict with IT’s other priorities – financial systems, internal email, production systems, etc.  An IT manager wants marcom’s needs to be planned, quantified and prioritized well in advance.
2. IT's need for advance planning means that marcom managers must predict closely when they plan to communicate, and how they want to implement translation distribution. An unplanned mailing in response to market conditions is contrary to IT’s ways of working.
3. IT may have limited staff for creating and populating new webpages. Marcom, on the other hand, wants space made available as needed.
4. Distribution of translated marcom messages to different language populations typically requires:
   1. A database of marcom targets and the languages they prefer, constantly updated;
   2. Coordination of multiple mailing tasks to achieve simultaneous release of all translations.
5. Coordination of translations, Quality Control for all language versions, translation distribution tasks and meeting maraketing schedules is inconvenient for the IT department.
6. Errors can be made that are embarrassing to the company.
   1. An example of one such error is available on request, when German documents were sent to English readers.

There is a solution:  a simple way to both translate and deliver without need for IT involvement.  Consumer Translations is that solution, giving any department self-sufficiency in implementing a translation strategy.