‘Resilient’ small businesses reveal how they’re evolving to survive a recession

Bank of England raises interest rates to 3.5% | 5 News

What the Autumn Statement means for you, one week after it was delivered

Cost of living crisis: How can small businesses budget? - Startups.co.uk

Families, business owners and self-employed react to spring statement

Residential property transactions up 15% month-on-month

Inflation hits 6.2% ahead of Rishi’s mini-Budget TODAY

10 of the biggest corporate translation fails

Human Translation & Localisation for E-commerce, E-learning, Software & Marketing in +90 languages | Co-Founder of Award-Winning Lotuly.com | Sustainable Web Design & Branding for #B2B | Co-Founder of BrandPercent.com

entrepreneurship

business

technology

marketing & media

women

hospitality

financial services

retail

politics

lotuly-tm.jpg

lotuly-whole-tm.jpg

Headshot Robert and Mariona Lotuly Co-Founders.jpeg

Headshot Mariona Co-Founder Lotuly Translation Agency.jpeg

Robert Bolohan - Co-Founder & Director.jpeg

lotuly-winner-badge-SBS.png

IMG-20230105-WA0017.jpg

Robert Bolohan

instagram

linkedin

<p>Lotuly recognised the benefits of remote working long before Covid-19 came along. Since we started in 2015, it’s been central to our ethos and way of working.&nbsp;<br><br>We work with language and translation specialists all over the world. Some, in their home countries. Others, in places they’ve chosen to call home. It’s the way they like it — and it works for us, too.<br><br>When the pandemic hit, our operation wasn’t affected and we were still able to deliver our clients’ translations as normal. It’s also been beneficial for our remote translators, who have the autonomy to take charge of their own safety and wellbeing.<br><br>If your business has been remote working since Covid-19 and you’re wondering about making it a more permanent arrangement, this article will show you how Lotuly does it and some of the benefits you and your employees can expect.</p><h2>Remote working benefits for employees</h2><h3>Freedom and flexibility</h3><p>Chronic stress and burnout can cause both psychological and physical symptoms for your employees. In the US, healthcare spending on burned out employees is estimated to be up to <a href="https://hbr.org/2017/04/employee-burnout-is-a-problem-with-the-company-not-the-person">$190 billion</a>.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p><p>Remote working provides a better opportunity for employees to balance their work and personal lives. It’s well documented that employees who achieve a healthy work-life balance are generally happier, and more productive during their working hours.</p><p>It’s also true that not everyone is at their most productive or creative during the traditional 9 to 5 work window. Our translators have the flexibility to work at times that suit their natural pattern and take fresh air breaks whenever they need to.</p><h3>No commute</h3><p>Commuting to and from a place of work every day can be expensive, stressful and draining.&nbsp;</p><p>Dalia conducted a <a href="https://daliaresearch.com/blog/the-countries-with-the-longest-and-shortest-commutes/">study of global daily commuting times</a>. The country with the longest average commute is Israel, at 1 hour and 37 minutes per day. Japan has the shortest, at 39 minutes, but even that works out to around 16 days spent commuting every year.</p><p>Over a year, the costs of running a vehicle and parking it, or using public transport, can really mount up.</p><p>Without paying to commute, our translators can enjoy more of the money they earn. And they can start work feeling fresh and relaxed, rather than tense and tired after sitting in rush hour traffic.</p><h3>No office distractions</h3><p>The office environment can buzz with chatty colleagues, constant activity and frequent interruptions, which makes it hard for some employees to focus during the day.&nbsp;</p><p>They may end up working late or taking work home with them to compensate, which can adversely affect their work-life balance.&nbsp;</p><p>A study by <a href="https://www.airtasker.com/uk/">Airtasker</a> suggests that remote workers experience fewer distractions than those office-based employees and are inactive for less time.</p><p>Working away from an office allows our translators to find somewhere they can work in peace and concentrate on what they need to do. It means they’re more productive and can deliver our translations faster.&nbsp;</p><h3>Healthier environment</h3><p>Remote workers can tailor their home working environments to suit their needs.&nbsp;</p><p>They can create stimulating, inspiring surroundings, and sit near windows, where they can enjoy fresh air and daylight. They can create a comfortable, ergonomically designed workstation. And they can prepare their own fresh food and drinks in their own kitchen.</p><p>Where contagious colds and bugs can breed in an office, remote workers can work from the comfort of home, without fear of becoming infected or infecting others.</p><h2>Remote working benefits for employers</h2><h3>Wider talent pool</h3><p>Lotuly wants the best translators for the job, but we would never find them if we could only hire from our own locality.</p><p>Using remote workers means we can source the best translators from all over the world.</p><p>While you may not need employees on the other side of the world, or even in other countries, considering remote workers allows you to cast your recruitment net wider.</p><h3>Reduced costs</h3><p>Office space is one of the main expenses for any business. But if a proportion of your employees can work remotely, you can manage with a much smaller space, for a fraction of the cost.</p><p>Your savings will include heating, lighting, business rates, telecoms, cleaning, utilities and insurance.&nbsp;</p><h3>Increased productivity</h3><p>If you’re concerned about trusting remote employees to work unsupervised, you may not need to worry.</p><p>A recent study by <a href="https://www.airtasker.com/blog/the-benefits-of-working-from-home/">Airtasker</a> shows that, on average, remote workers work 1.4 days more than office workers every month and spend more time getting things done.</p><p>Our translators are free to choose their own hours so they can work as much or as little as they want to, and at times when they’re naturally most productive. This is better for them, us and our customers.</p><h3>Employee retention</h3><p>Various studies show links between remote working and employee loyalty, with employees preferring flexibility over other benefits.</p><p>This flexibility also allows you to retain valued employees following a change in their circumstances, such as moving to a new area or starting a family.&nbsp;</p><h2>Remote working benefits for the environment</h2><h3>Reduced consumables</h3><p>The majority of remote workers can submit their work via email or digital download, which reduces the need for consumables like paper, printers and printer ink.</p><p>Lotuly has completely eliminated its use of consumables. Our operation is 100% digital, which means it’s paperless and creates zero-waste.</p><h3>Reduced pollution</h3><p>More people working from home means there are fewer cars on the road. This means a reduction in oil consumption and vehicle emissions, helping us protect our finite resources and breathe cleaner, safer air.</p><h3>Reduced congestion</h3><p>Fewer cars on the road also reduces traffic congestion, especially in our cities where it can be a particular problem.</p><h2>Do you need language translations?</h2><p>Lotuly works with experienced, native speaking translators all over the world.</p><p>If this is something you need, please visit our home page to get an <a href="https://app.lotuly.com/instant-quote">instant translation quote</a>, or <a href="https://lotuly.com/contact/">contact us</a> to discuss your needs with a real person.</p><h2>Are you a translator?</h2><p>If you’re an experienced translator and would like the chance to work with a progressive, ethical and environmentally conscious company, Lotuly would love to hear from you.</p><p><a href="https://lotuly.com/register-translator/">Tell us about yourself and upload your CV.</a></p><blockquote><p>More people working from home means there are fewer cars on the road. This means a reduction in oil consumption and vehicle emissions, helping us protect our finite resources and breathe cleaner, safer air.</p></blockquote>

Mariona Bolohan

Top 10 Benefits for Remote Working

<p>The Chinese market, as an example, has emerged, grown &amp; expanded exponentially in the past 12 months.</p><p>The top 5 industries expanding their businesses internationally are mainly the&nbsp;&nbsp;</p><ul><li>Motor vehicles&nbsp;</li><li>Mechanical &amp; Electrical machinery</li><li>Transport equipment/aircraft</li><li>Chemicals &amp; Pharmaceuticals</li><li>Material Manufacturers</li></ul><p>With such a growth &amp; SMEs looking to tap into such an opportunity the demand for translation services have gone up an impressive 144% compared to the previous 6 months.&nbsp;</p><blockquote><p>‘’We’ve seen a huge increase in UK businesses inquiring about translation services in Simplified &amp; Traditional Chinese, including Taiwanese, usually this is a good indicator of the export growth of some british companies’’ says Robert Bolohan, the Co-Founder of Lotuly.com (a sustainable &amp; human translation agency).</p></blockquote><p>SMEs willing to trade in international markets have been forced to adapt their strategy, invest in a robust localisation campaign and make sure they can communicate in the market’s local language.&nbsp;</p><p>China’s main language is Simplified Chinese (Mandarin), spoken by 70% of the population (source: Wikipedia), the largest of the 10 dialect groups, whereas Cantonese is also another one.&nbsp;</p><p>Hong Kong on the other side, which is also part of China, has its own language called Traditional Chinese which differs from Mandarin.&nbsp;</p><p>Knowing the differences is crucial for business transactions including exchanging big contracts.&nbsp;</p><blockquote><p>‘’Human translation is a must for getting that cultural awareness right and unfortunately machines are not in a position to beat that for the time being as there’s little to no room for error and to get the quality right the first time you need the experience of a human translation expert’’ says Mariona Bolohan the Co-Founder of Lotuly.com (a sustainable &amp; human translation agency)</p></blockquote><p>The global language services market is expected to grow $40B in the next 5 years (source: IMARC).&nbsp;</p><p>With the globalisation of marketing and digitalisation of content on the rise, British SMEs exporting products in other markets such as Asia-Pacific are having a substantial need for new translations.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p><p>A recent research in light of Brexit, of around 400 UK SMEs in different industries has shown that businesses implementing translation &amp; localisation solutions as part of their export growth efforts have seen 30% more chances of being successful at it.&nbsp;</p><p><a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://lotuly.com">Lotuly</a>’s recent new inquiries has proven that UK SMEs are more conscious of their target audience. Human interaction coupled with excellent customer service are two of the things needed in such instances where translation efforts are needed in order to make a deal become reality.&nbsp;</p><p>UK companies are paying more attention than ever to the region of their international expansion efforts and here’s where the right international partner can play a huge part in assisting &amp; adapting all sorts of business transactions &amp; legal documentation in favor of their non-English speaking partners on the other side of the world.</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

British SMEs have seen a 37% increase in international trade beyond the EURO zone

<p>Will machines replace human translators?<br><br>Tech companies are always telling us AI is going to replace human translators. And there’s no doubt the technology is improving.&nbsp;<br><br>But the tech companies are overselling what their machines can actually do — and what they might be capable of in the future.<br><br>As sophisticated as their machines get, they will always have to be programmed and follow predetermined formulae, rather than thinking critically and rationally.<br><br>And though they might be able to translate basic sentences and formulaic documents quickly, we should be wary of trusting them completely without some human scrutiny.<br><br>Where documents and projects are more complex, the style, tone, meaning and intent are vital. And machines simply can’t compete with human knowledge and understanding.&nbsp;<br><br>They’ll never be able to learn and apply, through programming, what a human has learned in their lifetime. Or make a true human connection with real people.</p><h2>An embarrassing translation error</h2><p>It was 2018 and Netta Barzilai had just won the Eurovision Song Contest.&nbsp;</p><p>It was Israel’s first <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://eurovision.tv/">Eurovision</a> victory in 20 years and Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, tweeted his congratulations in Hebrew.&nbsp;</p><p>“Netta, at kapparah amitit.”&nbsp;</p><p>He used the word ‘kapparah’, which is a slang term of endearment — and the sentence should have translated into English as “Netta, you are a real darling.” But it didn’t.</p><p>Instead, the English-speaking world read his tweet as “Netta, you are a real cow.”</p><p>The embarrassing error was made by Twitter’s integrated translation tool, which is automated by Microsoft Bing.</p><h2>The rise of on-demand translations</h2><p>A human translator would never have made a mistake like that.</p><p>But, unfortunately, for any platform that offers translations on demand, machine translation is the only viable option.</p><p>For example, <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.britishcouncil.org/contact/press/traditional-phrasebook-dying-out-tech-savvy-millennials-heading-abroad">according to a poll by The British Council</a>, translation apps, like Google Translate have become a go-to for young British travellers visiting foreign countries. More than 60% of 16–34-year-olds said they’d used their smartphone to understand the local language.</p><p>And 21% of those who’d used their smartphone had reported inaccurate translations, leading to misunderstandings.</p><p>But, while young people on holiday might be able to laugh off a mistake, it’s a different story for companies wanting to do business.</p><p>We previously posted about <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://lotuly.com/15-unfortunate-language-translation-failures/">15 Unfortunate translation failures</a> that were not only incredibly embarrassing, but cost companies huge amounts of money.</p><h2>Why machine translations fail</h2><p>There are a number of reasons why a machine’s translations might be inaccurate. Here are some of them.</p><h3>Words can have more than one meaning</h3><p>Unlike humans, machines can’t recognise context. So if a word has more than one meaning, the machine translator will go for the most obvious one rather than the correct one.</p><h3>Character strings can take on new meanings</h3><p>In Chinese language, an individual character, used alone, can have one meaning. But that same character can have an entirely different meaning when it’s used together with another character. Sports brand, Nike, found this to its cost.</p><p><a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.nike.com/gb/">Nike</a> launched a pair of trainers to commemorate the 2016 Chinese New Year, with a Chinese character embroidered on each heel.</p><p>The left heel had the character ‘fa’, which means ‘getting rich’. The right heel had the character ‘fu’, which means ‘fortune arrives’. But read side by side, the two characters formed the new phrase ‘Get fat’.</p><p>A human translator, or native Chinese speaker, would have been aware of this problem, but Nike didn’t consult either.</p><h3>Language is full of nuances</h3><p>There are lots of subtleties and cultural elements to language, like slang, evolved meanings, disguised insults, regional variations and idioms.&nbsp;</p><p>As humans, we’re learning these things as soon as we learn to speak and read. But we can never expect machines to master such complexities.</p><h3>Machines run on formulae</h3><p>Human translators can do language gymnastics. They’re experts at bending and breaking certain rules to make sure the words carry the same meaning from one language to another. A machine will only ever follow the rules it’s programmed with.</p><h3>Machines can’t read the tone&nbsp;</h3><p>The tone refers to the way the words are delivered. Maybe they’re supposed to be amusing, or have a poetic style. Perhaps they’re designed to shock, or motivate the audience to take action.</p><p>A machine performing a flat translation won’t pick up these style cues and the meaning of the message will be lost.</p><h2>Will machines replace human translators?</h2><p>Tech companies are always telling us AI is going to replace human translators. And there’s no doubt the technology is improving.&nbsp;</p><p>But the tech companies are overselling what their machines can actually do — and what they might be capable of in the future.</p><p>As sophisticated as their machines get, they will always have to be programmed and follow predetermined formulae, rather than thinking critically and rationally.</p><p>And though they might be able to translate basic sentences and formulaic documents quickly, we should be wary of trusting them completely without some human scrutiny.</p><p>Where documents and projects are more complex, the style, tone, meaning and intent are vital. And machines simply can’t compete with human knowledge and understanding.&nbsp;</p><p>They’ll never be able to learn and apply, through programming, what a human has learned in their lifetime. Or make a true human connection with real people.</p><p>So if you need reliable translations you can trust, please visit our home page to get an <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://app.lotuly.com/instant-quote">instant translation quote</a>, or <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://lotuly.com/contact/">contact us</a> to discuss your specific needs with a real person.</p><h2>Are you a translator?</h2><p>If you’re an experienced translator and would like the chance to work with a progressive, ethical and environmentally conscious company, Lotuly would love to hear from you.</p><p><a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://lotuly.com/register-translator/">Tell us about yourself and upload your CV</a>.</p><blockquote><p>Lotuly never uses machines to do a human’s job. The potential for error is just too great — and you have a reputation to protect. Instead, we work with experienced, native-speaking translators and writers all over the world. Skilled translators who understand exactly what you want to say and give you the right words to say it.</p></blockquote>

Will machine translators ever replace humans? 

<h2>Businesses often make the mistake of thinking translation can be done by anyone who knows two or more languages. But it’s not quite as simple as that.</h2><p>Even some of the world's biggest brands have got it wrong and paid a heavy price for their mistakes, with the fallout ranging from cringeworthy embarrassment to huge financial losses and reputations left in tatters in the relevant locality.</p><p>Translation experts, <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://lotuly.com">Lotuly</a>, singled out 10 of the biggest corporate translation howlers of all time.</p><ol><li>Pepsi (1963-1967): In the 1960s, Pepsi was sizing up against its arch rival, Coca Cola. The brand introduced a new advertising campaign with the slogan ‘Come Alive, You’re in the Pepsi Generation’. The campaign was a huge success in America, but not so much in China. There, the translation was understood to say: ‘Pepsi Brings Your Ancestors Back From The Dead’.</li><li>Canadian Mist (1986): Canadian Mist is a brand of blended whisky from Canada. But the name of the brand became an issue when the company tried to introduce the product in Germany. In German, ‘mist’ means ‘manure’, which doesn’t sound very appetising.</li><li>Coca Cola (2018): When Coca Cola launched in China, they soon found that the pronunciation of the Coca Cola name sounded very similar to the Chinese phrase ‘female horse with wax stuffing’. This wasn’t quite the image they wanted for their refreshing drink. The brand ran into problems again more recently when they attempted to combine English and New Zealand’s native Mãori language. The project was to create a slogan for their vending machines in New Zealand. And they settled on the phrase ‘Kia ora, Mate’. It was only after the slogans were in place that they discovered the Mãori translation was ‘Hello, Death’.</li><li>Coors (1983): Coors is a US beer brewer, famous for its ‘Turn it loose’ slogan. But when the slogan was translated literally for the Spanish market, it suggested the beer would cause diarrhoea. Doh!</li><li>Ford (2012): When Ford launched the ad campaign for its latest vehicle in Belgium, it used the slogan ‘Every car has a high-quality body’. Unfortunately for them, this was mistranslated as ‘Every car has a high-quality corpse’.</li><li>General Electric (1988): In 1988, General Electric and Plessey Co merged their telecoms businesses, creating GEC Plessey Telecommunications and using the acronym GPT. But the merger was less well received in France. Because, in French, GPT is pronounced ‘Jai pété’, which translates as ‘I farted’.</li><li>General Motors (1978): General Motors faced embarrassment when it launched its popular Chevy Nova in Latin America without checking the translation of its name. In Spanish ‘No va’ means ‘not going’, which is not the greatest name for any kind of motor vehicle.</li><li>HSBC (2009): In 2009, the global bank’s ad campaign used the slogan ‘Assume nothing’ to say it didn’t make assumptions about the expectations of its customers. But in many languages, the translation was closer to ‘Do nothing’, which was problematic, as you can imagine. Thanks to its translation blunder, the bank had to spend $10 million on a global rebrand to become ‘The world’s local bank’.</li><li>KFC (1980): KFC’s ‘Finger-lickin’ good’ slogan had been used in America since the 1950s. But when the brand decided to expand into Asia in the 1980s, they hit upon a problem. In China, the translation of ‘Finger lickin’ good’ was ‘Eat your fingers off’. Clearly this was never going to work. Thankfully, KFC were virtually unknown in China at the time. They fixed their slogan quickly and went on to become one of the country’s most popular Western fast foods.</li><li>Parker Pens (1973): Parker Pens’ advertising slogan was: &nbsp;‘It won’t leak in your pocket and embarrass you’, which worked perfectly in English. However, when the company translated its ad into Spanish, it was wrongly presumed that the Spanish for embarrassment is ‘embarazar’. The Spanish version of the ad read: ‘It won’t leak in your pocket and get you pregnant’.</li></ol><p><strong>Robert Bolohan of Lotuly said this of the bloopers:</strong></p><blockquote><p>Businesses often make the mistake of thinking translation can be done by anyone who knows two or more languages, but it’s never as simple as that. This list shows that even some of the world's biggest brands have got it wrong and paid a heavy price for their mistakes, from cringeworthy embarrassment to huge financial losses and reputations left in tatters in the relevant locality. It's vital to get the right message to your market and avoid cultural gaffes. Localisation services adapt your language for a particular locale or market, taking into account the regional and cultural differences as well as the differences in language."</p></blockquote>

10 of the biggest corporate translation bloopers 

<p>Lotuly helps B2B companies translate and localise their content (websites, apps, software, documents, etc.) effectively in +90 languages and +40 subjects.&nbsp;</p><p>Their mission is to help create more caring relationships by enabling businesses and their customers to start meaningful conversations. You can try Lotuly's free instant quote here: <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://app.lotuly.com/instant-quote ">https://app.lotuly.com/instant-quote</a></p><blockquote><p>Mariona, the Co-Founder says: ''Being a native Spanish &amp; Catalan speaker myself I struggled with fears of rejection (my husband having Romanian roots too). We live in a world where people judge you depending where you are from and both my husband and I have an accent so it was a struggle to go past that situation. But, that’s a success, why? Because if it wasn’t for those times of struggling to fit in, we wouldn’t have gone past that point onto the next achievements and therefore we would have not created Lotuly.''&nbsp;</p></blockquote><p>The couple managed to successfully onboard Fortune 500 companies and work with top startups giving them the push they needed and the support they craved. They doubled their revenue after launching in the beginning of the <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&amp;rct=j&amp;q=&amp;esrc=s&amp;source=web&amp;cd=&amp;cad=rja&amp;uact=8&amp;ved=2ahUKEwj0kuTHw6PyAhXEUMAKHZhiD7cQ9fUFKAQwM3oECEsQEQ&amp;url=https%3A%2F%2Fgov.uk%2Fcoronavirus&amp;usg=AOvVaw3cHKw-0SQhdY-4wfiMjdnA">Covid-19 pandemic</a> and they hope to keep on growing sustainably.&nbsp;</p><p>One of the best implementations they've added to their business strategy is planting trees for translated words through their partners <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://ecologi.com/lotuly">Ecologi</a>.&nbsp;</p><blockquote><p>Robert, the Co-Founder says: ''We strive to help businesses communicate more effectively and in a meaningful way because I know how it feels to not know how to express yourself, to speak other languages, to always look like you don't fit in a place that it's not your own country, to get judged by being too young to handle certain matters, I've been there, felt that and owned it.''</p></blockquote><p>They moved through those challenges and strived to help other young people overcome the same feelings of rejection. They give a lot of opportunities to young people, to work with them and feel appreciated no matter where they are from.</p><p>Lotuly stands by the slogan: ‘’machines don't have cultural awareness, but our human translators do'', therefore they believe human translation still wins over AI and there's a lot of work needed for these systems to be better than humans. Just as an example, Hawaiians have more than 200 words for ‘’rain'' so most likely a machine won't be able to properly choose the right fit. and that's why they strive to help their clients understand that human translation is super important when localising a product or software for the right market.&nbsp;</p><p><a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/robert-bolohan-website-designer/">Robert</a> and <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/mariona-bolohan-translation-expert/">Mariona</a> have recently moved their whole brand online and that has automated many of their processes, making it easy for clients all over the world to access their services and manage their translation needs.&nbsp;<br><br>But, at its heart, Lotuly is still a people-first business, built on caring, helping and creating a world of understanding.</p><figure class="image"><img src="https://s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/newspage.com-staging/company/779/files/cd98e129d0f6304d2bc2ece52b89aed9eee729c5011ddb08bdb2998c4172f97bbb4c301fc0119a7b716b7c78edd135af70078c32d3104e2b1431d33ea6479fcf.jpeg"></figure><blockquote><p>''When Robert &amp; I started this back in 2015 when it was very much a freelance enterprise and we worked other jobs to support ourselves. But we found that clients liked our human approach and the fact that they were treated as people, rather than just numbers says Mariona the Co-Founder of Lotuly.''</p></blockquote>

How a couple from Spain bootstrapped their way into the translation & localisation startup world!

Co-Founder

Lotuly

Media coverage of Robert Bolohan