How to translate a multilingual survey?

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๐ŸŒ Translating a survey into multiple languages

Do you have employees based internationally? Zest lets you offer a survey in multiple languages, with automatic translation that you can then review, correct, and have proofread by dedicated translators.


๐Ÿ› ๏ธ Enabling translation for a survey

When creating your survey:

  1. Go to the "Define" step.
  1. Turn on the "Survey language" option by selecting "Yes".
  1. Select the language you are currently building your survey in.
  1. Then check all the additional languages you want to get an automatic translation into.

โœ๏ธ Build, then translate your survey

Once your survey is built, a new "Translate" tab will appear in the menu (top left of the screen).

In this space, you can:

  • View all your questions
  • See the automatic translations
  • Edit and validate the translations
  • Save your changes

Understanding translation statuses

Each translated question displays a status indicator:

  • ๐Ÿค– Robot icon: the translation was generated automatically and has not yet been manually reviewed.
  • โœ… Green check: the translation has been reviewed and manually validated. This status appears automatically as soon as you edit a translation and click Save and next.

๐Ÿ’ก Tip: this system lets you spot at a glance which translations still need checking (robot icon) and which have already been validated by a human (green check).

๐ŸŒ Switching translation language

If your survey includes several additional languages, a language selector is available at the top of the screen, in the Translate tab. It lets you switch from one language to another to check each translation.

๐Ÿ‘ฅ Adding translators to the survey

You can invite an employee as a Translator contributor on your survey.

โžก๏ธ Their role is limited to access to the Translate tab: they have no visibility on the rest of the survey (questions in the main language, settings, resultsโ€ฆ).

๐Ÿ’ก Tip: assign one translator per location or per language, who can check or correct the translation in their native language.

A translator can be added at three different points in the survey's editing process: when creating from a template, when creating from scratch, or from a survey already saved as a draft.

From creating a survey based on a template

  1. Go to Survey > Create a survey.
  1. Choose to create your survey from a template, then select the template you want.
  1. Click the pencil icon โœ๏ธ next to Subject, then enter the building language and the translation languages, and click Save.
  1. Click the pencil icon โœ๏ธ next to Contributors.
  1. Click Add a contributor.
  1. Search for the relevant person, then click Add.
  1. The default role shown is Owner: click on it to switch it to Translator.

๐Ÿ’ก Tip: assign a translator per location, who can check or correct the translation in their native language.

From creating a survey from scratch

  1. Go to Survey > Create a survey.
  1. Choose to create your survey from scratch.
  1. Fill in step 1: Title and description.
  1. In step 2, Add contributors: search for the relevant person, then click Add.
  1. The default role shown is Owner: click on it to switch it to Translator

From a survey already saved as a draft

  1. Go to Survey > Manage > Draft.
  1. Click Edit on the relevant survey.
  1. Go to step 2/3 โ€“ Add contributors.
  1. Search for the relevant person, then click Add.
  1. The default role shown is Owner: click on it to switch it to Translator.
  1. Finally, click the cross in the top right, then click Save changes.

๐Ÿ“ง Translator access to the survey

Once added as a Translator contributor, the employee receives an email.

  • If they have never logged in to Zest before, they receive a welcome email and will need to set up their password (unless they log in via SSO).
  • To then access the translation, they go to Survey > Manage > Draft > Edit: they land directly on the translation steps, without access to the rest of the survey.

โ„น๏ธ Note: the translator can only edit the Translate tab, in line with their limited contributor scope (see "The translator's role" above).

โœ… Good to know

  • Automatic translations are generated from the text you enter in the main language.
  • You can manually edit the translated versions at any time.
  • Participants will automatically see the version of the survey in the language set in their Zest profile (if available).

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