Words In Translation review
Worth a conversation about Localization & Transcreation once the caveats below are settled.
A genuine London transcreation practice with roughly two dozen named-brand campaigns across stated language pairs, undermined by publishing nothing on price, turnaround or who owns the translation memory.
No published price we can link to. We do not estimate one — ask on the call, and see the pricing-transparency line in the scores below.
How it scored
Every dimension is scored against this discipline’s published rubric. Open one to see the claim it was scored on, what the rubric measures there and how much it weighs, and where the evidence came from.
Transcreation and marketing practice evidenceExcellent
The case studies index carries roughly two dozen named-brand engagements with the work and the language scope described per project: Air Wick via Havas (French transcreation with VO direction), Mars Agency (15+ markets over a stated 15-year relationship), SEGA Sonic social content in four European markets, Wunderman Thompson transcreating Amazon marketplace landing pages, NetJets in six languages, Suzuki in five, Ceylon Arrack in five, Accor Hotels in five, Rakuten Viki market-entry translations, Brother in twelve languages, The Callisto Protocol at 20 languages of marketing plus six of community. The site separates transcreation from translation in its own definitions ('adapting the message while maintaining its intent, style, tone and context. Options, feedback and cultural insights') and structures the offer as Ideation / Creation / Production rather than a translation menu with a marketing label bolted on. The Brother study names a client-side contact by name and title. This is a marketing localisation practice, not a document mill with a services page.
What this dimension measures: Is marketing work a real, named practice with attributable campaign or content work — or a service-page claim on a general translation business? Named marketing clients with described campaign work across stated language pairs scores 4-5. A marketing services page with no attributable work scores 2-3. Distinguish transcreation (copy reworked for the market, briefed like creative) from translation with a marketing label; vendors that explain the difference in their own materials tend to actually do it. Counts for 25% of the weighted score.
Evidence: partly checkable — corroborated in part against the sources below; the remainder rests on the agency’s own account.
Linguist model and quality processAdequate
The model is described in outline: linguists 'carefully selected for your brand and assigned consistently across your projects' rather than a rotating pool, translators positioned as marketers themselves, teams stated as having at least five years' experience, and corporate membership of the Institute of Translation and Interpreting with adherence to its Code of Conduct. Machine translation is disclosed honestly as its own line (MTPE for high-volume repetitive content, with human finishing) rather than hidden inside human-rate work, which is the transparent handling the rubric asks for. Against that: no named review or revision layers anywhere on the pages read, and the one process artefact named, the 'WIT SIX toolkit', is referenced without ever being explained. The site claims ISO 17100:2015 certification, but I could not locate or read any certifying body's register entry to confirm it, so the corroboration cap applies and this dimension is held at Adequate rather than scored on the badge.
What this dimension measures: Who does the work and who checks it: in-country professional linguists versus anonymous pools, named review layers, and certifications that can be verified (ISO 17100, ISO 9001 — check the certificate claim, not the badge). A described model with named QA steps and verifiable certification scores 4-5. 'Native speakers' with no process detail scores 2-3. How the vendor positions machine translation matters: disclosed MT-plus-post-editing with stated boundaries is honest and scores on its own terms; undisclosed MT sold as human work is a red flag scored 1-2 where evidenced. Counts for 20% of the weighted score.
Evidence: vendor stated — the agency’s own claim, recorded as theirs rather than ours.
Scope and pricing transparencyWeak
No pricing of any kind across the homepage, services page, sector pages or contact page: no per-word rate, no transcreation hourly rate, no per-language minimum, no tiering, and no statement of which billing mechanism is even used. The contact page is a quote-request form with no indication of how a quote is constructed or what a floor project looks like. This is bespoke-only quoting, and a buyer cannot form any budget expectation before making contact.
What this dimension measures: Published per-word rates, hourly transcreation rates, or stated pricing models by service tier score 4-5. A stated model without numbers scores 2-3. Bespoke-only quoting scores 1-2. This category bills by mechanisms buyers rarely see up front (per-word, per-hour, minimums per language); a vendor that explains its own billing mechanics scores toward the top of whatever band its disclosure earns. Counts for 15% of the weighted score.
Evidence: inferred — our reading of indirect evidence, not a documented fact.
Stronger here: Translated scores Excellent on the same dimension.
Technology and workflow integrationAdequate
Better than an email-the-files shop but well short of a described stack. The Brother case study is the only place workflow is visible: a phased approach starting with sample translations to fix tone and terminology, then full rollout, CMS integration and UI review, with translation performed directly in the client's Sitecore environment (the page spells it 'Sitescore') and the named client contact quoted approving exactly that. Ongoing SEO across sixteen languages and community management running seven days a week imply continuous rather than one-off delivery. But no TMS or CAT tool is named anywhere, no connector list, no stated file-format coverage, and no explicit continuous-localisation offer. The gaming page advertises three process phases as headings only and gives no mechanics beneath them.
What this dimension measures: How work actually flows: TMS use, connectors into the client's CMS or design stack, stated file-format coverage, and whether continuous localization is supported for content that ships weekly. Named integrations and a described workflow score 4-5. Email-the-files-back workflow scores 2-3 — workable for a campaign, a ceiling for a content operation. Proprietary-platform lock-in with no export path should be named in the verdict. Counts for 15% of the weighted score.
Evidence: partly checkable — corroborated in part against the sources below; the remainder rests on the agency’s own account.
Asset ownership and translation memoryWeak
Silence, and complete silence. Across the homepage, services page, marketing translation page, gaming page, entertainment page, about page, contact page and case studies, translation memory and glossaries are never mentioned at all, let alone assigned an owner. There is no stated policy either way on who keeps the TM, the termbase or the deliverables at the end of a relationship. For a vendor whose named engagements run for years and cover forty-plus languages, that accumulated asset is substantial and its ownership is undocumented.
What this dimension measures: The translation memory and glossaries built on the client's money are the client's accumulated asset, and whether they leave with the client at exit is the switching question of this category. Explicit client ownership of TM, glossaries and deliverables scores 4-5. Silence scores 2. A stated policy that the vendor retains the TM scores 1-2 — that is the client's spend converted into the vendor's moat, and it should be named plainly. Counts for 10% of the weighted score.
Evidence: inferred — our reading of indirect evidence, not a documented fact.
Stronger here: Argos Multilingual scores Strong on the same dimension.
Turnaround and capacityWeak
No turnaround is published by volume or language pair, no rush terms, no service-level commitment. What exists is retrospective and lives inside case studies: 'seven days a week, 16 hours per day' community coverage on The Walking Dead, out-of-hours and weekend cover for Eight&Four, daily marketing translations for Rakuten Viki, 71,000+ words on the Brother Russian site. Those describe past engagements, not a commitment a new buyer can hold them to. To their credit the site makes no implausible speed claim, but scheduling is undisclosed.
What this dimension measures: Stated turnaround by volume and language pair, rush terms, and stated capacity across time zones. Published, realistic turnaround commitments score 4-5. Undisclosed scheduling scores 2. Score honesty over speed: same-day everything at marketing quality across forty languages is a claim to be sceptical of, not to reward. Counts for 10% of the weighted score.
Evidence: inferred — our reading of indirect evidence, not a documented fact.
Stronger here: Translated scores Strong on the same dimension.
References and review baseWeak
Read the Clutch profile first-hand: the listing exists but carries a 0.0 rating with zero verified reviews, no project sizes and no published rate range. No Google, Trustpilot or G2 review base for this company was located; a Facebook page shows three reviews and no rating, which is not a usable base. The only checkable reference is self-published: a named quote from Manuel Buchner, Senior Digital Marketing Manager at Brother, on that case study. One named reference on the vendor's own site is not a review base. Low weight is appropriate here since enterprise localisation buyers work from procurement references rather than public ratings.
What this dimension measures: Independent, verified reviews or named checkable references. A substantial verified base scores 4-5; a handful scores 2-3; none scores 2. Low weight deliberately — enterprise localization runs on procurement references rather than public reviews, so absence is weak evidence, and the practice evidence above matters more. Counts for 5% of the weighted score.
Evidence: verified — checked against a named source you can open; the links under Sources below are where to check it yourself.
Stronger here: Translated scores Strong on the same dimension.
Verdict
Words In Translation is what it says it is. Founded in London in 2011 by Alice Warde-Poullain, who came out of advertising, it presents as a boutique marketing localisation agency and the case study library backs that up rather than decorating it. Roughly two dozen engagements are named and described with their language scope attached: Air Wick transcreated into French through Havas, a fifteen-year Mars Agency relationship across fifteen-plus markets, SEGA's Sonic social content in four European markets, Wunderman Thompson's Amazon marketplace landing pages, NetJets in six languages, Suzuki and Accor and Ceylon Arrack in five each, The Callisto Protocol at twenty languages of marketing material.
The site also draws the transcreation-versus-translation distinction in its own definitions and organises its offer as Ideation, Creation and Production rather than as a translation menu with a marketing tab. On the first and heaviest question in this category, whether the marketing practice is real, the answer is clearly yes. The delivery model is sketched but not documented.
Linguists are said to be hand-picked per brand and kept consistent across a client's projects rather than drawn from a rotating pool, translators are positioned as marketers with five or more years of experience, and the firm is a corporate member of the Institute of Translation and Interpreting working to its Code of Conduct. Machine translation is handled honestly: MTPE appears as its own named line for high-volume repetitive content with human finishing, which is the disclosed-boundaries approach a buyer should want rather than MT smuggled in at human rates. What is missing is the middle: no named revision or review layer appears on any page read, and the one process artefact the site names, a 'WIT SIX toolkit', is invoked without ever being described.
The site claims ISO 17100:2015 certification, the standard that would itself mandate an independent reviser, but I could not find or read a certifying body's register entry confirming it, so that claim stays vendor-stated and this evaluation does not score it as verified. Workflow evidence is thin but not absent. The Brother engagement is the one place the machinery shows: sample translations first to settle tone and terminology, then full rollout, CMS integration, UI review, translation performed inside the client's own Sitecore environment, with a named client-side marketing manager quoted approving exactly that arrangement, plus ongoing SEO across sixteen languages.
That is a real content operation rather than files emailed back. Yet no TMS or CAT tool is named anywhere on the site, no connectors are listed, no file-format coverage is stated, and continuous localisation is never offered as such. The sector pages for gaming and entertainment advertise process phases as headings with nothing underneath them.
The gaps that should shape a buyer's diligence are commercial rather than creative. Pricing is entirely absent in every form: no per-word rate, no transcreation hourly rate, no per-language minimum, not even a statement of which billing mechanism applies. Turnaround is undisclosed, with the only timing facts being retrospective descriptions inside case studies.
Most consequential for a long relationship, translation memory and glossaries are never mentioned on any page, so the ownership of the linguistic asset a multi-year, forty-language programme would accumulate is simply undocumented. Independent validation is likewise unavailable: the Clutch profile exists but sits at 0.0 with zero reviews, and no readable Google or Trustpilot base was located, which for enterprise localisation is weak evidence rather than damning. The picture is a credible creative practice with a genuine client roster and an opaque commercial contract, and a buyer should put price mechanics, turnaround commitments, the ISO certificate itself and TM ownership in writing before signing anything.
What you can do next
Koolav can make the introduction and handle the back-and-forth, or you can go straight to the agency.
This agency has not published a paid trial. What a paid trial is.
What we verified
Each claim below was checked against a named source, last on 2026-08-26. Follow any of them and check for yourself — that is the point of publishing them.
- The domain returns a genuine HTTP 404 for a nonsense path, so the site is not a blanket-200 responder and its pages can be trusted to match their URLs. wordsintranslation.com ↗
- Roughly two dozen named-brand case studies are published with work type and language scope stated per engagement, including Air Wick via Havas, Mars Agency, SEGA, Rakuten Viki, MGM+, NUXE, Brother, The Callisto Protocol, Wunderman Thompson for Amazon, Accor Hotels, NetJets, Suzuki, Ceylon Arrack, LaCie, Pukka Herbs, StarzPlay and Lebara. wordsintranslation.com ↗
- The Brother engagement covered twelve languages with 71,000+ words on the Russian site alone, ran phased sample-then-rollout with CMS integration, had translation performed directly in the client's Sitecore environment, and carries an attributed client quote from Manuel Buchner, Senior Digital Marketing Manager. wordsintranslation.com ↗
- Machine translation post-editing is published as its own disclosed service line for high-volume repetitive content with professional human finishing, rather than being folded silently into human-rate work. wordsintranslation.com ↗
- The firm claims ISO 17100:2015 certification and Institute of Translation and Interpreting corporate membership on its own pages; the ITI membership and Creative UK Federation membership are stated alongside it. wordsintranslation.com ↗
- Founded in London in 2011 by Alice Warde-Poullain, a former advertising professional; describes itself as a boutique agency with linguists selected per brand and assigned consistently across a client's projects. No headcount is published on the site. wordsintranslation.com ↗
- No pricing, rate, minimum project size, billing model or turnaround commitment appears on the homepage, services page, marketing translation page, gaming page, entertainment page, about page or contact page. The contact page is a quote-request form only. wordsintranslation.com ↗
- The Clutch profile shows a 0.0 rating with zero verified reviews and no published rate range, and lists the company at 2-9 employees. clutch.co ↗
What other platforms say
No independent client review base was located or read. The Clutch profile at clutch.co/profile/words-translation exists and was read first-hand: it shows a 0.0 rating with zero verified reviews, no project sizes and no published rate range, and lists the company at 2-9 employees. No Google, Trustpilot or G2 profile for this company surfaced; a Facebook page shows three reviews and no rating, which is not a usable base. The only checkable reference is self-published: a named quote from Manuel Buchner, Senior Digital Marketing Manager at Brother.
These are other platforms' numbers, not ours. We report them because they are part of the picture, and we do not average them into our score — our score comes from the published rubric above.
What we could not verify
- What does anything cost? No per-word rate, transcreation hourly rate, per-language minimum, tiering, or even a statement of which billing mechanism is used appears anywhere on the site.
- Who owns the translation memory and glossaries at the end of a relationship? TM and termbases are never mentioned on any page, so the exit position on the client's accumulated linguistic asset is undocumented.
- Is the ISO 17100:2015 certification current and issued by whom? The claim is made on the vendor's own pages; no certifying body's register entry confirming it could be located or read.
- What are the review and revision layers? No second-linguist review, QA step or sign-off stage is named, and the 'WIT SIX toolkit' the site credits for quality is never explained.
- What turnaround can a buyer expect by volume and language pair, and what are the rush terms? Only retrospective coverage descriptions inside case studies exist.
- What TMS or CAT platform does the work run through, which connectors exist into a client's CMS or design stack, and what file formats are supported? Only one client-side CMS is named, in a single case study.
- How large is the delivery team and what time-zone coverage exists outside the community-management line? The site publishes no headcount; the Clutch listing says 2-9 employees, which does not obviously square with forty-plus-language programmes.
- What do past clients say independently? No readable third-party review base was found, so the only reference is one named quote published by the vendor.
Sources
- https://www.wordsintranslation.com
- https://www.wordsintranslation.com/this-page-cannot-possibly-exist-9f3k2
- https://www.wordsintranslation.com/services
- https://www.wordsintranslation.com/services/marketing-translation-services
- https://www.wordsintranslation.com/case-studies
- https://www.wordsintranslation.com/case-studies/brother
- https://www.wordsintranslation.com/case-studies/air-wick-havas
- https://www.wordsintranslation.com/about
- https://www.wordsintranslation.com/gaming-translation-localization
- https://www.wordsintranslation.com/media-entertainment-translation-localisation
- https://www.wordsintranslation.com/contact
- https://clutch.co/profile/words-translation
Others we evaluated in Localization & Transcreation
Same rubric, same evaluator, same date range — so these are directly comparable to the verdict above.
See all 17 Localization & Transcreation agencies we evaluated →
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