Since I love everything Copyblogger, I took their Copywriting essentials from A to Z and recycled it into this post for freelance translators. No “essentials” are to be found here, though—just an alphabet soup of things I’ve learned over the past two years.
Action
Always take action. When business slows down, you can approach potential clients, fix up your website (read Translators and marketing for inspiration), and get more exercise. More suggestions can be found on Dealing with freelancing famine, especially about social media.
Back up
I’ve never lost my hard drive, but I’m not taking any chances. I usually back up my work once a week on an external hard drive, and I email myself my works-in-progress every evening.
Courses
Do some sort of training every year. You might want to read this review of the NYU Certificate in Translation, or see what’s going on at eCPD Webinars.
Deadlines
Never EVER miss a deadline.
Be good at email. Show courtesy and professionalism by writing clear, concise emails that come with appropriate subject lines.
And think about getting a proper email address. The Oatmeal explains why you should have your own domain.
Catherine Translates in on Facebook. Feel free to post your nuggets of wisdom and flashes of brilliance.
Grammar
That versus which. Think ‘define’ versus ‘describe’. Who versus whom. Think ‘he’ versus ‘him’.
If you follow the Chicago Manual of Style, subscribe to the excellent 9 months with the CMOS. This grammar nut was giving his readers the silent treatment for a while, but has promised to make a comeback.
Home office setup
Think about ergonomics and good desk chairs. We only get one body in life.
Industry events
Show up. Stay relevant. Come prepared.
Jobs
We won’t lose any worthwhile translation jobs because of a silly translator blacklist run by a cheating agency. The market is huge, and you only need ten good, regular clients.
Kindness
Good vibes here: 10 kind things you can do to help another freelancer. What are you waiting for?
Only one client has contacted me via LinkedIn. And I’m happy to report that she’s given me over a dozen translations to do. It’s worth having a good LinkedIn profile up.
Marketing
If you have more money than brains, you should focus on outbound marketing. If you have more brains than money, you should focus on inbound marketing.
Network
Join a professional association. The best move I made when I set up shop was to become a member of the Société française des traducteurs. Since early 2010 I’ve attended a seminar about getting your first clients, a workshop on writing skills, a webinar on social media, and many, many Saturday morning get-togethers featuring translation-related presentations, and I’ve met many talented, inspiring colleagues.
One task at a time
Multi-tasking is overrated. Do one thing at a time.
Passwords
Make all your passwords unbreakable. You already know that passwords should contain a nice mix of capital and small letters, numbers, and symbols.
If I ever say “LOL” in a tweet, FB update, or email, that is not me. Notify me immediately about my hacked account.
Questions
When you don’t understand something in your source text, ask. Don’t send an email each time you get stuck. Put all questions in a single email.
Rest
As an experienced practitioner of naps, I can attest to their value in terms of productivity and cheer. Nap insights can be found in Do you nap? The comments are wonderful.
Spend money
We should expect to invest in our businesses.
After a busy spring, I renewed my SFT membership, bought Dragon Dictate, hired someone to set up this self-hosted blog, and signed up for more training.
I am now thinking of buying Translation Office 3000 (I’d love to read a good review of it) and a CAT tool (first time for everything). I also want to attend a conference in North America next year.
Do not tweet unwisely. Actual tweet from a freelance translator (I looked at her profile after she had retweeted my blog post):
@friend Can’t talk now. I’m an hour past deadline.
USP
What is your unique selling proposition? Alex Eames talks about differentiation in Four facets of marketing for freelance translators.
Voice Recognition
I now use Dragon Dictate, and my back, elbows and wrists are happy. So is my bum.
Writers
Translators are writers. If you need convincing, read Are you a writer? and Moving beyond garbage-in garbage-out translations.
Wendell Ricketts:
A translator’s most essential skill is the ability to write in her or his native language—and I mean write not adequately, but superbly. It’s a radical position, but I don’t think it can be emphasized enough. Writing skills come before language skills.
Xmas cards
Remind your clients that you exist. Send them holiday greetings by snail mail.
Yoga
Take four minutes to do this desk yoga. If you’re sitting, you don’t even have to get up.
Zest
Do work you love. Specialize in an area you want to keep learning about.
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Comments appreciated, as always.
{ 7 comments… read them below or add one }
Really enjoyed reading this Catherine. Thanks for posting.
All good advice, but your back-up method sounds a bit long-winded.
As you’re using Dragon Dictate, I assume you use a Mac. If so, why not use the excellent Time Machine back-up function? It backs up your entire system automatically every hour without you having to do anything.
It’s one of the best features of Mac OS X, and also makes it very easy to migrate everything to a new computer when you buy one.
@Liz, I’m glad you liked it.
@Matt, thanks for the tip!
I enjoy your blog very much. Keep up the good work, Catherine.
Jonathan
Thanks for the post. Pleasant to read and to the point.
Just discovered your blog. What a refreshing read! Especially for those ‘need-a-break-but-should-really-be getting-this-project-finished moments…
Read a few posts and got the energy back to carry on working…Thanks!
Jonathan, Talli, and Victoria, thanks for reading :)