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The following article was featured in the November 1998 issue of the “Werbeberater“, published by the Verlag Norman Rentrop.
Internet Success Story
The whole world is talking about e- commerce. Corporations invest millions. But there is scarcely any mention of the profits being made. That is the one aspect. The other: a freelance translator from Lindau on Lake Constance wins 100 % of his customers from the Internet. Monthly outlay: 8 DM for the connection to the online provider, T- Online.
Just over a year ago Ian Diggance, from England and now living in Lindau, started working as a translator on a freelance basis. Initially he was rather sceptical about the Internet. “I mainly wanted to attract customers through newspaper advertising”, says the entrepreneur. “The Internet was simply another alternative, from which I didn’t expect a great deal.” Out of curiosity, Diggance took advantage of the offer available to all T-Online customers and placed his own Homepage on the Internet. In German and English he offered his services world-wide under the address http://home.t- online.de/home/ian-uebersetzungen.
The breakthrough came with the search engines
His fears were almost realised. Although he registered his Homepage with all the important German and international search engines, and then in January 1998 published an improved version online, there was initially very little reaction. A few enquiries, but no orders.
The breakthrough came in February 1998. “While surfing one day I stumbled on the Web site of the translator and interpreter directory, Sprachmittler http://www.sprachmittler.com”, reports Ian Diggance. “I registered myself straight away. It only costs 30 DM a year.”
A short time later the first order was placed. An established translation company from Baden-Württemberg saw his name on the Sprachmittler register. “After successfully completing a trial translation, I received more and more orders from this company”, Diggance is delighted to say. During the course of the following months, other translation agencies contacted him via the Internet and placed orders.
Orders for more than 10,000 DM
And then in July and August of this year things really took off. Orders for more than 10,000 DM within just two months. All resulting directly or indirectly from the Internet site.
And the volume is increasing continually. “At the moment I am literally being bowled over by success. I would never have thought it possible. As things stand I could translate day and night,” lan Diggance reports enthusiastically. In the next few months, he considers a monthly turnover of 10,000 DM to be a realistic aim. Almost 100 % remains as profit. The running costs are minimal, likewise the advertising costs – thanks to the Internet.
Only the invoice is sent by post
90% of customer orders are sent by email, the rest by fax. All translations are returned to the customer by email. All that is sent by post is the invoice.
This success has been a real impetus for the freelance translator: Diggance already has further plans. At the moment he mainly works for translation companies. “I would like to work directly with the customers themselves. That is considerably more lucrative.”
In the long term he would like to assume the role of an agency himself. His wife will probably take over this side of the business. “There are only 24 hours in a day, and there are our 2 sons to think about as well.”
In order to give the Internet presence of his translation firm a more professional touch, its own domain name was recently registered. lan Diggance showed his creativity here as well. “The name had to directly relate to the services I offer and be internationally usable. All the relevant English names such as ‘Translator’, ‘Translation’ etc. had, of course, already been snapped up.”
As a former Latin student, he chose without further ado the Latin word for ‘translator’. Customers all around the world can now reach the Ian Diggance Übersetzungen translation agency under the Internet address http://www.interpres.de. Cost: 70 DM a month for Web space and 150 DM a year for the domain name.
What you can learn from this Internet success story
Tip 1: Small firms and one-man operations, whose services can be offered over the Internet – e.g. software, translations, journalistic articles and computer graphics, can expand immeasurably at low cost. Distance to the customer no longer plays a role.
Tip 2: The more specialised the service or range of products, the better. Companies use the Internet to search world-wide for specialists.
Tip 3: A simple Internet presentation, which reveals the people behind it, their personalities and know-how, is a thousand times more valuable than the expensive, self-glorifying Internet campaigns of some giant corporations.
Tip 4: The Internet is a fast medium. People expect enquiries and orders to be completed more rapidly than in the “real world”. This is the only way to guarantee long-term success.
Extra Tip
The cheapest way to a professional Internet address
As a customer of T-Online or other online services, you can place your advertising pages on the Internet for free. The disadvantage, however: you do not have an address which can be used effectively for advertising purposes, e.g. www.yourfirm.com (the professional talks about one’s own domain name). Instead of this, the customer has to tip in an awfully long homepage address if he wants to call up your pages, “http://home.t-online.de/home ian-uebersetzungen” or some other similarly unwieldy name: nobody can remember it, and it also looks somewhat unprofessional. The solution: you can use the free homepage service of the online providers, but at the same time have an effective address such as www.yourfirm.com, by taking advantage of the services of the US company “name-secure”. The company registers the domain name for you. And whenever somebody tips in your name “www.yourfirm.com” in his Internet browser, he arrives on your page with its unpronounceably long name. The whole process can be compared to telephone call forwarding. And it is a lot cheaper than renting Web space with a provider. There you can pay $30 to $90 per month for the most basic offers, plus annual fees of around $90 for the registration of your domain name. For the namesecure service you only pay $25 for the initial set-up, followed by $24,95 a year for “forwarding”.
In addition, $70 is charged for registering the name for the first 2 years. Registration with namesecure takes place online and takes just 5 minutes. All further information under the address: www.namesecure.com.
Der Werbeberater / November 98 (pp 17- 19)
© Copyright 1998 by Verlag Norman Rentrop
