Greater than 2 minutes, my friend!
Diversification efforts My experience and thoughts about sources of income
Being translator for more than 10 years sometimes I’m thinking about room for growth and results of such analysis make me sad. Freelance translations are really great – I have a lot of free time, I can work from any place in the world, I earn times more average income in my country, I like languages and translation, and so on.
But whatever good and high-performing translator I am or can be, finally I just selling hours of my life. The price could be higher but the quantity always remains the same. And of course I want to create steady source of income that can feed me without a direct relation to the time spent/sold. I don’t become younger every year and will not be always able to work with today’s productivity level.
Converting my freelance business to language agency looks like the simplest and logical way. However I don’t like this idea and don’t know why.
That’s why during my freelancing career I tried to establish several businesses, like:
- Manufacturing of garbage recycling equipment – fail
- Minishop (aka kiosk) – fail
- Multi-level marketing – fail
- And several others – fail 🙂
In 2012 my friend has proposed to invest in a project of naming service website.
It was a good proposal for me because as distinct from the examples listed above it connected to “words”. And maybe it is still alive for me because of its connection to languages and words.
You need a name for your company/startup/book/etc, you publish a project at www.domenames.com, pay for it, and authors from different countries propose names from which you can pick the best one and use it (or refuse all and take your money back).
This service could be useful for translators – we are good in words and can create good names. I also make proposals in naming projects there.
It could be useful for translator’s clients – we can advice this service if they need a name for something and this way improve our relationships.
After 3 years of development, programming and random promotional attempts today we have a great website with good design, many features, and authors -“namers” on it, $5000 spent on programming and ads, we even have an article about our project in quite known online magazine (http://yourstory.com/2013/03/a-startup-domenames-from-ukraine-wants-to-name-the-world).
And almost no ideas how to promote it and there to find customers.
My role in this project has changed from “investor” at the 1st stage into co-founder with many tasks and responsibilities. I dream about Spanish version (to put my knowledge to work) but it is useless without clients.
I always asking myself should I do all my best in my translation career or should I try to find and evolve other non- or a bit related sources of money in my life? And if the right answer is the second – how to find correct mix of those efforts?
Dear colleagues, I ask you to share your thoughts about diversification of income.
Did you asked yourself the similar questions?
What was your answer?
How do you make money in addition to your translations career?
Nixie Adams 
Gert Van Assche 
Yuliya Kinash 
Thank you for sharing your thoughts on this topic, Alexey. Now, I must say I am totally seduced by the idea of brand and company names! I am a contributor at a similar site but it only pays if the client accepts your idea. I won only once and was really excited but that was it. I am still looking for ways to use creative writing as a second income generator but translation takes up almost all of my time. I have also thought of establishing an agency but this isn’t me, like in your case. Thank you again! Good luck.
Thanks for sharing, Magda. It’s interesting how many people entertain the possibility of starting a translation agency. It seems like a such a natural thing to do, right?
A lot of people don’t know about but I also tried to build a translation agency. I even created a website, come up with a name (We Love Translating), hired a professional designer to design a logo, set up email accounts and wrote a 70-page business plan during my 1 year of Small Business Entrepreneurship program.
Everything was great, but it didn’t took off. Partly because this company lacked personality. It didn’t have any specialization. The vision was not clear enough. But I still remember how passionate I was about it. How I could talk for hours about this company with my wife.
In reality building a translation company takes a lot of courage, requires some substantial financial investment and you got to have amazing sales skills to be able to find clients.
I was not ready for that, and this is when I did a U-turn and tried building my personal brand (Best Russian Translator) and I think personal branding is the most suitable business model for freelance translators. Because we get to be ourselves while still building an actual business which works just like any other company.
Thanks for your comments, Magda. Do you propose names on Crowdspring?
You are welcome Alexey! Your post really struck a chord with me. I haven’t heard of Crowdspring but I will check it out. I am on SloganSlingers.
Check my Domenames, too 😉
Hey Alexey!
Congrats on sharing your first Open Mic story! High-five from Toronto!
I think diversification is something that every entrepreneur should think about on a constant basis. It’s a very smart and responsible approach to your business. I would definitely love to add other revenue streams to my income and I think every freelance translator should at least try it.
Translation industry is a pretty awesome place to be at right now. It grows steadily and at a very high rate (provided that all those CSA reports are true). So I think there is a lot of room for growth and improvement for every translators no matter how many years they’ve been in the profession.
As far as other side projects go – you have to decide – is this what you really want to do? If the answer is yes – then pursue it. Pursue it like crazy. Pursue it for the rest of your life.
The thing is: nothing happens overnight. Keep working hard and keep pursuing new things and creating new opportunities for yourself and the others. Also, if you feel like you’re burning out or lack motivation to keep going, watch this Gary Vee video: link to youtube.com – one of the most powerful videos I have ever seen.
Thanks, Alexey, for sharing this and reaching out to us, in such a direct, candid and open way. Unfortunately, I am not an entrepreneur by nature, so I am not qualified to give you my two cents on this. But I believe Dmitry said it all. Follow your gut feeling and don’t give up. Sounds cliché but that’s how things work and people succeed.
Ana, thanks for your support 🙂