Search It, Find It: The Translator's Minimalist Guide to Online Search

By Carlos Djomo

THE INTERNET IS AN OCEAN - HERE'S YOUR COMPASS

Everyone - including you - hate to spend hours searching online for important stuff with less satisfying results. So, why continue the same way? Fortunately, there are little-known strategies you could leverage to up your online searching game. Imagine how you would feel if you could find accurate terminology, specific documentation, high-paying opportunities or virtually anything that is available online...This book takes you on an exciting journey through the dynamics of search engines, social media, electronic terminology tools, online support platforms and much more, in a drive to show you untapped approaches and steps you can take to become an online search ace in no time (even if you aren't a geek).

• Language: English
• Publisher: cdlancer
• Release date: Dec 21, 2016
• ISBN: 9781386815518

Carlos Djomo

English to French technical translator, DTP specialist and language consultant, Carlos is the winner of the 2015 Proz Community Choice Awards (Best Translation Article). With an 8-year experience handling technical translation projects for the world's top end clients (The World Bank, Cat, Toyota, WHO, etc.), he is currently running a small translation business and keeps blogging about entrepreneurship, the business of translation and visibility. Read some awesome content at http://cdlancer.com/blog/

Book preview

Foreword

Over the past twenty years, the Internet and online search have radically changed the way we go about our daily business. Nowadays, searching online is part of almost everything we do each day—for whatever random question we might have to getting directions to our next meeting—and this includes terminology research for translators and interpreters.

Back in the 1980s when I went to elementary school, I used an encyclopedia and visited the local library to research topics for school essays. While I was in university (still in the pre-Google era), the professors suggested we use Copernic and Altavista (on Netscape, remember that?). But the university library was still the main reference point for knowledge and information and the bibliography at the end of essays consisted entirely of actual printed books, with no online links in sight.

Google was founded in 1998 and I remember using it extensively in the years after university to find anything translation-related, from online courses to further my knowledge on translation (the only one I found was provided by Logos), to articles on pricing and a bit of client research. (Read: how to find contact information for Greek translation agencies so that I could send them my CV – pretty low-tech compared to today's agencies' online application forms and personalized emails!).

Back then, Google and the few other search engines that did exist were pretty much useless for terminology research. No Proz (it was founded in 1999 and I discovered it some years later), no Babylon, no specialized glossaries, very few monolingual English dictionaries – pretty slim pickings in general. If I wanted to find a pet for my cat, I opened the Yellow Pages. If I wanted a specialist doctor, I asked family and friends for recommendations. Oh, and of course there were no smartphones for searching on the go!

Years passed and my paper dictionary collection grew nicely as did my list of bookmarks of online glossaries. Two years ago, I moved to Canada with my family and business. Guess how many paper dictionaries came with us from Greece? None! They are still back in Athens, stored along with most of our household things. Have I missed my paper dictionaries? Has there been an impact on our daily translation work? None whatsoever. Sadly, I haven't missed them and when they finally get here they will serve more as decorations than the valuable business tools they used to be.

How many times per day do you use your paper dictionaries? Is there a resource left that you use regularly for translation that hasn't been made available online? Have you used the Yellow Pages or a similar print guide lately to find clients? How many times do you use Google or another search engine daily to look up a term, or anything else non-translation related? How about your smartphone when you are out of the office?

I'm sure you've come across online articles with tips for Google power users. I was very excited when Carlos contacted me to tell me he was writing a book about online research. I'm a big fan of lists. I have a list for everything on note-taking apps and calendars, with the topic of online search filling an entire notebook comprising a healthy inventory of lists, notes and tips. This book would serve as a mega-list that I would be able to use at any time! I figured I’d finally have everything organized in a guide.

Business-wise, search engines are the most important tool we use daily. For our translation and interpreting projects we do terminology research, industry and client research to understand context, and we search for images of a particular tool or part of a tool when we are translating a manual without photos (which happens a lot). For existing and potential clients social media keep relationships going and the Internet is the first place to do some digging on a particular client that looks like a good fit for your business.

For networking with colleagues and clients, search engines take us to social networks and help us find local and international events and conferences. Translators and interpreters educate themselves online consuming newspapers, journals, blogs, webinars and courses, and even recommendations for what book to read next. When prospecting, your online searches will help you learn all you can about the industry you specialize in and can help identify the right companies you want to work with for translation and interpreting assignments. No more cold calls and emails.

Online research gives us the opportunity to learn all about our potential clients and contact them in a personalized way, turning 'cold' communications into 'warm' and dramatically increasing our chances of turning those prospects into actual clients.

This book offers tips that will help you become a better translator, communicator and marketer by using better search methods that will save you heaps of time. Onward and upward!

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Catherine Christaki

Founder & Partner, Lingua Greca Translations

http://linguagreca.com/

Introduction

We are living in a digital world, where the Internet has been shaping our lifestyles, transforming every one of us into addicts that can’t live without being connected.

However, even basic tasks like searching through our email boxes are far from being as simple as they seem. On a daily basis, we surf on the Internet sea, but ignore how deep it is.

But, what if you could be the more than just an average Web