The mission of a nonprofit organization should always be to help as many people as you possibly can. This core of altruism and charitable work is what makes nonprofits what they are, and it is also why proper translation can be so incredibly important to such a business. There are many potential benefits of proper translation for a nonprofit, which will be discussed below, but at their core, these increases come from an improvement to your altruistic power, and that is something any nonprofit should aspire towards.
The Importance of Speaking Someone’s Language
Among the many potential benefits of proper translation, one of the most well-known and respected benefits is the ability to make a real connection with the people you are talking to. As Nelson Mandela once said, “If you talk to a man in a language he understands, that goes to his head. If you talk to him in his language, that goes to his heart.”
Emotional Connection. The brilliant thing about this is that by translating your content and communications into other languages, you are enabling yourself to make genuine, human connections with the people who read it. This is by far the best way to fully connect with the people who believe in your messages and would be eager to help your nonprofit thrive.
Understand Intricacies of their Language. Proper translation is more than just conveying direct, literal meaning. There are intricacies and nuances to every language that you only learn by becoming truly fluent, and these are the inflections and connotations that will really transform a translation from clinical to emotional. This level of translation will strengthen that emotional connection and allow you to really reach people in their own language.
Brilliant Languages to Translate Into
When it comes to deciding on a language to translate into, there are a lot of important points to consider. Not only is it important for you to translate into a language that will open the door to a lot more people, but also to translate into a language that will help you reach people who are interested in helping your nonprofit.
Spanish. Translating into Spanish, for one, will help any American nonprofit immensely because there is a huge portion of the American population who speak Spanish natively, and even if they speak English, by reaching out in Spanish, you are able to reach out far more emotionally. On top of that, Spain is a European country and as such fairly connected to the workings of America and potentially interested in playing a role in the American nonprofit scene.
Simplified Chinese. Chinese, on the other hand, is the single most spoken language in the world, allowing your company to reach a much, much larger group than almost any other language would allow. However, it is unlikely that the average Chinese citizen would be all that interested in supporting an American nonprofit, limiting the effectiveness of such translation.
Opportunities Opened By Translation
On top of everything else, an ability to effectively and reliably translate the messages of your nonprofit into other languages has the potential to open a fair few doors for your company. A couple of these fantastic opportunities are described below.
SMS Marketing. The mobile network is one of the biggest open lines of communication across the world. In fact, mobile phones are so ubiquitous that the mobile network is probably second only to the internet in terms of the ability to reach others. This means that a company with excellent translation would be able to make use of the mobile network to run an SMS marketing campaign across multiple continents, reaching English speakers and non-English speakers alike. Mobile donations for nonprofits could be an incredibly beneficial source of funding for your company and enable you to do so much good in the world.
Reach an International Audience. Additionally, by reaching an international audience, you would be able to spread the word and support of your nonprofit across a far wider scope than you could without proper translation, potentially even enabling your company to establish more nonprofit organizations and operations across the globe.
Help More People
Finally, one of the biggest benefits that proper translation gives to any nonprofit is the potential to help more people than you could before.
Communicate Your Benefits to Others. If your nonprofit exists to provide relief to people in struggling nations, then the capacity to effectively communicate with those people and explain how you are going to help them would be invaluable. Similarly, if you want to provide support to recent immigrants or refugees, then it is often useful to be able to speak their language to ensure that no meaning is lost when you speak to them.
Stay In Touch with International Donors. On top of that, if you do receive donations and support from abroad, then by being able to speak your donor’s language, you would be able to keep them up to date with what your nonprofit has done with their support and tell them of the good they have done, which is nice.
