BMJ: Creating a healthier world through translation

BMJ overview

When it comes to driving a large global health strategy, especially in countries that lack adequate healthcare, BMJ knew how vital it was to provide in-language content. Using their roster of native speaking doctors who worked on revising all the translated content in their respective languages, BMJ knew their process was getting complicated. With so many moving parts to each piece of translated content, they needed to find a solution to help scale their operation.

The challenge

BMJ faced several challenges, including a convoluted process, slow delivery of vital content, and a high volume of translations. Working in an email-based workflow, the BMJ content team struggled through their manual translation process. Busy sending Google documents by mail and with lots of back and forth, translations were slow to get to and through the approval process, preventing any scalable growth. Finally, each new language required translation of up to 4 million words in less than a year. BMJ needed a translation provider to be able to handle their volume while keeping costs as low as possible.

The solution

Using the Smartling cloud-based translation management system, BMJ was able to move away from their email-based workflow and create a fully automated translation process. With their new workflow, BMJ’s content team eliminated the need to manually handle files which helped them cut their time to publication by 54%, from 13 to 6 weeks. BMJ was also able to leverage translation memory in the Smartling platform which reduced the amount of translations they needed to complete (and their translation costs) by 21%.

With Smartling, BMJ has reduced project management efforts by 75% through real-time updates and reporting. BMJ’s content team used to spend a majority of their time on translations, they can now dedicate that time to working with providers to produce valuable content to build a healthier world.