Small Business Idea No. 6: Translation Service

Despite the fact that the United States does not have an official language, the vast majority of the population speaks American English. Nevertheless there are an estimated 337 other languages spoken by the population. Spanish is the second most typical language in the U.S. with it being spoken by over 12% of the population. The Chinese languages, French, German, Tagalog (of the Philippine's), Vietnamese, Italian, Korean and Russian round out the best ten languages spoken in the United States according to the 2000 census.

As we move towards a far more culturally diverse country, coupled with the impact of globalization on our economy - the need for translation services will increase. Most, if not all key corporations give a Spanish language translation to their customers via telephone IVR systems, marketing supplies and other customer promotional items. It's straightforward for them to do this because they have the spending budget and manpower to put into it, but this is not the case for the small organization owner - and this is where you come in!

If you are fluent in multiple languages, think about putting that extremely valuable skill to great use by beginning a Translation Service organization. The World wide web book of the last 15 years has had a tremendous effect on marketing, for the 1st time in history the little enterprise owner can reach a global audience with just a couple of clicks of the mouse. The unfortunate thing is that most of them are not capitalizing on this wonderful benefit due to fears of language and cultural barriers.

If a Translation Service sounds like an organization that you'd be interested in keep these issues in mind: 

1. What are the set up expenses of a translation service organization?

 For the price of marketing and advertising materials, a site, and the price of your business license - you can commence a translation service organization. The principal component of your business model is the ability to speak another language(s), nevertheless it is crucial that you are fluent and nicely versed in the appropriate spelling, grammar, tenses, etc. If you want to brush up on those points, we suggest generating the investment in Pimsleur or Rosetta Stone language courses. Remember that your clients are business owners and professional so their documents must reflect that no matter what language they are written in.

2. How much income can I expect to make?: 

The going rate for expert translation services is .15 to .30 per word, however the larger businesses tend to pad this quantity with minimal requirements and other processing fees. It's not uncommon for a 75 word document to run the neighborhood of if not far more. Taking into consideration the reality that the average email sent in the United States contains 50 words, paying for translation is not price successful. Your competitive edge will be found in your price point. By keeping your minimum requirements low coupled with a wide range of services, you will make a name for your enterprise.


3. How can I marketplace my translation service organization?

 The first thing you will want to do is establish your online web presence. This will enable you to reach a global market. Your marketing and advertising efforts even so will start on a much more local level until you can create the revenue to advertise on a broader skill. Your target demographic will be businesses that although they attract a culturally diverse client base, they have no supplies obtainable in the language(s) you specialize in. Supply to, for a totally free or decreased rate - translate one page of their brochure, website or other essential documents in exchange for their testimonial or reference. Do not limit your self to brick & mortar companies, reach out to on-line companies as nicely. When approached with professionalism, the possibilities of the translation service organization are endless. As your client base grows, you might also take into account hiring employees who are fluent in other languages as well. This will expand your reach and give you a leg up on the competition!

Translation Resources:

• http://www.openoffice.org/ - A free and open source alternative to Microsoft Word. It even has a free CAT tool that works with WordFast and which you can find doing a search for "Anaphraseus" through the extensions menu on the site.
• http://www.freelance-translator.info/ - many useful links for translators
• http://www.lai.com/rsrcmain.html - many useful links for translators
• http://www.translation.net/ - useful products for translators
• http://www.ipl.org/div/subject/browse/ref28.80.00/ - The Internet Public Library - translation dictionaries section
• http://www.word2word.com/dictionary.html - many online dictionaries and other useful links
• http://www.webpersonal.net/dmarques/resources/ - thousands of links to dictionaries in many languages
• http://www.foreignword.com/ - many useful links
• http://www.sil.org/translation/nonsil.htm - many useful links for biblical translators
• http://www.gilbertolacchia.it/risorse/risorse.htm - Internet Resources for Medical Translators
• http://www.iol.ie/~mazzoldi/lang/ - Italian/English oriented translator resources links
• http://www.masternewmedia.org/2001/12/31/best_translation_resources_online.htm - various translation resources
• Travlang Online - free online dictionaries in many languages, good for traveling
• Free Online Translations - free online dictionaries in many languages
• http://www.google.com/language_tools - Google Language Tools Use the Google Language Tools to translate text or entire web pages. Search specific languages or countries, use the Google interface in your selected language via Preferences, or even visit the Google site in your own country.
• http://www.enetsc.com/FreeTranslation.htm - FreeTranslation.com Use the power of FreeTranslation.com for instant translation service! FreeTranslation.com provides free translation of both text and web pages. Use it for rapid translations where you can get the "gist" of foreign language text and web pages.
• http://www.enetsc.com/SYSTRAN.htm - Systran Translator Use Systran Translator to translate web pages and text. To translate a Web page, just enter or paste the URL. To translate text, type it or paste it. You can enter up to 150 words of text.
• http://www.translation-service.com/free-tools/ - These tools are useful for personal use and reference. They perform machine translation, and will not produce quality texts, basically because no machine can yet 'understand' the meaning of what it is translating.

• YourDictionary.com offers translations of words and phrases in English, French, Spanish, German, or Italian. Type the desired word or phrase into the search box and select a language from the pull-down menu.
• Babel Fish Translation is an easy to use tool for translating small blocks of text or web pages written in a foreign language. Website owners also have the option of adding the Babel Fish tool to their own content.
• ImTranslator has a number of language options that make it easy to translate your text. Some of the many languages available include Russian, Portuguese, Korean, Chinese, and Japanese
• PROMT has a free text translation tool for English, German, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, and Russian translations.
• Translation Booth provides machine-translated text in a number of languages, including Arabic, Greek, Latin, and Vietnamese.
• Excite lets you translate between Japanese and English.
• WordLingo provides free translations of up to 150 words, plus an additional paid translation service.
• FreeTranslation.com offers a free translation service for simple text translations in English, Spanish, French, German, Italian, Dutch, Russian, Norwegian, Portuguese, Chinese, and Japanese. As an added bonus, a paid service is available for longer or more complicated translations.
• Local Translation offers both free and paid translation services.

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