The Linguist

The Linguist 57,2 – April/May 2018

The Linguist is a languages magazine for professional linguists, translators, interpreters, language professionals, language teachers, trainers, students and academics with articles on translation, interpreting, business, government, technology

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Q. Why did you decide to study and then work with languages? A. I enjoy the challenges of learning a new language, the chance it affords you to develop a keener understanding of different cultures, and gain a different perspective, and I have always been fascinated by how languages work. At the University of York, I discovered an interest in translation, which I pursued with an MA in Applied Translation Studies at the University of Leeds. These skills have allowed me to pursue a career I'm passionate about. It's really important to me to use my languages every day at work – whether it's communicating with a writer or a client, checking and editing translations, or just chatting with colleagues. Q. Tell us about the role… A. The majority of my day involves managing projects for a variety of global clients. We specialise in transcreation, working mainly with creative copy, so I deal with a lot of interesting ideas and concepts. I also check and edit translations in my language pairs, liaise with current and prospective clients, and help other account managers with English language queries. Marketing and advertising texts employ many linguistic techniques. As a result, the English team is often asked to help explain cultural references, word play, etc, so our writers have the best understanding of the English source copy. We also identify and assess new writers who work into English and help to deal with any ad hoc requests. Q. How did you get the job at Mother Tongue Writers? A. I learned about project management on my MA course, and about Mother Tongue, and transcreation in general, at one of the professionalisation talks organised at Leeds. A vacancy arose towards the end of my MA and I jumped at the chance to apply. I was asked to complete a test translation piece, and then to interview, where my editing and spoken language skills were assessed. Q. Mother Tongue Writers is based in London, Singapore and LA. Did you have to relocate? A. I moved from Leeds to London. This all happened fairly quickly, as I started about a month after my MA teaching ended. I'd wanted to move to London for a while, so everything fell into place really nicely. Q. What are your career plans? A. I want to continue to be involved in the language services industry, and am currently enjoying the various challenges and opportunities presented by project management. The skills I'm gaining here are incredibly useful, and I hope to keep learning more and more. French and German graduate Chris Hoyle discusses his role as Junior Account Manager at Mother Tongue Writers, following a Masters degree at Leeds Just the job thelinguist.uberflip.com APRIL/MAY The Linguist 25 Links online ALBA SORT Translator and integrated marketer Alba Sort shares her social media advertising tips in our second column on the subject. Any kind of advertising needs to be eye- catching, and this is especially important on social networks due to their visual nature. I strongly advise engaging a designer and copywriter with experience in social media, but if you go down the DIY route, Canva offers several templates for social ads. Look at the kind of ads that works best in each platform: Instagram is very visual, whereas Facebook allows some copy before the main image. Remember, what you think about your ads doesn't matter much: it's all about what your target audience likes. Your ads will need to be relevant, compelling and include a call-to-action. Ask your target audience to do something, but be prepared to offer something of value in return. Some suggestions: send them a link to a fee calculator, invite them to download a white paper, or encourage them to visit your blog to get the latest insights on topic X. If you are stuck for content ideas, answerthepublic.com is a brilliant resource. You want to make sure your ad addresses a specific pain your audience experiences, without over-complicating things. Above all, don't 'send' your leads to the homepage of your website. Instead, create a landing page aligned with the copy, look and feel of the advert. Your visitors will perceive your brand as much more robust that way. Lastly, consider the budget. Decide how much to spend in your first week and follow the results methodically. Make sure you have the systems in place to track all metrics, and keep an eye on how much it costs you to get traffic to your website, as well as how many visitors do what you want them to do. Look out for discrepancies: if it costs little to direct traffic to your site but the number of individuals who take you up on your offer is tiny, you are probably targeting the wrong people. Experiment until you are happy with the response in relation to the aims of your campaign. Share your thoughts @Linguist_CIOL using #TheLinguist. OPINION & COMMENT

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