One of the main obstacles that any novice translator faces after completing university education or postgraduate diplomas and courses lies in the most professional way by which he can prove his competence and proficiency as a freelance translator. Whether approaching a translation agency or a direct client, the whole process can be really more intricate than it seems to be, with view to the fact that both end users of his services are only after certified/sworn translators or experienced translators with proven records and references. If so, how can a novice freelance translator manage to keep out of this vicious circle?
If you are approaching translation agencies, you will have to abide by certain rules and guidelines. To embark on your new career as a freelance translator, you may find it necessary to work for free a few months or even a year as a trainee in any translation agency. This will enable you to add practical experience to your knowledge, find out the knowhow techniques of the job, learn how to use CAT tools efficiently, acquire skill and gain appropriate speed and competence in your fields of interest.
You must always remember that your brain is your asset. It is the faculty of reason that must be regularly broadened and updated with relevant up-to-date events, and knowledge. Consequently, you should never overlook the importance of enriching your subject knowledge and boosting your experience by extensive reading in various domains and disciplines to be prepared to deal effectively with such specialties as the need arises (whether this be in the commercial, technical, medical, legal, financial, literary, or IT domains). You must also keep track of the most up-to-date CAT tools' releases and always be keen to develop your efficiency in using such tools in an expert and dexterous manner. After gaining the basic experience and preliminary know-how expertise, you have to start your search for a reputable international translation agency that would be willing to hire you and pay you for your services. You have to go down with your rate to encourage these agencies to contract with you. Putting into consideration that most translation agencies set a trial period to all newly-hired translators in which they can closely examine and monitor these translators' work, you will be required to deliver, as much as can be humanly possible, an error free professional translation, that is a true rendering of idea, style, and original composition, as well as a target text that is consistent in quality and accurate in content. To help you deliver an accurate translation and a first quality end product, you must always resort to relevant authoritative references, resources, technical dictionaries, glossaries and terminologies. The due dates predefined by your employers must always be observed and confidentiality of all handled projects must always be respected whether or not you were asked to sign their non disclosure agreement. Try to benefit from your present full time employment by devoting all your effort to further enrich your subject knowledge in your fields of specialty and enhance your first hand experience. In spite of the difficulty in abiding by all the above mentioned nuts and bolts, yet observing them is your only way to guarantee that you will be the target for any translation agency.
On the other hand, if you are approaching a direct client, whether corporate clients or individuals, this will be your second step in the field as a certified professional translator. Once you have polished your skills and experience and feel you can start your own career, you should transfer to a part-time contract so that you can have the time to build your own clientele database. You will, possibly, face a lot of trouble trying to gain access to these clients. However, to facilitate such process you have to create your own website and undergo all the stages that it would entail; from creation of the website, to optimization of its content to be SEO friendly, to the search of ways and means to gain traffic, to the use of all possible free or low budget e-marketing campaigns. In this regard, most small businesses start making use of all free means available on the net to gain traffic to their websites through registering at free directories, creating free ads, or building links and reciprocal links to their websites. Meanwhile, you should also bear in mind that corporate clients and companies prefer, in the first place, to outsource their translation needs to partners who are able to offer comprehensive solutions. They search for agencies that can satisfy their translation needs in a range of different languages, are available 24/7 hours a day, can accept handling translation of specialized domains, have DTP and typesetting services, maintain procedures that guarantee all deadlines are met and observe the confidential nature of all handled jobs. Taking into consideration their need for diversity, capacity, continuity, and confidentiality, it is scarcely surprising that many such companies direct their choice to a one stop shop translation agency rather than individual freelancers. Although a translation agency may be more expensive than a freelancer, yet the additional comprehensive service and quality gained justify the extra investment. As to individual clients, you cannot get access to this type of clients except if you have a wide scope of social acquaintances and relations or a website to showcase and market your services. However, this does not usually work and soon you will find that you have to start your marketing campaign. Contacting a professional company to handle your e-marketing campaign at low budget for small businesses is one of the easy and direct solutions to get access to your potential clients. Social marketing has also come to be an important tool which accounts now for a great share in the market with view to the fact that about 96% use social networks such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, and MySpace.
Once your freelance work provides you with a work flow that engages you 20 to 22 hours a week, you can now terminate your part-time contract and start your own career and private business. While going through all the above procedures, you have to be systematic, logic and patient. You must never embark on a step except after being sure that you are going to stand on solid ground. Being in the same stand as a doctor, a translator cannot prove himself in his profession without having vast knowledge backed with state of the art technologies.
Although translation had been one of the most important pillars of civilization and cultural development, and had marked the evolution of many modern sciences, it continues, nowadays, to occupy an elevated rank after the introduction of globalization and the launch of the internet. It goes without saying that translation offers a fascinating and rewarding career to anyone who has the right combination of language skills, the adequate professional commitment and intuitive business acumen. Although starting up can be very tough and the competition can be extremely fierce, yet the really skilled, fully qualified and sufficiently motivated professionals have great prospects to success.
Noha Mostafa is a certified translator & translation instructor with over 10 years hands on experience in translation & translation instruction. She is holder of B.A. in English Language & Literature from Cairo University. She was awarded 3 translation certificates (with distinction) and a professional translation diploma in Legal translation (ongoing) from the American University in Cairo.
She is a certified translator and translation instructor at the Arabic Translation & Intercultural Dialogue Association (ATIDA), the Arab Translators Network - Arab Professional Translators Society (ATN-APTs), and the Egyptian Translators Association (Egyta).
You can find some of her translated work published on her profile page on Proz.com http://www.proz.com/profile/776773, and ATIDA. Besides translation, she is contacted for copywriting, which is her passion. Her translation fields of specialty are diverse ranging from legal, business, medical, technical, and documentary translation to art, literary, and marketing translation in addition to many other fields published on my website. For more information, please visit: http://www.arabization-translation.com
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