Language and brand: Problems for localization

Abstract

The language used in a product or service has an extraordinary impact on the creation of its brand and on its online success. As localization is a key aspect of a globalized business, attention should be given to the localization of brand language to ensure global consistency. This study explores brand language localization problems in an online help corpus. Specifically, it analyzes the problems posed by the localization of brand names and terms in the pre-translation phase, following Nord’s pre-translation text analysis theory (2012). The main objective of the study is to understand the nature of identified brand language problems (professional purposes) and examine them (research purposes). The method implemented is a qualitative, interpretative analysis of a monolingual corpus in English comprising representative extracts from the Dropbox and Google Drive Online Help systems. The study is part of a wider research project exploring the concept of localization problems in online help localization.