Episode 1: An introduction to the Marketing tips for translators podcast
01/30/2014Episode 3: Marketing tips when getting started as a translator – Interview with Corinne McKay
01/30/2014Episode 2: CV’s for translators – interview with Marta Stelmaszak
In this episode I interview Marta Stelmaszak, a Polish into English translator, interpreter, trainer and mentor. She has published a free e-book called “You need a CV that works” where she covers everything about CV’s for translators.
This episode includes:
- A presentation of Marta
- A presentation of the book “You need a CV that works” and why Marta wrote it
- Five most important tips for writing a CV when marketing your translation services
- The most common mistakes translators make when writing a CV
- When a CV works and when it does not
- Alternatives to a CV
- How Marta markets her translation services and what works best for her right now
Thank you for listening to this episode! To make it even easier for you, I have created a CV Checklist for translators, with all important tips compiled on one page. Enter your name and email below to get the FREE checklist sent to you.
- Marta Stelmaszak is a Polish – English translator and interpreter specialising in law, IT, marketing, and business. She is a member of the Management Committee of the Interpreting Division at the Chartered Institute of Linguists and a Co-head of the UK Chapter of the International Association of Professional Translators and Interpreters. She is also an Associate of the Institute of Translation and Interpreting, a qualified business mentor, a member of the Institute of Enterprise and Entrepreneurship and the Chartered Institute of Marketing. She is currently studying for master’s degree in Management, Information Systems and Innovation at the London School of Economics and Political Science. Recently, she’s been awarded with the Higher Education Social E
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12 Comments
Dear Tess,
Thank you very much for inviting me to take part in your podcast series. I hope my tips will help our colleagues! I’m looking forward to listening to other episodes myself.
Marta
Good evening, Tess. Yes, I would add some more tips. Maybe some of them had already been mentioned, but still here are some points from my point of view as a job provider:
1. Be brief but informative. 2-page resume is more than enough. Just consider showing only relevant information.
2. Use your Name/Surname and Language pair when you save your CV. It helps a lot, because agency shouldn’t open your CV, check name and working languages and resave it under another name.
3. Double check your resume on possible misspellings, grammar or orthography mistakes.
4. Insert clickable link to your portfolio. Sometimes when we have some urgent order, we prefer to check portfolio straight away, rather than information stated in CV.
5. Be outstanding. I really like it when I get resume strict in content but creative in its format, especially when we are choosing freelancers for translation of marketing related materials.
6. Show your willingness to start working straight away. Recently we received a CV where a freelancer mentioned that she was ready to provide a sample translation within 2 hours. And she did, she provided it even within 40minutes. This is a huge advantage.
7. Do write a cover letter. Although this tip relates to the application process. And this is another huge theme.
All these tips are simple and obvious, but still, not all translators follow them up. Translation industry is high-competitive, that is why, as Corinne McKay said (if I’m not mistaken), everything matters. I completely agree. One needs to stand out to be noticed
Thank you Marta and Tess for a wonderful interview and useful tips.
Besides my translation activity, I also own translation agency. Very often we get, how to say it mildly, “dull” resumes in a WORD format, without even a photo, and I can not stop wondering: “Freelancers, are you really interested in doing this job?”
I think the main reason is that most freelancers do not take their job seriously, they do not understand that being a freelancer is a kind of business, where marketing and promotion are two key points.
P.S. By the way, I have also updated mine according to your tips) Thank you once again.
Alena Klimtcova
English to Russian Translator
Thanks Alena! Glad you enjoyed it. As an agency, do you have any other tips?
I’ve never heard that a WORD format is a drawback. A WORD CV can be made as interactive (with photos, links etc) as a PDF CV. Moreover, links are not easily clickable in some PDF readers.
[…] During my interview with Marta Stelmaszak, she gave us her five most important tips for writing and sending a resume when marketing our translation services. These are: […]
Hi Tess,
I’m so glad that I found your site! This is your first podcast that I listened to, and looking forward to the others.
Hi Marta,
I appreciate your tips on “customizing” the CV based on the type of client, to tailor to their needs. I have a full-time IT job so I do translation part-time / as a sideline. I have a CV for my IT job, and another for translation. So you gave me an idea to customize my CV further and maybe have more than one for translation. Also your tip on sending brochures or presentation to direct clients instead of the traditional CV is something new to me.
I tried to download your free ebook via Slideshare mobile but the functionality is not available. Can’t scroll up/down the webpage either (I think this is more of a glitch on their part). I signed up to your newsletter to get your free ebook but I did’t get the link. Can you help?
Best regards,
Jaclyn
Thanks Jaclyn! I will make sure Marta gets your comment.
Hi Jaclyn, thanks for reaching out – it’s now all sorted!
[…] CVs for translators – interview with Marta Stelmaszak: kako da CV prilagodite prevodilačkoj industriji i vrsti klijenata za koje želite da radite. • […]
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