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Now that March Marketing Madness has wrapped up (for the eighth year in a row, no one died from a continuous month of marketing!), I have two master classes on the calendar for April, both taught by me:

• How to prepare for (and pass!) an interpreting exam, a 90-minute session on Thursday, April 16. Registration is $60 and includes the recording. I’ll teach you the process I used to pass (on the first try!) three sets of high-stakes interpreting exams.
• Marketing to direct clients, using e-mail and LinkedIn. A two-hour session on Thursday, April 23. Registration is $75 and includes the recording. Especially if you’re new to direct client marketing, it can help to use tools you already know. We’ll discuss how to create a simple e-mail/LinkedIn/e-mail sequence to help break out of the analysis paralysis that holds a lot of people back!

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In episode 24 of the Training for Translators podcast, based on this blog post, I dissect a common freelance fear of the moment: “I feel dishonest marketing translation services, when clients could just do it themselves for free with AI!” I personally don’t share this concern, and in this episode, I explain why!

Listen in Apple Podcasts or Spotify, or right here!

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Free webinar on Friday

On Friday, March 27, guest instructor Samuel Mowry will teach a one-hour free webinar, An introduction to LSP.Expert. If you’re still using spreadsheets for accounting and project tracking, LSP.Expert is a better way! It’s designed by translators, at a fraction of the cost of programs like QuickBooks. Come learn what it’s all about! This session is not a sales pitch; it’s an informational introduction, after which you can try (or not) the free trial of the software. Registration is free and includes the recording.

Also, it’s interpreting exam season! On April 16, I’m teaching How to prepare for (and pass!) an interpreting exam. Registration is $75 and includes the recording.

“I try to motivate myself to market, but then I think…can’t clients just do this themselves with AI??”

It’s a common fear these days. I’ll admit that I don’t share this fear, which makes me either the best, or the worst, person to write about it (we’ll see!!). How do I market my translation services, without feeling like I’m selling something that clients can get for free? Here’s what I’ve heard from a few colleagues:

• “Marketing these days feels dishonest, like I’m hoping clients don’t know that they could just use DeepL”
• “Good enough is good enough for most clients; they’re totally happy with an AI translation and won’t pay for a professional translator”

Here’s what’s not incorrect:

• Just as with any professional service, some clients are happy with “good enough.” Let them carry on with their tolerance for mediocrity while you carry on looking for clients who value excellence, service, and trust.
• For straightforward information in common language combinations, AI does a decent job. Again, that’s not what you’re selling; you’re selling a really well-written translation, done by someone who knows the terminology, the context, the cultural aspect, and is a really good writer (which AI is not).

DIY options aren’t a new thing

If you’re thinking that “software that does a similar task to a professional knowledge worker” is a new thing, like this all started with ChatGPT, it didn’t. Lots of professions exist alongside software that does some version of what the human professionals do. Sometimes, the software does virtually eliminate the professional: very few people these days go to a travel agent for something simple like booking a plane ticket. But in professions that require a high degree of knowledge, skill, or creativity, that doesn’t seem to be the case. For example…

TurboTax (DIY tax preparation software that many Americans use) came out in, wait for it, 1984, and the accounting profession seems to be holding up fine. QuickBooks? 1992. LegalZoom (a U.S. service that sells template legal documents for things like making a will, or selling your house): 2001. Various pieces of website creation software have been around since the early 2000s as well. Yet, bookkeepers, attorneys, and web designers haven’t been eliminated. There honestly isn’t enough money in the world to convince me to do my own taxes; the first business task I outsourced was accounting, and I’m never going back!

Likewise, many service providers do something that you could do yourself if you have the time and the desire. During COVID, I learned how to cut my own hair by watching YouTube videos. It actually looked OK (not just my opinion, validated by several friends!). But a few years ago, I went back to the salon; my hairdresser does a better job with less hassle. The same is true of tons of professional services: we’re hired to do things that people are not incapable of doing themselves, they just don’t want to or don’t have time.

Then there’s translation quality

This newsletter doesn’t have enough room to dissect the issue of AI-generated translation quality. But let’s say this, because it’s what I tell my clients.

• DIY can be a decent option for a low-stakes, information-only document that will be used only in-house (“Kind of/sort of what does this say in our language”).
• AI often sounds great, when it’s totally incorrect, and it does crazy stuff. A client came to me because they suspected that a translator had used machine translation. The clue? The name of the Swiss town “Aubonne” had been “translated” as “Augood.” No kidding.
• Raw AI output is a wildly bad idea for anything that carries a legal, reputation, or brand risk, or where consistent terminology is important. A lot of my clients use AI-generated translations of conference presentations. You’ll see things like the English word “capital” (in the financial sense) translated in three different ways, in the same paragraph. AI gleefully spits out, “capitaux propres,” “fonds propres” and “capital,” or it will use the same French word for two different concepts in English (“financement” for both “financing” and “funding,” for example). I’m sure other languages have these examples as well, and it’s not what you want in your annual report.

Many freelancers’ issue? Selling the wrong thing

In my opinion, many freelancers have a deeper issue, which is that they’re selling the wrong thing. Recently, someone commented on a LinkedIn post I wrote (I’m paraphrasing here), “So many translators go on and on about how complicated and difficult the work is, when they should really be emphasizing how much easier the client’s life will be when they don’t have to deal with translation anymore.”

Bingo. Clients want a solid translation. You can’t be a nice person and an incompetent translator and expect to retain high-paying clients. But you can and should realize that most clients hire you to solve a problem and take something off their to-do list. You want to emphasize:

• Peace of mind: Once the client hires you, they no longer have to worry about their translations
• Risk reduction: No more wondering what’s in that AI-generated translation
• Trust and confidentiality: Their document won’t be blasted out in a “come and get it” e-mail to 50 translators
• Confidence and reputation: The documents you translate can stand up to legal, reputation, and brand risks; AI can’t stand behind what it produced, because it’s not human

Also: Getting clients out of the AI slop

In recent months, I’ve also landed some new writing clients who hired me specifically to get them out of the AI slop. Ghostwriting for the CEO; writing the company newsletter; doing case studies and client interviews.

I’m a little skeptical of claims/hopes that the pendulum is swinging away from AI. I think that there are just too many clients who prioritize price and speed over trust and quality. But I do think that there are many, many clients who have certain tasks for which they will not use AI, and they’re willing to pay quite well for an explicitly human touch.

I hope these tips are helpful! 

Marketing mindset master class on Thursday

This Thursday (March 19), I’m teaching a two-hour master class; Get out of your own way: Overcoming the mental roadblocks that hold back your marketing. Registration is $75 and includes the recording. I developed this class after numerous students told me:

• “I get fired up about marketing, then I rapidly lose steam when it feels like people aren’t responding”
• “I’ve taken a zillion marketing classes. I know what to do. I just can’t make myself do it.”
• “It’s really hard to market when it feels like no one is finding good work in this economy”

We’ll dissect these, and other self-sabotaging things we tell ourselves when it comes to marketing, and identify better ways forward. Registration includes the recording.

Roundup: My headsets, headphones, and microphones

Headsets and headphones are a reality of the Zoom/Spotify/podcast/YouTube era! Especially if you interpret/teach/present online, it’s important to have the right audio equipment for the task. And even if you’re just listening to webinars or podcasts, you want to protect your hearing, stay comfortable, and have the sound be pleasant to listen to.

As someone who does all of the things listed above, I have a pretty big equipment inventory: three interpreting headsets, a pair of noise-cancelling headphones, a pair of basic wired earbuds, a pair of bone-conducting headphones, and a podcast microphone. I’m sure that some of you have even more and better collections than this; feel free to hit Reply and give me your own recommendations.

My interpreting headsets

My most mission-critical equipment is my interpreting headsets. I interpreted about 180 days (half court, half conference) in 2025, and the bulk of that was remote, so I spend a lot of time wearing a headset.

First consideration: headset, or headphones plus standalone microphone? A lot of interpreters strongly prefer headphones plus a standalone microphone, and it’s true that very few headset microphones can match the quality of a standalone microphone. My issue is that I move around too much. I use a criss-cross chair (just Google what that is if you’ve never seen one) because I like to change positions, sit with my legs crossed, sit backwards, sometimes I stand up, or even kneel on the floor and lean over the back of the chair. None of that would work with a standalone microphone.

Next consideration: your head. There will be headsets that other people rave about, or that you even objective would love to love, but they just don’t work with your head. This is me and Jabra headsets. One of my interpreting clients bought all of their employees Jabra headsets during COVID, and I love the sound quality from them. However when I bought myself a Jabra Evolve 40, something about the earpieces felt like pleather muffins strapped to my head. I honestly hated how it felt and I returned it.

My collection: I have three interpreting headsets; my primary one, a backup to that one (so that we don’t have a single point of failure), and a spare for home (I work at an office outside my house) and traveling. They are:

1. My everyday interpreting headset, the Audio-Technica ATHGDL3BK. That’s kind of a mouthful , but it’s a headset style that I would recommend: an open-back gaming headset. Open-back means that the earphones are covered with mesh, not solid material, so that you can hear yourself talking without either shouting or half-removing one of the earphones (both are habits you want to avoid), and gaming headsets are designed to be worn for long periods of time, so they’re generally very comfortable. I really love this headset, and I get lots of compliments on its sound quality. I paid $139 for this headset and I haven’t had any durability issues after almost two years. The only downside of this headset: because of the over-the-ear headphone design, it’s huge, and not very packable unless you put it in the original box, which is about the size of a shoebox. Not something I want to take with me on a trip, for example.
2. My other two headsets are the Sennheiser SC60 and the Sennheiser SC75, which are what I would recommend buying if you just want a basic headset for things like webinars and online meetings. They’re small and light, and have a flip-up microphone, which my Audio-Technica does not. Also, they’re really inexpensive. I paid $40 for the SC60, and $60 for the SC75 which has slightly more features, like an adapter to use it with either USB or your audio jack. These headsets fold up very small, so I have one as a backup in my office, and one that I keep at home and take on trips. I’m a big fan of these headsets, they’re just slightly less comfortable and tend to shift around more, because the earphones sit on top of your ears rather than going over them. But if you just want to buy a decent headset without analysis paralysis, get one of these.

My wireless headphones

I have two pairs of wireless headphones that I use for different purposes:

1. The Bose QuietComfort noise-cancelling headphones. Aaaahhhh, for when you just want to shut out the world (which is a lot of the time, these days!). These babies are expensive, with a list price around $360, but I bought a factory-refurbished pair on Ebay for $195 a year ago, and they work just like new. To be accurate, these can also be used in wired mode, but they come with an audio jack cord only, which isn’t a ton of use on a phone these days. I use them on buses, airplanes, and when I do over-the-phone interpreting. The microphone quality isn’t stellar, but it’s acceptable; I’ve never had anyone complain about the sound quality when I use them for phone interpreting. And when you have them in high noise-cancelling mode, like on an airplane, you hear almost nothing around you, which I love
2. The Shokz OpenRun bone-conducting headphones. I bought these during COVID and can’t remember how much I paid, but the current list price is $125. Bone-conducing headphones (on a headband that goes around, not in, your ears) are a little weird the first time you use them, but they accomplish the opposite of noise-cancelling headphones: you hear everything around you. I use them for lots of things: when I’m outside and I want to hear what’s going on around me, when I’m in my house but I don’t want to seem antisocial (this was the case during the COVID lockdowns, where I would listen to hours of podcasts while hanging out with my family), or when I’m doing something like lifting weights where I don’t want do deal with a cord but I also don’t want to be sweating inside my Bose headphones.

My standalone microphone

If you want really, really crisp audio, there’s nothing like a high-quality standalone microphone. When I started the Training for Translators podcast, my interpreting buddy Amélie Roy suggested the Shure MV7+, which I purchased and have been very happy with. It’s not cheap: I paid around $300 and it doesn’t come with a stand, so you’re going to spend some money on that as well.

With standalone microphones, you’re always balancing various factors. In my experience, to really get that “radio announcer” sound, you have to put the microphone very close to your mouth. In a couple of tutorials that I watched, the suggestion was to position the microphone about one fist-width from your mouth, which is probably like four inches? Really close, which means that the sound is crisp and rich with no echo, but it picks up every single breathing and swallowing noise. Due to too many years doing intense vinyasa yoga classes, I breathe very heavily and audibly, so I have to edit those sounds out of all the recordings that I make with this microphone.

An easy first step if you use Audacity is to set up what’s called a noise gate, meaning that everything below a certain decibel level is automatically deleted. This saves me a ton of time when editing my podcast. In my version of Audacity, it’s Select All>Effect>Noise removal>Noise Gate, and I generally set it to 25 decibels.

A few other considerations:

• If you use your headsets for listening to live audio (where unexpected things can happen), look for a feature called acoustic shock protection. This automatically limits the headset’s volume to a certain decibel level (most headsets designed for children have this feature), for example if there’s a sudden, loud feedback sound, or if someone taps a microphone to see if it’s on.
• If you use your headsets for interpreting or presenting, you want to make sure that you can hear yourself talking without raising your voice. Interpreting is really taxing on your hearing and your voice, so you want to protect both of those as much as you can. I also find that when I’m interpreting for a really challenging speaker, it helps my own stress level to lower my voice rather than raising it. This is why I prefer an open-back headset. But at least don’t use a noise-cancelling headset to interpret, because you’re likely to end up talking too loudly so that you can hear your own voice.
• In my opinion, the bigger danger with remote interpreting isn’t so much sudden acoustic shock, but chronic exposure to not-great audio, where the only thing you can do is turn up your volume to get more of what you want to hear, which also means that you get the echo, static, etc. This is a constant struggle, and I really wish that more clients were willing to tell their speakers and meeting participants, if you want to be interpreted, you have to wear a headset. Particularly if you have a full-time interpreting job, this is definitely something to pay attention to.

I hope these tips are helpful if you’re thinking about your own audio-related topics!

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