Training for Translators

Classes for translators and interpreters

Marketing


Corinne McKay

Responding to a request for quote

When you receive an “out of the blue” request for a quote from a potential translation client, what’s the best next step? Is it more advantageous to call the client, e-mail them, ask for more information or send them a rate sheet…or something else entirely? The beauty of impromptu inquiries from potential clients is that you, the translator, are in the position of power. Rather than attempting to sell the potential client on the value of your services, the potential client is coming to you. So, it’s important to decide how to convert this inquiry into a new client. Let’s take a look at some potential courses of action.

First, read the potential client’s e-mail carefully; note the information that they provide and don’t provide, because this will give you some clues as to the client’s level of seriousness and their knowledge of what translation involves. Look at the client’s website and/or Google them to get a sense of their business. Then, decide how to respond to the potential client; for example you might:

  • Call them or ask them to call you. I’m really not a phone person, but I do think that a phone call makes a good impression. You can get a sense of the client’s personality and they can get a sense of yours, you can chat about the project, what translations they’ve had done in the past and what they are looking for in this translation. My only hesitation with phoning a potential client is that I like to get the important project details (i.e. rate, turnaround time, other terms of service) in writing. So, if you take this tactic I think it’s important to follow up with a brief e-mail, for example, “Thank you very much for taking the time to speak with me this morning. Just to confirm the details of our conversation, I will be translating the document we discussed at a rate of X cents per source word and I will deliver it to you by 5PM Eastern time on Friday. I accept payment by check or wire transfer and the full payment is due within 30 days of the date on which I deliver the translation.”
  • E-mail them and ask for more information. It’s unlikely that the client’s initial e-mail included all of the information that you need, so you might e-mail them and ask some of the questions listed above. Thank them for contacting you and let them know that in order to provide them with a detailed quote, you’ll need to get some more information.
  • E-mail them your basic information about rates and terms of service. In part, I think that your response to potential clients should be guided by how much you need or want the work. Responding with some prepared information, for example “I’m attaching my 2010 rate sheet which includes my per-word and hourly rates as well as my standard terms of service, feel free to look these over and then let me know if I can provide you with a detailed quote” may not be the most personal way to respond to an inquiry, but it saves your time and immediately weeds out clients whose budget is much less than what you charge.

Whichever strategy you choose, make sure to lay the groundwork for a successful translator/client relationship. For example:

  • Respond promptly to all inquiries from potential clients. Even if you don’t want to provide a quote on the project, respond and let the potential client know that.
  • Clarify your payment terms and methods; decide whether you want first-time clients to pay all or part of the project fee in advance.
  • Ask the client to confirm the rate, deadline and payment terms in writing. This can be as simple as a very short e-mail or can take the form of a service agreement or purchase order, but make sure that you and the client agree in writing on these important details.
  • Ask the client for their accounts payable person’s contact information. For example, “Please let me know the e-mail address and phone number of the person to whom I should send my invoice, and let me know who I should contact if I have a question about the payment.”

Any other tips for responding successfully to inquiries?


Corinne McKay

Marketing your services to translation agencies

Whether to work with direct clients, translation agencies or both is a personal and business decision. I work with both types of clients and I feel that this mix keeps my work volume and income up while giving me a wide range of projects to choose from. Paula Dieli’s blog has an insightful interview with Peter Berends, the primary translator recruiter at LUZ, Inc. (a medical translation company). It’s well worth a read if you’re looking for agency clients. Here are some additional tips, and feel free to add your own!

  • Target your marketing. As Peter comments in the interview, there’s no bigger turnoff than a generic, carbon-copied e-mail asking for work. The more personalized your e-mail is, the better. For example, something like “Your agency’s focus on the translation of annual reports caught my eye; during the 2010 annual report season I translated all or part of five companies’ annual reports and I would love to help you with similar types of projects” is much more attention-grabbing than “Dear Sir or Madam, I would like to offer you my services.”
  • Don’t lump all agencies together. Yes, in general agencies pay less than direct clients and also add a middle layer between the translator and the client (which can be a plus or a minus depending on the project and the client). However, top-quality agencies pay respectably and can save you some of the administrative overhead that comes with working for direct clients. Just as in every other business sector, there are agencies that operate on the Wal-Mart model and agencies that operate on the Mercedes-Benz model.
  • Charge real money and earn it. I think that a lot of translators eschew the agency market because they think it’s all 8 cents a word and 5,000 words for tomorrow. Insider tip: it’s not. I think that quality-conscious agencies know that quality-conscious translators save them money because their work needs less editing and they help keep the agency’s own clients coming back. Give some metrics of your quality: you proofread a hard copy of every translation (no missing text, no untranslated text); you compile a list of queries and send them all at once, allowing time to get the queries resolved before the deadline (no endless stream of e-mails to the already-busy PM, no file submitted right at the deadline with queries still outstanding); you always meet or beat your deadlines (no stressed-out PM having to make excuses to the end client).
  • Focus on high-margin projects. For example if you actively seek out projects on which you can produce 500 finished words per hour and you charge 15 cents per word, you’re earning $75 per hour. I think that it’s also fine to let your agency clients know that you are most interested in medium to large projects, for example $500 or more. High-margin projects can also come in unexpected places, as I described in a previous post about translating official documents. Each invoice might be small, but on most official document translations I make at least 50 cents per word.
  • Use the objective data that is available to you. Don’t market to agencies as if you’re throwing spaghetti against a wall; pick some agencies that mesh with your business goals and market just to them. For example, search the Payment Practices database for agencies that are rated highly by other translators.
  • In general, target small and medium agencies. Not every big agency is a sweatshop, but I think that in general, large agencies are geared toward the high volume, low margin market. In addition, you’re more likely to find small and medium agencies that work primarily or exclusively in your specializations.


Corinne McKay

The tyranny of the sub-goal

I learned the expression “the tyranny of the sub-goal” from my husband, who most frequently applies it to chores around the house, as in “We need to paint the living room but before that we have to fix the hole in the sheetrock where we smashed the corner of the washing machine into the wall.” Painting the living room is the goal, but since both of us despise doing drywall, the hole in the drywall becomes the lingering sub-goal that holds up the whole project. I had always assumed that this expression was some sort of standard IT-guy-speak but it actually doesn’t return any Google hits, so maybe it’s an original!

I think that there’s a lot of truth to the idea of the tyrannical sub-goal, and I also think that attacking these sub-goals usually takes less time than you’ve already spent procrastinating and complaining about them.  I recently experienced this when I had to update the Colorado Translators Association bylaws for our upcoming election. I’m ashamed to even calculate (much less admit) how much time and emotional energy I had spent avoiding this task, and the whole election process was on hold because of it. Once I sat down and just did it, the total time from when I opened the file until I finished the edits was 13 minutes. Right: in about the same amount of time it takes me to brew a cup of coffee and return a phone call, I was done with the task that had been haunting me for weeks. Here are some typical translator sub-goals:

  • Website and résumé updates seem to be at the root of a lot of translators’ goal achievement problems. “I have this great marketing plan but I don’t want to implement it because I’m embarrassed to send clients to my website.” “I want to pursue a new specialization but first I have to redo my résumé and it’s taking me forever,” etc.
  • Small research tasks can also tyrannize your work life. For example, I’ve been thinking of hiring an intern but first I need to research the applicable employment laws related to paid and unpaid internships, so the idea is on hold.
  • Tasks that you despise are ripe for sub-goal tyranny. For me, it’s paperwork and accounting. This year I delayed preparing my W-2, which delayed getting my tax prep materials to my accountant, etc. etc. etc.

And some ideas for defeating them:

  • Create an external deadline. A lot of sub-goals remain unconquered because unlike our regular work, the time frame for completing them exists only in our heads. In addition, when a sub-goal has been on the to do list for a really long time, we no longer have any sense of urgency about it. The marketing plan? Well, if it didn’t get done in all of 2009, then does it really matter if it happens this week or in six months? So, create a deadline. Ask a colleague if he or she is available to proofread your résumé on Monday. Invite a friend over to usability-test your website next week. Then, you have to have the task completed by that date.
  • Admit defeat and hire someone to complete the sub-goal for you. This year I decided that although I’m generally anti-outsourcing, I had to hire someone to do my corporate payroll and I’m very happy with the results.
  • Decide that you don’t want to achieve the sub-goal. When you’re generally a 120 percenter (I love this expression, coined by Michelle Obama), it’s tough to throw in the towel on a task without feeling like a failure. However, I think that it’s important to be honest with yourself about your sub-goals. Sometimes the sub-goal remains undone because a certain project no longer seems important, relevant, fun or profitable to you. Then, cross the sub-goal off your list and let it go: and move on to something that really inspires you!


Corinne McKay

Potential clients and sticker shock

Wiktionary defines sticker shock as “Disgust, shock or fright upon learning the price of an item offered for sale,” and this roughly describes the reaction of many would-be translation buyers when they learn the price of a professional translation. This leaves the professional translator with a dilemma: how to handle a sticker-shocked client.

In my experience, sticker-shocked clients come in two basic flavors: translation buyers who are somewhat informed about the translation market and translation buyers who are not at all informed about the translation market. I feel that I can deal fairly well with the first group: generally low-paying translation agencies that are out of touch with what quality-conscious translators charge. Because I feel (or at least hope) that these translation buyers have some inkling of what good translations cost, I don’t tend to get overly involved with them. As in:

Agency: “Our budget for this project is X.”
Translator: “I appreciate the contact, but my base rate is X times 2.”
Agency: “You can’t offer a discount?”
Translator: “I’m fortunate to be very busy at those rates, so unfortunately not.”

I find it much harder to deal with potential clients who, through no fault of their own, are completely out of touch with how much a professional translation will cost. In these situations, I’m often unsure how to allow the potential client to save face while delivering the news that the project will cost two or five or ten times what the potential client has budgeted. As in:

Potential client describes a really interesting-sounding translation project that is right up the translator’s alley. Then, the conversation turns to money.

Potential client: “So, can you give me an idea of approximately how much this would cost?”
Translator: “Well, in order to give you a firm quote I would need to see the full text of the book and we would need to talk about your deadline, delivery format, etc.”
Potential client: “But just as a ballpark figure, can you give me an idea?”
Translator: “Right, just as an example I translated a book of similar length a couple of months ago and the total cost was $7,500.”
Potential client: “Sorry? You mean $750, right?”

Over the past year I’ve had several conversations similar to the one above. These leave me feeling terrible for a few reasons: often, the potential client is *really* excited about the project. Sometimes it’s a book they’ve written themselves, sometimes it’s their grandmother’s journal that’s just been found in the family attic, sometimes it’s a book on a topic they feel passionate about and for which there is very little information available in English. I’m also unsure how much it’s worth helping these potential clients from sticker shock to acceptance. Sometimes I empathize with them (“I know, if you’ve never used a translator before it’s a shock to find out how much it costs”), sometimes I try a little client education (“I’m sure that you can find someone cheaper or even free, but consider the risk of ending up with an unusable translation”) and sometimes I just try to end the conversation. However, I feel that there must be a better way to handle this and bring these clients around to an awareness of what professional translation costs.

Any sticker shock coping strategies from the readers?


Corinne McKay

Some thoughts on business cards

Despite the explosion in online and offline marketing techniques, the lowly business card remains one of the most cost-effective and widely used marketing materials in a freelance translator’s arsenal. Small, inexpensive, customizable, easy to distribute… business cards have a lot of advantages, so it’s worth looking at what makes a good (and bad) business card.

I currently have three sets of business cards: plain, fancy and bilingual:

I use each of these cards for different purposes. The plain cards (on top) are inexpensive (about $50 for 500) to produce and they have my specializations on them, so I put large stacks of them out when I attend a conference or give a presentation. The fancy cards (middle) have an image from the cover of my book; they’re more expensive to produce (about $60 for 250) because of the custom image and because I have them printed on heavy stock. I use these for direct clients and when I mail out official document translations. The bilingual cards (bottom; only the French side is shown) are the most expensive ($80 for 250) because they’re double-sided and I have them printed by a local company instead of ordering them online.

Business card designs are very personal; my tendency is to go for a look that might be termed either classic or boring, depending on your design tastes. I’ve seen a lot of cluttered, illegible business cards but I’ve also seen some non-traditional cards that really work: for example a conference interpreter whose card background is a photograph of him in the booth. Judy Jenner recently wrote a post on this card (a court interpreter’s card that doubles as a guide to the courthouse where he works) which I also thought was clever. If you like something a little on the cute side, I thought this was a neat idea; a literary translator who commissioned an illustration of herself for her business cards.

Most of all, your business cards need to convey the information that they’re meant to convey: make sure that your name and contact information are easy to find and read. Don’t load the card with extraneous information: after receiving exactly one fax last year, I dropped my fax number from my 2010 cards. Don’t make your cards too specific if the specifics might change; for example if you vary your specializations, don’t put them on your cards. And please, please don’t order the free cards that say “Order your free business cards at…” At least be willing to spend $25 on your cards so that they don’t have that imprint on them.

Any other business card tips?