Post: #1

Hey guys, I'm a 20 y.o college student who wants to escape all the 9-5 hassle. I am studying Biotechnology but I don't think it will help me achieve my dream of becoming location independent.

I recently started a profile on elance as a Spanish-English translator (I'm a native Spanish speaker) but the market is extremely competitive and despite having completed my profile (portfolio, description...etc) I still haven't found my first client (I'm guessing due to my lack of experience/references).

I was thinking on learning other useful skills since there really aren't that many Spanish-English translation jobs and most of them easily get 20-40 proposals from other contractors.

My first thought is giving freelance article writing a try since it doesn't require any special skills and is something I'd maybe enjoy but I would like to hear other suggestions.

I believe perhaps another option would be to learn programming or graphic/web design but I have no previous experience and I'm guessing it could easily take a year or two to become proficient enough to get freelance gigs, would it be worth it?

I've read a bunch of threads on freelancing and programming but most of them are quite old. Are there any other skills that are worth learning that I'm missing here? If you guys have any other advice for earning money online for newbies, it would be greatly appreciated.

In the meantime, I'm going to continue to pursue the freelance translator gig since it's something I enjoy and I'm good at so any advice from other professional translators would also be very useful.

PD: I also use Odesk but I find it even worse since translation jobs there can get up to 60 proposals. Are there any other freelance websites that are worth the try for a translator/writer?

Post: #2

Hey man,

If you are dead-set on translating, check out:

1) http://www.proz.com
2) http://www.translatorscafe.com

They are both geared towards translation and interpretation as opposed to Odesk and the like being used for all kinds of jobs. Proz has some great forums and is an immense resource for a translator. You can do a search of language agencies wherever you are on those sites, do some translation tests for them, establish a relationship/payment system, and many will still give you work via email should you choose to grow it to a more location-independent lifestyle. Starting locally and getting some face time has some definite advantages because these companies get spammed to shit by tons of candidates who will all undercut each other on the price per word.

Do you speak any other languages besides Spanish and English? What country are you from and which country are you currently in?

Post: #3

(03-12-2014 12:13 PM)texas Wrote:  Hey man,

If you are dead-set on translating, check out:

1) http://www.proz.com
2) http://www.translatorscafe.com

They are both geared towards translation and interpretation as opposed to Odesk and the like being used for all kinds of jobs. Proz has some great forums and is an immense resource for a translator. You can do a search of language agencies wherever you are on those sites, do some translation tests for them, establish a relationship/payment system, and many will still give you work via email should you choose to grow it to a more location-independent lifestyle. Starting locally and getting some face time has some definite advantages because these companies get spammed to shit by tons of candidates who will all undercut each other on the price per word.

Do you speak any other languages besides Spanish and English? What country are you from and which country are you currently in?

I recently used proz to download a freelance translator guide and check on some price per word fees. I guess there is still a lot more other useful stuff in there.

I used to be quite good at French but it's been a long time and now I'm learning Polish, which seems to have messed it up a little.

I'm Spanish but I'm currently on a student exchange in Poland.

Thanks for the reply, I'll also check translatorscafe.

Post: #4

I wouldn't give up on biotech just because you want to be location independent. You can be that while you're that young just by doing menial online tasks like writing in Spanish. I'd recommend you to stop looking at Elance and hit up local business instead. Even with the spanish economy not doing that well, you can probably find some companies who need ongoing translation or SEO companies, who needs spanish content. Even if you're outside Spain, just get to networking with people online on small business and webshop forums in spanish and offer translation, I am sure you can easily make decent money. Small biz and startups don't have a lot of money, but if you make a good offer for them, then they'll jump on it. You could go into affiliate marketing in spanish too, will have less competition than english, for example the dating market in spanish, but affiliate marketing is also a skill that takes a long time to learn.

Post: #5

(03-12-2014 12:28 PM)berserk Wrote:  I wouldn't give up on biotech just because you want to be location independent. You can be that while you're that young just by doing menial online tasks like writing in Spanish. I'd recommend you to stop looking at Elance and hit up local business instead. Even with the spanish economy not doing that well, you can probably find some companies who need ongoing translation or SEO companies, who needs spanish content. Even if you're outside Spain, just get to networking with people online on small business and webshop forums in spanish and offer translation, I am sure you can easily make decent money. Small biz and startups don't have a lot of money, but if you make a good offer for them, then they'll jump on it. You could go into affiliate marketing in spanish too, will have less competition than english, for example the dating market in spanish, but affiliate marketing is also a skill that takes a long time to learn.

Thanks for the advice, cold contacting/emailing may be the way to go. I am not planning on giving up Biotech since I only have two semesters left.
Affiliate marketing sounds interesting but I think it's probably not for me right now. I believe it could be a good option if I was more experienced and had a blog, audience etc, but I will do some more research on the topic. I definetly want to learn more about SEO since I've seen it come up several times in elance job listings for content writers. In the meantime I am checking out proz to find out more about translation and see if perhaps I can get a mentor.

Post: #6

If you want to work as a translator you are almost set to go, but if you want to pursue other careers you would have to learn from scratch.

If you want to earn a decent income as a translator the most important thing is to have experience in some field other than translation. You say you are almost done with your bachelor in Biotechnology, this alone will make you stand out from the other translators.

Don´t use elance or odesk for translation jobs, these sites are probably more suitable for programming, web design and SEO, but the translation and writing jobs are total garbage.

So if I were you I would pay an experienced translator to help you craft a well written curriculum vitae and to create a professional-looking profile on Pro z and/or translators cafe. And finally, send at least a few hundred emails to translation agencies, but first make sure that they want to receive applications and that they work with your languages and your field of expertise or any related field, otherwise they will see you as a spammer. If you take these steps you should find at least one client.

And lastly, don´t buy into this mentorship bullshit (this is just a publicity stunt). These people are just a few volunteers and there are hundreds (or perhaps thousands) of newbies wanting to be mentored.

Post: #7

Hi Luisaceo! It was nice reading you! How is going on your dream to become location independent?

Post: #8

You can forget about freelancing as a programmer except if you live in India and are willing to code for $3 an hour

Post: #9

Hi Luisaceo I agree with your post. Today there is lots of scope in freelancing career because a freelancer has the ability to bring business from online market. In a software company a freelancer has the responsibility to bring business from freelancer sites like Odesk and many more and deal with the customer.

Post: #10

Woah, I started this thread ages ago... Since then I actually changed my field of study. I'm now doing languages and international relations, I'm thinking on getting into law as a way of having something to fall back on, pretty much. I have been doing some thinking lately though and I'm considering learning about forex/trading. Already found some useful resources but I haven't had the time to do some proper research on the subject.

Post: #11

I would say that programming is a good skill to have, particularly tailored to web development or mobile applications. Hell, there are even some pseudo programmers (read: wordpress) who are making bank.

(04-20-2015 04:20 PM)the Thing Wrote:  You can forget about freelancing as a programmer except if you live in India and are willing to code for $3 an hour

I disagree with this statement. Programming is easy, but programming well is difficult. How come good programmers are still able to find employment?

You can still become location independent with programming if you're capable of finding local clients and deliver good software in a timely manner.

Post: #12

Contract killer.

Post: #13

(04-21-2015 03:09 PM)southamerica Wrote:  I would say that programming is a good skill to have, particularly tailored to web development or mobile applications. Hell, there are even some pseudo programmers (read: wordpress) who are making bank.

(04-20-2015 04:20 PM)the Thing Wrote:  You can forget about freelancing as a programmer except if you live in India and are willing to code for $3 an hour

I disagree with this statement. Programming is easy, but programming well is difficult. How come good programmers are still able to find employment?

You can still become location independent with programming if you're capable of finding local clients and deliver good software in a timely manner.

I meant that about working on websites like elance odesk and freelancer. I work at a branch of a large international (Indian) IT consulting company. Most (pretty much all) of our projects we charge the client Western rates and outsource back to India. The quality of work we receive from there is very and I mean very low. No kidding, I've worked with consultants with 10-12 years experience who couldn't even get basic if/else or switch logic right. I wasn't supposed to do much coding myself when I joined but I ended up rewriting large chunks of what we receive before it works right or the client sees it. They call me a top-level, very bright programmer. I don't think I'm that good but I guess I look super star by comparison.

If you can code well you can of course look for work where you move. In Europe I noticed that language can be a bit of a barrier. I have no idea how it works in SEA but I guess you can get local rates and work in an English-speaking environment. Programming is of course an international skill and it may be easy or hard to find but you can find work at absolutely anywhere in the world. But this is not freelancing, this is finding a job as an expat and you won't really be location independent by doing this. I mean you can live next to anywhere yes but you can't up and leave whenever you want to.

But if you want to truly be location independent and be able to work from anywhere you wish at the moment, programming is not the way to go because even if you are willing to work for as low as $20 a day, let me tell you that $20 a day can pay the wages for a small coding operation in Ind/Pak/Bgd very easy, and 3-4 people working on a project will always deliver quicker and will be able to get more work, to build reputation to get even more work. There is a 10-year SAP FI/CO guy at the office who just came from India to work here for a client on site, and he tells he got $20 a day as a senior SAP consultant (Which is so cruel it's not even funny, if you know how much these guys are worth here!)

If you have web design and SEO skills you can of course do your own websites and work affiliate/AdSense but that's again not freelancing. If you can do basic iOS or Android you can flip apps: there's lots of websites where you can buy source code and all art for small games, for example if you buy like a card matching memory game, you can make godzillion variations of it, like one Barbie themed, one dinosaur etc. pump all of them full of ads and upsell, then list on the app store and win the numbers game. This is not freelancing either, it's having your own business. Getting local clients at least in Europe you can forget about it because your tax etc. costs will be high, living expenses are high and clients will prefer to go for more established companies like us instead of just one guy.

At the end programming in today's world is nothing more than a numbers game. There's millions of coders both good and bad and most of them can work remotely from anywhere in the world. You either go San Francisco style startup or online business like I told above. Forget freelancing.

Post: #14

Thanks for the clarification the Thing. Now I see your point of view.

To add to what the Thing has said, if you want to become location independent with programming as a freelancer, you'll probably want to rethink your strategy. However, if you can outsource the work to other programmers and have them deliver to you so you can deliver to your client, you will be able to make some money - you probably won't get rich though. Anyway, this has been discussed in other threads.

Post: #15

Find out what you enjoy and do that. It doesn't matter whether you write content writer or graphic designer , if you are good you will get paid good money. There are a lot of wannabes out there currently, just sharpen your skill set and you will make good money.

Post: #16

So what I'm gathering from this thread is that, while software engineering as a whole can be lucrative, it's hard to make any type of good money working remotely because if you're not on site anyways the client would rather just hire the $3/hr guy in India?

Post: #17

(04-21-2015 03:33 PM)Travesty444 Wrote:  Contract killer.

It's a growth industry, but the medical and dental are complete shit.

Post: #18

(04-29-2015 10:54 AM)tallandblonde Wrote:  So what I'm gathering from this thread is that, while software engineering as a whole can be lucrative, it's hard to make any type of good money working remotely because if you're not on site anyways the client would rather just hire the $3/hr guy in India?

I would say this is an extremely false presumption. My very close buddy makes six figures working from his home office for companies in America and Europe coding software. He has an impressive resume and knows his shit. He's been developing software for 10+ years, has 3 young kids and a wife and owns a home in a different state. Just like anything else, people will pay for quality.