Effective Marketing in Translation

Effective Marketing in Translation


Specialisation and USP

If you are about to embark on a career in translation, it is essential to choose a specialisation and indentify your Unique Selling Point (USP). USP is a gimmick – something which could give you an advantage over your competitors. It could be something to do with your background, licenses, acquaintances, additional skills or hidden talents. Often people don’t realise if they are using their full potential, so this is something to think about. Of course your specialisation could be your Unique Selling Point – if it’s rare.

Indentifying your core client base

If you’re specialising in a particular field, your marketing is much simpler because you know who your clients are. Of course, there would be variety of types of jobs. Every translator outside of his/her main area of expertise, often translates: general texts, love letters, statements and brochures. The crucial question which you should always ask yourself while you get paid is: why do I make money? Is this because of your experience, price, lucrative deals, good referrals, location or your availability?

Marketing in Translation

Marketing in Translation is extremely difficult because translation is a niche industry and relatively very few need our service. Usually, it takes a detective work to establish who might be our potential clients, although I’ve met busy translators who didn’t even have a website, and all their workload was achieved through academic progression and referrals. This way mainly exists in Poland where a translator, after qualifying, puts a plaque “sworn translator” on his/her doors and waits for phone calls.
In the current highly competitive environment, I would advise to consider the whole range of ways to promote your service.






Ways of promoting your service:



Website

A website is your calling card. Most people get a website to look more professional and to give more information about themselves.

Except this, a website is a way of promoting service through Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) – making your website popular in search engine results (for chosen terms). From my own observations, 95% of translators know nothing about SEO, so even if you learnt the basics, your website would get more visits. If you want to learn more on this subject, I recommend an ebook called “How To Really Make $5,000 Per Month Online” by Court Tuttle. The ebook is about making money on blogging but the same rules apply to optimising all others types of websites. Once you studied the book, you will have the knowledge needed to get your website easily found in Google and you will save on professional, but expensive SEO fees.


Online ads

Online adverts is the option to consider. However most of online marketing experts don’t recommend this method when your website is relatively young. Online advertising is something supplementary to SEO. In order to use this method successfully, you have to make sure your website has a good conversion rate and it’s trustworthy. Otherwise, you could lose money.
To purchase and create your ad contact Google of Facebook. Underneath the page there’s a little bar which says advertising. You can limit your daily budget and decide if you want to be charged by clicks or impressions.


Sending emails

Be cautious about using emailing programs because, in most cases, your message will get to a spam box. Write real emails to real people. If it is possible try to find out the name of the person you are writing to.


Blogging and social media networks

Blogging and social media networks are great for enhancing your publicity. It’s all about getting to know more people, sharing knowledge and ideas, and doing referrals when a job comes in.

It is a bad practise if you attempt to sell stuff or service on Facebook, Twitter or Blog. Most people don’t like that. But remember that your writing needs to have a value for the reader. You will have to decide if you use social media for social purposes or for networking. For instance I use my Facebook Wall for interesting philosophical discussions or industry related thoughts, something too personal has no value and sometimes can be embarrassing.


Calling and contacting face to face your potential clients

If you can call or see a potential client, do so. This is not only a way of telling who you are and what you do, but an opportunity to verify or get precious information. Don’t rely only on the internet. Without interpersonal skills, you will be like those people who send hundreds of applications and don’t want to learn how this world really works.



Final words: never rely only on one way of promoting yourself – use all of them. World constantly changes this is why we need to adapt. Do at least one thing a day to promote yourself.