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an archive of content from ≈ 2005 - 2015, relating to international business, translation, freelancing, and working online.

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Guerrilla word-fare

by Sarah Dillon

A metal toolbox.

Guerrilla marketing involves taking a non-traditional approach to meeting conventional marketing goals. Best of all, it’s a way for small fry to successfully compete with the big players in the industry by applying a toolbox of tricks that no self-respecting translator should be without.

In fact, it’s probably more accurate to describe guerrilla marketing as a mindset. Key to its adoption is the understanding that marketing is not just about trying to sell your services. Marketing involves everything you do in the process of carrying out your day-to-day business activities (including the clients you choose to work with).

The really interesting thing about all this is that when you take a guerrilla approach to marketing, the question of whether to use [insert preferred web 2.0 tool here] is no longer relevant. Instead the question becomes what exactly do these online tools offer, and how can you apply them to meet your specific, offline goals.

If you want to read a little bit more about guerrilla marketing, I recommend downloading this free pdf called Guide to Guerrilla Marketing for Consultants. It doesn’t refer to web 2.0 directly but it does give a really useful framework on which to hang your activities.

Image via Wikipedia

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Last updated: 23 September, 2008 by Sarah Dillon. Filed Under: Business of translation, Marketing for language professionals Tagged With: advertising, business, Client relationships, guerrilla marketing, Marketing for language professionals, online presence

5 Qs with Christian Arno, Lingo24

by Sarah Dillon

Armed with a degree in languages, Christian Arno founded Lingo24 Translation Services from his bedroom in Aberdeen in 2001, with a view to harnessing internet technologies from day one. Today, Lingo24 operates out of London, Aberdeen, New York, Paris, Berlin, Cham, Christchurch, Tokyo, Timişoara and Shanghai… Here are Christian’s thoughts on building a ‘virtual’ business.

Sarah Dillon: Hi Christian. Can you tell us what a ‘typical’ day looks like for you (if there is such a thing!)? What kinds of tasks do you tend to take on as managing director of Lingo24?

Christian Arno: There really isn’t such a thing as a typical day (thank goodness)! My three main roles are to take the time to talk to Lingo24’s senior and departmental managers and help them formulate and deliver on ambitious development plans; to travel between our operations throughout the world helping to make sure we’re all singing from the same hymnsheet; and to monitor closely developments with our clients and within the industry making sure that we are always implementing the brightest ideas in translation quicker and better than everyone else!

SD: How has founding an online translation company differed from your expectations? What have been your greatest moments and biggest challenges?

CA: To be honest, I didn’t really have any expectations as to how things would happen. The core idea behind Lingo24 – to use Internet technologies to make translation more efficient – just seemed an obvious one at the time, and one existing translation companies weren’t taking advantage of. Now, of course, lots of companies are doing similar things, so it’s important that we continue to innovate.

The greatest moments are always when you see you’ve got a special culture going. We had one two days ago on a beach in Panama – there were ten people from our Americas operation and two from our European operation, and we had an absolute ball. Everyone got on so well, and you could see how good the atmosphere in the company is. That, to me, is what it’s all about. We have a ‘positive feedback’ reporting system and that is also hugely motivational for me. When you see clients talking about Lingo24 in glowing terms it shows you’re helping.

I’d say the biggest challenges have been coping with downturns in the business – I’ve hated having to let good people go, but am confident that won’t happen again. Other than that, the cultural differences between all the people we interact with are a constant challenge – but then, like everyone in the industry, I consider that part of the fun.

SD: Any tips for freelance translators on developing an online marketing strategy?

CA: I’d say there are two steps: firstly, decide on a niche area (language combination and subject matter) you’re interested in with good growth prospects, and become the best translator in the world in that area – a genuine expert; then, create a website based around the key phrases prospective clients (both translation companies and end clients) might use to find you, and blog continuously about your work. If you can get others in a similar but not competitive area to link to your site, and use industry sites and social networking sites to engage with your peers, you’ll soon build a strong online profile.

SD: At a conference I attended, your operations director spoke about developing a homeworking mindset among employees. Any insights or experiences you could share about that process?

CA: Lingo24 attracts strong, independent-minded individuals – and we need them, given our reliance on home-working. As a general point, I’d say if you go down this route, you need to be much more organised in terms of communication, and you need to make sure you’ve got well-defined means in place to measure performance.

SD: What do you read — in print and online — to keep up with developments in your field?

CA: I read the Common Sense Advisory blog and love John Yunker’s Bytelevel. I read pretty widely beyond that. My favourite publication is the Economist – I find it immensely informative and the wry humour behind it is refreshing.

Thanks for featuring in my first 5 Qs, Christian!

Last updated: 17 September, 2008 by Sarah Dillon. Filed Under: Marketing for language professionals, Real-life translators (5 Qs), Technology for translators Tagged With: online presence, translation companies

Blogging does not put us ahead of the pack

by Sarah Dillon

KYOTO, JAPAN - FEBRUARY 9: Ichimame, an 19-yea...

Are Gen Y committing the cardinal sin of believing our own hype? I’m afraid we might be. Blogging may be a great way to get noticed in our respective fields, but let’s not allow our mastery of fancy technology to lull us into thinking we’re achieving something we’re not.

In a radio interview  a few years back*, career advisor Penelope Trunk said something that made me think, “No, no, no, NO!”. She said:

The people who are blogging about their careers are the top performers, because it is so hard to blog. It’s so hard to be constantly thinking about your profession and to be gathering new ideas and putting out new ideas and having conversations about it, that only the best people, only the best employees are blogging and following blogs…

There are lots of things that make someone a top performer – hard work, talent, experience.  But blogging? I really don’t think so. It may be a common denominator among successful or highly motivated employees, but I bet it’s also common among employees who are bored, or disillusioned, or really, really ticked off too.

Penelope does a great job of giving a voice to a sub-culture and I really admire the time and effort she puts into helping young bloggers find their voices. But in this particular case, I think she’s in danger of mis-managing expectations. I think it’s dangerous to believe that just because someone blogs, they’re a top performer or the best kind of employee. And it’s especially dangerous for younger bloggers to believe this, as it plays into all the worst kind of stereotyping of Generation Y-ers.

There’s no doubt that it’s hard to be constantly thinking about your profession, and formulating ‘new’ ideas. But who’s to say we’re coming up with anything really new? An idea or concept might be new to me, but that doesn’t mean it’s new to everyone else in my field too. I’d be embarrassed if anyone thought I was under the illusion that I was contributing to my field in anything other than a general way. (And by general I mean that if someone learns from my mistakes, then all the better).

The main issue here is that we’re in danger of confusing style with substance. Blogging is just a tool we can choose to employ for any number of purposes. Personally, I blog to learn, not because I’m any kind of ‘expert’. Blogging is simply one way to consolidate all the information I come into contact with everyday. It doesn’t in itself make me any different to another professional translator who might choose to use a different set of tools to track their development.

Blogging with an authoritative voice is an accepted means of writing for the web, but let’s not fall into the trap of believing our own hype. That’s just setting ourselves up to look dumb when it turns out that we’re only learning what a lot of other people have already worked out for themselves – and in a much less painful and self-absorbed way. I’d heartily advocate using blogging as a means of developing professionally, but I’d also recommend being clear on how sure you are of your ideas, and at what stage you’re at in the opinion-formulating process. Anything else and we’re just giving blogging a bad name.

Image by Getty Images via Daylife

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Sept 2012: This interview was with Peter Clayton on Total Picture Radio in the latter part of 2008 – no longer available online. 

Last updated: 2 September, 2008 by Sarah Dillon. Filed Under: Marketing for language professionals, Professional development, Technology for translators Tagged With: blogging, Brazen Careerist, Generation Y, online presence, Professional development, web 2.0

List of 85 translator-related blogs

by Sarah Dillon

Thanks for dropping by. See my more recent, updated page listing these translation blogs and more at http://www.dillonslattery.com/translation-blogs – Sarah

—-

There’s been a huge increase in the number of translation blogs over the past year or so. When I started blogging (very sporadically) in 2006, it felt like there were very few of us out there – now there’s a vast community and it’s very exciting to be a part of it!

Here’s a list of translation blogs that I follow from my feed reader. Some of these are more active than others and there’s a definite bias towards my own language combinations of French, Spanish, German and English. But if they’re in my feed reader, it’s because I like reading them.

I normally prefer to synthesise this kind of information before posting it to my blog. So I normally only include certain blogs in my blogroll, for example, or I run occasional blog round-ups. But my list of blogs to write about has gotten so long that I don’t know where to start! So until I catch up, here’s the raw data – happy reading.

yndigo
Working Languages
What’s New – Language Translation
Versión Original
ÜberSetzerLogbuch
ÜBERSETZER IM INTERNET
transubstantiation
TransMUG
Translator’s Musings
TRANSLATOR’S BLOG
Translator Support
Translator Power
TranslationMaven
translationfound
Translation, Language, Culture
Translation rants
Translation Quality Blog
Translation Notes
Translation Journal Blog
Translation in the Trenches
Translation For Lawyers
Translating is an Art
Translate This!
Transblawg
Traduction technique, interprétariat et coaching en anglais
TraduBits
Tips4translators
Tips for Translators
Thoughts On Translation
There’s Something About Translation…
The translator’s cafe
the court interpreter
T4T blog
Switch Off And Let’s Go
Spanish Translation Blog
Sinoed
Sabela Cebro Barreiro Traductora profesional
Poetry for Vadney
Pasión por la traducción
Pandemonium
Oversetter
Open Brackets
Nouvelles News de Zesty Dormouse
Transblawg
Musings of the Mad Wordsmith (and other things)
Musings from an overworked translator
Masked Translator
Maremagnum
Mac For Translators
luke spear online
life in translation
Las palabras son pistolas cargadas
LA TRADUCCIÓN AL DESCUBIERTO
Jianjun’s Blog
Irma Ferran Teacher of Languages and Freelance Translator
Into Spanish Translation Blog
In Other Words
ICE Upcoming Events
How To IFL Freelancer’s Blog
HeidiLives&Learns
germantranslation
FIELD NOTES
Estudiantes de Traducción e Interpretación
Enigmatic Mermaid
En Translation
Elisabeth Hippe Heisler
eel in the air
DolmetschBlog
Dispatches from an environmental translator’s desk
De traducciones y otras rarezas lingüísticas
Christof’s Blog
Brave New Words
Boston Translation
Blogging Translator
Blog.MotsAndCo.com
Around the world in 80 Mays
ALTAlk Blog
Algo más que traducir
Ad Libs
About Translation
A World of Translation Work
A Translator’s Blog
“la parole exportée”
¿Se habla English? Life of a Translator

31.08.08 Update: thanks for all the link-backs and positive feedback to this post! I’ve added hyperlinks and tidied up the list ofr ease of use.

Last updated: 14 August, 2008 by Sarah Dillon. Filed Under: Marketing for language professionals Tagged With: blogging, online presence, real translators

Map of Online Communities

by Sarah Dillon

For anyone who has ever found themselves lost in the tangle of Web 2.0…


Source: http://xkcd.com/256/

Last updated: 19 April, 2008 by Sarah Dillon. Filed Under: Marketing for language professionals, Technology for translators Tagged With: online presence

An outtage doesn't have to leave you down and out

by Sarah Dillon

I love thinking of different ways to be more mobile (or “location independent“) as a translator. One of the ways I do this is by trialling different web-based applications to see which best suit my needs. For example, I’m currently using Backpack, an organiser with a calendar, to do lists, notes, etc. to help me stay on top of both work and personal tasks.

So you can imagine how I felt last Friday when I logged in see to this (read from the bottom up):

Photobucket

Thankfully, I hadn’t been left high and dry. I’ve been using Backpack with PackRat, an application which works with Backpack, but which stores all your information on your computer like any other application. This meant I was able to access my information as usual, with no excuse not to get cracking on my to-do list. Phew.

So why is this remotely blog-worthy? This experience probably confirms the worst fears of a whole lot of people, but it hasn’t put me off using web-based tools and I’m convinced that it shouldn’t deter anyone else either.

Even before Friday, I was never seriously worried about my data being irretrievably lost. I’ve carried out my due diligence and I figure that the makers of Backpack are no more likely to lose my data than I am (and even less likely than the UK government, by all accounts). Nor am I excessively concerned about my personal data being “held” and potentially used for sinister commercial reasons – I don’t particularly like the idea, but I don’t buy the misinformed conspiracy theories either. I view it the same way I do my accounts with eBay, Amazon, Hotmail, or any other wonder of the internet age. Anything that important, or that confidential, is backed up and/or not uploaded in the first place. (I’m not using Backpack to store translations or client documents, for example.)

Most of all, there really is no excuse for not backing up regularly, especially as a professional with responsibility to your clients. Backpack’s outtage just emphazises that moving data server-side doesn’t relieve us of this responsibility. We can’t control when the technology is going to fail, we only know that it will; so shame on us if we’re caught out. It’s an oldie, but a goodie.

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Last updated: 23 January, 2008 by Sarah Dillon. Filed Under: Marketing for language professionals, Working habits Tagged With: online presence

There's Something About Translation: 2007 in review

by Sarah Dillon

I’m going to do a more in-depth review of my experience of blogging after March 2008, the 12 month anniversary of when I started to regularly blog. In the meantime, here’s a quick’n’dirty review of 2007, based on Google Analytics stats from the entire year:

Top 10 most popular posts

  1. Harry Potter in translation
  2. Swear words
  3. Key phrases
  4. Join the translation neighbourhood watch
  5. What are you worth? Don’t be a monkey
  6. Knowing your worth
  7. I signed up for payscale
  8. Translating in Dublin’s Fair City
  9. Friday funnies: Make the naked translator into a super translator
  10. A chance to prove yourself

Top 10 keywords entered into search engines to find this blog

  1. chand lakhwani proz (by a LONG shot – not sure why or how, either!)
  2. naked translator
  3. freelance translat english to portuguese blog (again, not sure why this exact search string is so popular, or why it finds me…)
  4. grindhopper
  5. the naked translator
  6. nakedtranslator something
  7. about translation
  8. jed schmidt (yay to the original mobile translator!)
  9. harry potter translations (still going strong. If it was traffic pure and simple I was after, I’d build an entire blog around this. Too easy… )
  10. naked translation

Top sites referring visitors to this blog

  1. Google
  2. Nakedtranslations.com
  3. Deweymonster.com
  4. entraduisant.splinder.com
  5. life-in-translation.blogspot.com
  6. armiebagagli.splinder.com
  7. margaret-marks.com
  8. blog.penelopetrunk.com
  9. iti-wmg.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk
  10. Bloglines.com

I’m pleased with how the year has gone in blogging terms. I only started to blog regularly from March, but posted a total of 100 times. I’ve experimented with different kinds of posts (lists, reports, quick link referrals, humourous posts, opinion pieces, etc.) and I hope I’ve started to find a more consistent voice for myself too. I’m looking forward to taking full stock of the experience later in the year!

For 2008, I’d like to continue to blog at an average of 2 – 3 posts per week, but hopefully concentrate a little more on opinion and reporting-style pieces. No doubt the blogosphere will have its own opinion, but I find I get more out of it when I take the time to craft an article of sorts about whatever has caught my attention at the time.

Onwards and upwards for us all, then!

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Last updated: 3 January, 2008 by Sarah Dillon. Filed Under: Moi Tagged With: online presence

Why Blog Action Day isn't just a pointless virtual gimmick

by Sarah Dillon

When I first read about Blog Action Day a couple of months back, I thought, “what better way to start off the week than with a warm fuzzy feeling from a spell on my soapbox (conveniently located by my unsustainably produced desk by my energy sucking computer) to blog about changing the world?!” Blog Action Day tomorrow is when millions of voices all over the world will unite to talk about one thing, but within the usual style and theme of their blogs. This year, the theme is the environment. Noble but yes, you could say I was wary of the idea.

I mean, I’m all for printing on both sides of my paper and hey, I even use energy-saving light bulbs. But I felt a not-entirely-irrational stab of annoyance at the thought of millions of bloggers carbon-footprinting it around with a glow of self-righteous indignation at the state of the world today. This is not because I feel powerless or believe that one person can’t make a difference when it comes to important issues (Margaret Mead’s quote “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has” is one of my favourites). I just wasn’t convinced that blogging was where we needed to be channelling our collective energy. Surely there’s not a person left in the blogosphere who isn’t aware of the environmental issues we face? Hasn’t the yet time come for ACTION?!

But yet [sigh], here I am, about to go green for Blog Action Day. So why the change of heart?

The main reason is lack of a better idea, if I’m honest 😉 Because whatever your view on virtual communications and online networking tools, there’s no denying the might of blogs. As of 7.23pm today, Technorati is tracking about 108.7 million blogs and with more than 175,000 added daily, that figure is only going up. More than 14,000 blogs have committed to posting on this year’s Blog Action Day. A small percentage, perhaps: but still a lot of words, no matter how you look at it.

I’ve also been thinking a lot about the impact of the virtual world on the “real” world lately. I like Tiffany Monhollon’s post about how the more wired we get, the more value we place on communication and action in more “traditional” forms. The impact of this year’s Blog Action Day is already evident in the political arena with Stavros Dimas, the European Union’s Environmental Commissioner, already lending strong support on his own blog and in traditional media too. Who’s to say that won’t translate into something even bigger and better?

But my cynicism really started to thaw when I realised how many bloggers were putting time and energy into thinking about how best to address this issue well in advance of tomorrow. I was impressed by their honesty in explaining their thoughts around the day. Best of all, not everyone was attempting to speak from an “expert” point of view.

So this is bigger than just me, yet without me, it wouldn’t be the same. That’s not being bigheaded, it’s true. Initiatives like that mean something to me. Finally, I figured that even if millions of posts on the environment had no effect whatsoever on blog readers, the time and energy put into crafting all these posts would have to prompt some bit of actionable change in the behaviour of us bloggers.

So why not?

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Last updated: 14 October, 2007 by Sarah Dillon. Filed Under: Moi Tagged With: online presence

Blogrushing Translators :)

by Sarah Dillon

You may notice I’ve added a new widget to my sidebar called Blogrush – the idea is it will display links to similar blogs, so if you enjoy There’s Something About Translation… then hopefully, you’ll see something you like there too. It’s still very much in its early phases and I expect it may take a bit of fiddling with before it becomes really useful – I’m willing to give it a chance but will be keeping a close, beady eye on it!

Of course, it should also help boost my traffic, and I’m curious to see what will happen there too.

If you have a blog yourself and are interested in getting more information about Blogrush, click here. It’s very easy to add and there are some excellent video tutorials on setting it up.

Last updated: 18 September, 2007 by Sarah Dillon. Filed Under: Technology for translators Tagged With: Blogrush, online presence

Key phrases

by Sarah Dillon

In a nod to (read: shameless hack of) the excellent Lauren Squires over at Polyglot Conspiracy, here are some of the search phrases that people have used to find me here at There’s Something About Translation… Why is this interesting? Well, if you’re working on building up your web presence, maybe you’ll get some ideas on keywords for your metatags. And if you already have a blog or website, maybe it will give you something interesting to compare your own stats with. Go on, post your analysis – I dare you 😉

freelance translat english to portuguese blog
grindhopper
naked translator
harry potter translations
translation careers
blog of freelance translator
books on translation invented words
naked translator blogspot
the naked translator
translating harry potter
translation jobs london 2012
translators for blogs
“running a translation business”
“tom riddle” copywriter
“translation coffee”
“worked for” transperfect
ate shot and left
best translation lessons
but there’s something about that name
cat translation courses
crew wanted and there cv 2007
female entrepreneur, translation
freelance translation earnings
get naked in spanish translation
grindhopper website
harry potter book differences countries chapter title
highest salary for freelance translators
hindu translator for mobile windows
how to get harry potter translated in to portugese
hungarian name anagram
im translatior
importance of invented words in harry potter
invented by ukrainian
is it a good idea to specialise in translation
is there a market for slovak translators
legal translation blog
naked blogspot freelance translator
naked in other languages
naked translator blog
naked translators
olympic games
out of office notice
poor translation spanish “harry potter”
role of proper names in books for children
something interesting about translation
spanish translation for i love you and i put it in spanish for the nosey people p.s continue to let people know that you are taken
starting out, translation rates
tax rate “freelance translator”
theory versus practice translation
there’s something about that name key of d
there’s something about translation… blog
thesis about the technique translation of horry potter from english to spanish
translate happy birthday in ukranian
translate my anagrams
translating labels in london
translation opportunities overseas
vietnamese translation of sara
voldemort anagram language
when is translation useful
work like translate harry potter in portuguese

OK, so some of these are completely random. And my Harry Potter in Translation post seemed to pull in plenty of random googlers too!

Last updated: 8 September, 2007 by Sarah Dillon. Filed Under: Marketing for language professionals Tagged With: keywords, online presence, website

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