Welcome back to our guest post series. Today, our guest is Clara Giampietro.

Welcome, Clara!

How To Market Your Translation Services With Creativity

Don’t you want to stand out and be unique?

Obviously, we all want to get recognised, differentiate ourselves and attract new clients.

First impressions count, but we have just a few seconds to grab our readers’ attention.

That’s why, instead of using words only, we can use visual content to market our translation services.

HOW CAN YOU USE VISUAL CONTENT TO TELL YOUR STORY?

I’ve been using my visual CVs, infographics, creative presentations and the images of my Little Wing’s adventures for a while, and I can confirm that they draw people’s attention.

In this post I’ll share with you tips, resources and tools that will help you spark your creativity for marketing your translation services.

1. KNOW YOUR AUDIENCE AND PURPOSE

Exactly as when you approach a text to be translated, before designing your visual content you should know your target audience and purpose.

You need to have a clear message and to be relevant.

Start asking yourself these questions:

• What is your product/service?
• With whom do you want to connect?
• What do you want to accomplish?

2. PLAN TIME FOR YOUR CREATIVE ROUTINE

I can hear some of you saying “I am not creative.”

I’ve never thought of myself as a creative person too. I was that kind of girl who really liked reading or doing Maths homework rather than making a piece of art.

Take a look at my first attempts (scroll down the page).

I leave them online to remind me where I started out – with no natural talent, creative power or storytelling ability – and where I am now.

They demonstrate that everyone is creative to some extent. Creativity is part of who we are. It’s a way to express ourselves and our unique personality.

Remember that your goal is not to market your creative projects but to create visuals to market your translation services. You can improve them over time if necessary.

Start cultivating your creativity now. Figure out what time of day you are most creative and schedule regular time every week for your creative work.

3. RESEARCH YOUR IDEAS

Start collecting images, designs, colours and fonts that you like to stimulate the creative flow of ideas for your visual content.

Sources of inspiration:

• Pinterest
• SlideShare
• Visually
• Creative Market

4. DEFINE A COLOUR PALETTE AND A FONT PALETTE

If you have a website and logo, use the same colours and fonts.

Otherwise, choose two to three colours and fonts. They are enough.

Build trust through repetition of the colour and font palettes of your choice. Consistency is the key. It helps your audience recognise you and connect with you across the web.

Save your fonts and HEX/RGB codes for colours in a file, and always stick to them when creating new visuals.

Colours and fonts are important elements of your brand. If you don’t know where to start, I definitely recommend you to hire a professional designer to help you with this process.

Read more:

• Rainy London Branding’s blog
• Canva Design School’s blog
• The Power of Visual Storytelling: How to Use Visuals, Videos, and Social Media to Market Your Brand by Ekaterina Walter

Tools for choosing colours and fonts

• Paletton
• coolors
• Adobe Color CC
• DesignSeeds – Great to find inspiration when choosing your colour palette.
• EyeDropper – An open source extension for Google Chrome that allows you to get the HEX colour code from web pages.
• Pictaculous – It generates a colour palette from any PNG, JPG or GIF images/photos you upload.
• Google Web Fonts
• Font Squirrel
• DaFont
• MyFont

5. CHOOSE IMAGES AND GRAPHICS

Images and graphics help your audience visualise your words.

I always try to use my own photos and graphics to create unique content. When I don’t have what I need, I use Pixabay, iconmonstr and flaticon.

If you need more inspiration, there are several places where you can find great, free images and icons.

6. TELL YOUR STORY

You are what differentiates you from others. Your background, experience, knowledge, values and all the things you’ve learned make you the unique person and professional you are.

You are the main character in your story, but remember that the goal of your story is to create a connection with your audience.

7. DESIGN YOUR VISUAL CONTENT

Types of visual content you can create:

• CVs, portfolios, brochures, leaflets, flyers, invoice templates, etc.
• Infographics and presentations.
• Images for your blog and social media channels.

When designing your visual content keep in mind the following:

• Keep texts legible and respect simplicity.
• Provide adequate spacing and align all the elements.
• Coordinate the colours and harmonise visual elements and texts.
• Use icons and graphs to illustrate your texts and engage the audience.
• Personalise your visuals adding your logo, website, signature or social media channel of your choice.
• Add unexpected texts or images to surprise the reader.
• Ask friends or trusted colleagues for advice and feedback. Then do your own editing based on that advice, if necessary.

For designing my visuals, I normally use PowerPoint and Xara Designer Pro.

Other tools:

• GIMP and Inkscape, PicMonkey and BeFuncky – Two free software and two online tools that let you apply photo effects and enhance, edit and filter photos.
• Canva – Great for combining texts and images.
• Google Slides – A free alternative to PowerPoint for presentations and images for your social media channels.
• HaikuDeck – It doesn’t let you personalise colours and fonts, but it’s a very easy to use tool to create beautiful and effective presentations. Perfect for beginners.
• Phonto – When I want to add text to an image (on mobile) the fastest and easiest way to do that for me is Phonto, a free app available for iOS and Android.

8. SHARE YOUR VISUAL CONTENT

Once you have designed your visuals, it’s time to share them.

Use infographics and presentations on your website or blog. Upload them on LinkedIn, Pinterest, SlideShare and Visually.

Send your CV, brochure and portfolio to clients and prospects.

Share your images on your social media channels.

Read more:
58 places to promote your visual content for free

Now that you have some tools and resources, it’s your turn.

What will you start creating first?

Versione in italiano: Come promuoversi online in modo criativo

Thank you so much for accepting my invitation and taking the time to write such a useful and informational post, Clara! 🙂

Questions?

About the author

Clara Giampietro is a professional English and Spanish to Italian translator. Since 2004, she has been translating technical, law and marketing texts. She loves working for technology and industry clients, and her mission is to help them expand their business by making their words fly in Italian. She is a qualified member of AITI (Italian Association of Translators and Interpreters) and a member of AITI’s Board of the Regional Chapter for Piedmont and Valle d’Aosta. Clara is also a member of IAPTI (International Association of Professional Translators and Interpreters). To learn more and to connect, visit her website.