SmartCoding Codes Answers in Any Language

A new Netherlands firm, SmartCoding, is offering coding services for multilingual research projects. The company, which has entered a strategic partnership with MR outsourcing firm Pulse, promises to save time and reduce errors by directly coding verbatim answers in any language - without the need for intermediate translation.

The company is an offshoot of VVH Business Translations, which has previously provided translation services for MR firms. Matthew van Hoorn, CEO at VVH, explains that the agency found itself frequently translating verbatim survey answers 'from a whole range of languages back into English, German, Spanish, Japanese, Thai - you name it'.

It soon became clear there was an easier way. 'Happy as we were with the work, we could not help noticing that what we sent the client was not really what they needed, namely codes. And we possessed both the organisational and language skills to interpret and code the verbatims, short-circuiting the whole process and providing the client with usable results. Thus we started offering a direct coding service.'

Realising that coding was 'quite a different business from translating', VVH set up a separate company - SmartCoding - headed by CEO Stella Bolscher.

Speaking of the new company, Bolscher states: 'Supported by our partners and building on extensive experience in market research, we are truly capable of coding directly in all languages, including those of the fast-growing Asia-Pacific economies. Our clients know that they can save both time and money by outsourcing the coding process to us, and that no meaning will be lost in an intermediate translation step.'

The new company is online at www.smartcoding.biz

All articles 2006-23 written and edited by Mel Crowther and/or Nick Thomas, 2024- by Nick Thomas, unless otherwise stated.