Recently, we have received several requests to review different companies. Alconost review was one of our priorities. It is a company that localizes apps, games, software, websites, and can proofread for you. They mostly help IT companies and big businesses. Alconost makes whole projects for you, and they boast over 1,500 completed ones. Some of their most famous clients are Microsoft and Kaspersky, which is impressive. The company works remotely, and only a small percent of employees work at the physical Alcon address at Alexandria, USA. Read more about them below.
Services Offered
Alconost provides many services. They touch upon marketing, promotional videos, translation, and even software. Let’s see what they can do for you.
Localization Review
We have analyzed the website content and reviews to find out is Alconost legit. From what we saw, Alconost deals with more than 70 languages, including English, Russian, Arabic, Chinese, French, German, Japanese. They have many localization projects in their portfolio that are available via their website. Also, they do game localization for game publishers and developers for desktop and mobile platforms. The company boasts over 700 professional linguists on staff. They can test your localization on many parameters such as grammar, completeness, stings, etc. Alconost cannot provide best medical translation services, but they localize apps, websites, and edit/proofread your text. Also, Alconost has its own localization service online called Nitro.
Video Production
Alconost has a 360-degree service for videos. They will create marketing videos or custom animated promos for businesses. Also, they offer voice-over services by native speaking voice talents. These videos are mostly for mobile and desktop apps, as well as services. For example, they produce training or promotional videos. Alconost.com review showed that they make animated trailers, teasers, cut-scenes, and game videos. Also, they can localize the game audio with the help of professional voice artists.
Multilingual marketing
If you have a multilingual website, Alconost can offer search engine optimization. They do full SEO audits, improve website usability, analyze statistics, and develop an international promotion strategy. A company promises to increase your business ROI and profits. They optimize for various locations if you want to reach the global market. Alcon website offers content SEO strategy, international specialists, project analytics, and thinks client input is important. They also offer multilingual PPC services and boast a certified Google partnership. The company promises to create a strong strategy for higher profits.
Our Order Review
For our review, we decided to test localization services of this company. As Alconost specializes in websites, we decided to go for it. Our website was in English and we needed it in Arabic. This kind of localization needs great precision and understanding of the target audience. Arabic is one of the oldest language in the world, has a rich cultural background, and requires precision. The text would be in Standard Arabic, and the layout and all interface parts should adhere to target culture. We expected that Alconost would make necessary changes to our webpage.
Prices and Add-Ons at Alcon Services
Alconost has prices for 1000 characters including spaces. The price depends on various factors:
Language pair
Depending on languages you need, the price can be different. Professional translation by native speakers can cost you a lot. For example, English to Belarusian translation will cost you 12.5$ per 1000 characters, while Chinese to Russian will cost you $75.8. The average price for Alcon services is $21-$31 for every 1000 characters. This is pretty expensive.
Proofreading
If you want to proofread your document by a second translator, you will have to pay an additional fee for every 1000 characters. The average price for proofreading is around $12, but it can go up to $80 in some cases. If you need only proofreading and editing but not a translation, you will have to pay around $12-$16 for every 1000 characters. Linguistic quality testing prices start from $43 on average.
Review of Our Order Price
For our English to Arabic translation, we had a webpage with 6,000 symbols. We ended up paying $192 for localization plus proofreading by a second translator. We chose this variant because we wanted to be sure that everything is fine in the end.
Alconost.com Quality of Services Review
Before we placed the order, we investigated the customer reviews all over the Internet. Our review findings were interesting. The customers say that they receive their documents on time, but the quality isn’t always great. Sometimes, the managers aren’t helpful and the translation isn’t accurate. Like many best translation services, Alconost mostly has good reviews, but part of them is mixed. Still, support members were helpful. They assisted us with the order and told us all information about pricing, speed of delivery, and other aspects of their work. Luckily, we received our order on time, even faster than we expected. A 6,000 symbol localization arrived in two days which is a great result.
Still, we had serious accuracy concerns. We gave our localization to a native Arabic expert for review. They were somewhat disappointed. They admitted that Alconost changed some of the pictures. This was for good because, in the Arabic world, they might seem obscene or offensive. For our Alconost reviews, they localized the layout of the website and Arabic audiences would read it easily. An expert admitted that button names and UI were well-localized, so people would have no problems with them. Still, there were concerns about text quality. It wasn’t quite good as there were some signs of machine translation, for example, omitted parts of sentences or weird word choice. The expert suspects machine assistance because of some mechanical mistakes. There surely was some proofreading, but it wasn’t enough for its price because there were lexical and grammar mistakes.
Review of Pros & Cons
We think that overall, Alcon corporation quality is average as there are more cons than pros. Alconost might be legit, but we think that price, speed, and accuracy are the most important for a translation service. Two of these factors failed, so we think that the cons outweigh the pros.
Pros:
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A convenient website with prices and services
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Great customer support
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Speedy service
Cons:
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Very high prices
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Machine translation
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Poor localization
Summary
From first sight, Alconost.com reviews show it’s a reputable company with many famous clients worldwide. They mostly serve the IT industry and do large projects. While many are thankful to Alconost, we didn’t experience many positive sides. Also, they completed our task real quick. We have read good reviews that say that Alconost delivers accurate texts. We also admit that the support team does a great job that might draw their customers back again to get localization. You cannot order USCIS translation or scientific translation services, but they localize for IT. Still, in our experience, they use machine translation that is slightly edited to look fine. Experts and natives would see that. If you want to keep your company’s reputation, choose another company. A lousy translation could scare away potential partners and customers, so we cannot recommend their service.
