Meet Melissa Kamenjarin, Success by Rx’s New Copywriter

As the new copywriter for Success by Rx, I’m excited to introduce myself to you. My name is Melissa Kamenjarin, and I am a Spanish/English translator, writer, editor and proofreader specializing in educational materials, health insurance, non-profits, and published fiction and non-fiction books, blogs and websites. Some of my clients include educational materials publishers, published […]

Looking for an affordable worldwide phone? It’s here.

If you’re a translator or interpreter who travels frequently, I might have some good news for you!I recently returned from a trip to Hong Kong and Thailand, which was my first time anywhere in Asia and while I’d been to Europe several times, just a couple of months away from my trip, I realized that […]

Dear translator/linguist/resource…It’s not personal – it’s just business

We’ve all gotten those impersonal e-mails from agencies and companies starting with “dear translator,” “linguist,” the dreaded “resource” or some other generalized category. I know many translators who immediately delete these without reading them, others who jump on them trying to be the first to respond and still others who are either silently offended or…not-so-silently […]

8 Reasons Why I “Work from Home” in an Office

In 2008, I left my one and only true professional office job to pursue my freelance business full time, and I swore to myself that I would NEVER EVER work in an office again. I was now free…I was free to work in my house, cafés, hotel rooms in distant lands, the beach or a […]

3 Reasons Why Introverts Are Better at Sales

The other day I was talking to a friend of mine who owns an internet marketing company and manages their sales team. He mused that he and most of his entire sales team were all introverts. As an extrovert fascinated by psychology, I’ve actually read quite a bit about introverts but it wasn’t until that […]

Scope Creep: Dealing with Small…and Not-So-Small Changes

Ever been in this situation? I started a proofreading job only to realize the translation is a disaster. I agreed to translate a file based on a sample, but the rest of the sample includes tons of unexpected formatting. I took an interpretation assignment that was supposed to be escort but once I got there […]

The One Crucial Thing You’re Forgetting When Handling Mistakes

We are all people, and mistakes happen. Sometimes we, as translators or interpreters, are the ones at fault. Perhaps we didn’t catch a typo or mixed up a deadline. Or perhaps there was a miscommunication between you and your client that produced what your client perceives to be a mistake on your part. It happens […]

Dealing with Low-ballers

Rates are a very controversial issue in our industry and the issue of low-ballers is even more controversial. In fact, it’s kind of a hard concept to pinpoint. One freelancer might be regularly (and happily) working for a rate that another considers low-balling. Or, you might be too fast to burn a potential bridge over […]

How to Unleash the Entrepreneur Within

As freelancers, we are translators and/or interpreters first, and many of us fall into being a business owner for no other reason than the fact that our industry is generally set up in favor of hiring freelancers to do work on a contract basis instead of hiring full-time employees. In other words, instead of having […]