Transcription business start up costs
Digital Transcription Firstly what is digital transcription? Digital transcription is transcribing of voice files that are received over the internet or email. If the file is small enough it can be emailed to you or it is sent to you via a server called an ftp, a file transfer protocol. Check out websites that have these ftp available for you to use to send and receive large voice files. Two good ones are Sendthisfile which is actually free; or Smartftp which has a marginal yearly cost for this service. Also my clients (transcription companies) all have their own ftp that I access for free. Then the next step is to downloaded the voice file from the ftp onto your hard drive and then finally load the voice file from your hard drive into your digital transcription software, which would have been installed on your pc (more on this below). Digital Transcription Software Possible transcription business start up costs will depend on which digital transcription software you choose. I use a free transcription software called Express Scribe and you can download it at
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Digital Transcription Hardware Further possible and recommended transcription business start up costs, no matter if you choose to use the free digital transcription platform or the paid one, is to purchase quality transcription headphones. Depending on where you live or who you are transcribing for, it may be necessary for you to wear transcription headphones anyway, even if it's in your home office, as the information you are transcribing is of a confidential nature and it must not be audible to others. Also you really do hear the audio much better with transcription headphones on as opposed to using your PC speakers. I have the sony stereo transcription headphones and they are really good and they have a volume control attached to them as well. Also further recommended transcription business start up costs, and I promise the last cost, is that you purchase a footpedal that is compatible with your particular transcription software. Please don't make the mistake of just going out and buying any footpedal and expect that to work with your software. Make sure it is compatible with the software platform that you will be transcribing from. Each digital transcription platform also allows you to stop, start, rewind, fast forward your transcription without a foot pedal via your keyboard, but this slows you down considerably. A footpedal is highly highly recommended if you will be transcribing often.
Tape Transcription This is the 'old fashioned' way of transcribing, and offering this service can add to your transcription business start up costs. 'Old fashioned" maybe, but still heavily used and there is nothing wrong with this. There are three types of tapes used for transcription: mini, micro and standard size tapes. The mini and micro are the tiny cassette tapes and they are both the same size, so you have to see what's written on them to know which is which. Then there is the standard sized tape, which is a normal sized cassette. Each of these three tapes requires their own different transcriber machine, although you may be able to get one transcriber that is able to transcribe both micro and mini tapes. Micro tapes tend to be used more often these days over mini tapes, but check it out in your own country to be sure. I still find standard tapes used a bit as well and they require their own transcribing machine. There is a trick though to converting your standard tapes into digital files. However I will say up front that if you are starting out with a poor quality tape the digital conversion will be even worse. Sometimes it's not worth the hassle as the conversion takes time and time is money. It may be cheaper to hire a trancribing machine for the day. But here is the method: 1. Purchase a jack to jack lead from an electrical supplier/store. 2. If you don't have a transcriber machine for standard size tapes us a tape machine, say a portable home system or hi-fi or walkman, for playing the tape. 3. Use a PC recording device such as Goldwave (free download from http://www.goldwave.com/) 4. Plug one end of jack to jack lead to PC microphone slot and the other end to the headphones socket of the tape player 5. Open up your pc recording software, hit record as you hit play on the standard tape machine player. 6. Save your recording (usually saves as a WAV file) and import that WAV file into your digital transcription platform.
Fantastic zero or low cost transcription business start up costs are: . that you may be in a situation where you may have a client who will lend you their tape transcriber to keep at your premises. I have had three such clients, two have a micro transcriber and one has a standard tape transcriber. All allow me to keep their transcriber machine on my premises, but I only chose to keep one. Too much responsiblity as my daughter pulled one off my desk a while ago and I had to pay for it to get fixed, ouch!! If you need or want to purchase one yourself, a fantastic way to cut down on your transcription business start up costs is to find transcriber for sale on eBay. But initially you can get away with zero transcription business start up costs whilst you get up and running, ie: . lend the transcriber machine from your client if he has one, if you are doing tape transcription and . using your keyboard and PC speakers for digital transcription in conjunction with free transcription software. This method for digital transcription will drive you bonkers after a while, but it's great until you get some cash flow happening to purchase the foot pedal first and then transcription headphones. Go to non medical transcription jobs on avenues to pursue to find clients Go to medical transcription client providers although this is useful for non medical transcription jobs too. Go to working from home and transcription for so much more valuable information Purchase transcription business start up EbooksYou may be interested in an Ebook written by Sandra Shirah. Her Ebook is an EPPIE Finalist for Best Non-Fiction! Packed full of tried and true information on how to establish and maintain a successful home-based transcription business — written by someone who has “moonlighted” as an independent transcriptionist since 1989. Ebook - Start your own transcription business Click Here! OR You may be interested in a medical transcription specific Ebook written by Michele Miller who has run a medical transcription business since 1994. Ebook - The step by step guide to medical transcription at home Click Here!
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