Transcribing and subtitling at iron mountain

Reaching audiences in any language, at less cost and without the heavy lifting

“Converting video content into another language used to take us three weeks. Now it can be done in just two or three hours.”

Pat Ziembicka, UK&I Field Marketing Manager, Iron Mountain

Challenge

Iron Mountain needed to extend the reach and impact of online events by repurposing video recordings into multiple languages for non-English audiences and social media promotion.

Solution

Iron Mountain Entertainment Services^® (IMES) Transcript and Subtitling Service, providing a collaborative workspace for internal teams and external suppliers to simplify content management and localisation using a single cloud video platform.

Results

Moving to a digital production process significantly cut costs and halved delivery times. Other benefits included an easy-to-search library for speakers and video sound bites that can be repurposed in the future.

Physical meets digital challenge

“In the past we would have to watch a video, manually hand-type a transcription, send it for translation and then pay another agency to embed the subtitles. Apart from racking up expense, it was really inefficient and time-consuming.”

Pat Ziembicka, UK&I Field Marketing Manager, Iron Mountain

Smarter content production strategy for international audiences

Event innovation

Rather than hold a traditional event at a central venue, the Iron Mountain^® marketing team decided to try something different. They conceived the idea of Physical Meets Digital, a live online event dedicated to discussing trends, challenges and best practices in information management.

“As well as reducing carbon footprint and venue hire and travel costs, we wanted to enable attendees to dip in and out of topics from their desktop – instead of wrenching them away from the workplace to sit through two or three days of presentations and panel discussions,” said UK&I Field Marketing Manager, Pat Ziembicka.

During each of the sessions customers and industry experts would share their knowledge, insights and experience with the audience, encouraging live collaboration.

Making content more consumable, for more people

For the idea to work, the team needed a smarter strategy for content production and to eliminate the heavy lifting associated with re-purposing videos for other languages. Initially, by localising content for French and German audiences.

“Although it made sense to run the sessions in English, the content was still highly relevant to customers in other countries,” explained Ziembicka.

“People often watch videos in public places, such as on the train or in a coffee shop, increasing the need for subtitling. We also wanted to do a big push with social media and blogs, which meant localising SEO tagging. With the clock ticking, we were really up against it.”

Cloud-based video content management platform

“With neat drag and drop features, it was really easy to pick up the tool and hit the ground running.”

Pat Ziembicka, UK&I Field Marketing Manager, Iron Mountain

Collaborative solution close to hand

For a fixed monthly price, the Transcript and Subtitling Service from IMES is designed to help video producers, media companies and marketing departments simplify workflows and build online video libraries.

“For each recording we were able to generate an English video transcript, review and edit, and translate into French or German – all in a few clicks,” added Ziembicka. “We then invited our local marketing colleagues and external partners to log onto the platform to quality check the text before finalising subtitles. And we used the same process to convert European videos into English.”

Impressive, quantifiable results

In total, over 100 assets were created over 16 weeks to support the Physical Meets Digital online event. Transcription time for a one-hour long video was five to seven minutes. Accuracy levels for the English transcripts initially hit 80% with translations hovering at 65%. Aided by machine learning, performance improved to around 95% and 75% respectively as the tool got attuned to native language nuances and acronyms.

The marketing team saw a 50% productivity saving overall. Now, with the Iron Mountain Transcript and Subtitling Service, they have a single, easy-to-search library for speakers and video sound bites that can also be leveraged for future promotion. There’s no need to upload multiple videos to YouTube. Using the tool, a video is rendered once with embedded language options, saving more time and effort.