hot off the heels / hot on the heels

[Abcl]

Hi,
What is the meaning of "Hot off the heels" (generally speaking)? I have it in the following sentence "Hot off the heels of one of our most successful webinars to date"
- sorry I'm not really proposing any translation as I don't know at all what it means. (So all I have would be "Inscrivez-vous à l'un de nos webinaires les plus appréciés à ce jour")
Thanks for your help

 

[franc 91]

shouldn't it be - on the heels?

 

[The Prof]

Like Franc, I think this sounds like it should be ´hot on the heels of...´, meaning roughly ´following closely behind ...´. However, it would help if you could give us more of the surrounding text.

 

[Catalinata]

I agree, we say hot on the heels where I'm from.

 

[Abcl]

Well I'm translating part of a Web site describing various webinars and this one is called "Turning Digital Dimes into Dollars" then I have this first sentence saying "Hot off the heels of one of our most successful webinars to date (an in-depth look at the semantic web), the XX team is at it again".
But the rest of the description does not help at all. :-(
I'm lost!

 

[Abcl]

So it would just mean "follow one of our most succesful webinars"?

 

[The Prof]

I can´t quite decide if they really meant ´hot on the heels of´, or if they are actually trying to say something else!

It actually feels more like a strange mixture of ´hot on the heels of´, ´hot off the press´, and ´flushed with success´!

Even if we play safe and stay with ´hot on the heels of´, I´m at a loss for a good translation!

 

[Catalinata]

Maybe it's something like:

No sooner has the webinar come to a close, than the XX team is at it again

I get the feeling they want to convey that they're coming up with new ideas/projects at such a rate that they can hardly keep up

 

[Abcl]

ah nevermind, thanks for your help anyway! I still can ask my client eventhough I had rather liked to figure this out by myself (well, with your help)!

 

[Cold_Sweat]

Assuming it is "hot on the heels" which would actually make sense in the context given, it translates as "dans la foulée (de)", "sur la lancée (de)".

 

[Abcl]

Well I now have "Fresh off the heels of moderating a much-lauded pre-SIIA Executive Session, XX and YY continue their in-depth exploration of how to publishers can find prosperity in perilous economic times"
So the author of the text persists with "off" (but I guess there are some errors in the text, like here I suppose "to" just before "publishers" shouldn't be there, should it?).
It must be some kind of playwords ("hot/fresh") I guess, meaning "juste après"/"sur la lancée".
Thanks to everybody for your help!

 

[wildan1]

ah nevermind, thanks for your help anyway! I still can ask my client eventhough I had rather liked to figure this out by myself (well, with your help)!

I think the copywriter mixed up hot off the press and hot on the heels.

Given the unanimous response from native speakers, Abcl, I think you can ask your client with confidence, "Maybe you meant to say 'hot on the heels...?'"!

How about: Fort du succès de notre dernier webinar/cyberséminaire...

 

[choksy]

I came across "hot off the heels" in the following context:
"Brian Kwong attended this conference hot off the heels of his own successful three-month challenge in German".
It means that he attended the conference immediately after his own successful challenge.

 

[franc 91]

Well as mentioned above - it should be - hot on the heels - 'off the heels' doesn't make much sense in English.

 

[choksy]

Well, I can't be certainly sure, as far as I'm not a native English speaker, but I believe that "hot off the heels" ans "hot on the heels" have somewhat different meanings.
Even though both phrases can mean "immediately thereafter",
"Hot on the heels" means "in close pursuit of someone/something", following its steps, that very soon we will reach the subject.
Whereas "Hot off the heels" means that we have just left it. We have already been there and experienced it and memories are still fresh and hot, but now we stopped.
Probably in some contexts both phrases are interchangeable, but they are not exactly the same.

I should mention that according to google "Hot on the heels" is a lot more frequent, but I don't think "hot off the heels" is wrong.

 

[Omelette]

There is quite a large number of 'hot off the heels' on Google, which surprised me.
In all the examples I read, you could substitute 'hot on the heels' without any apparent change in meaning.
'Hot on the heels' - as others have said - is the more usual expression. It also seems to make more sense.
If you were virtually on someone's heels you would be very close to them.

 

[wildan1]

I see the two expressions as similar but not identical in meanings/nuances.

Hot on the heels of someone is literal--you are physically following someone closely
Hot off the heels of something is figurative/temporal--it describes an activity occurring immediately after a previous one.

 

[Omelette]

My impression is that 'hot on the heels' is often used figuratively to mean 'straight after' - it sounds correct to me. And so there would be no difference in meaning, in that respect.

Collins Dictionary: "The shock news comes hot on the heels of the company axing its site in Scotland."http://www.collinsdictionary.com/di...urus/hot-on-the-heels-of-something-or-someone
Merriam Webster's Learner's Dictionary: 'Their second album is coming hot on the heels of the first.' http://www.learnersdictionary.com/definition/hot

Or do you mean that 'hot on the heels' can be both literal and figurative, whereas 'hot off the heels' is only figurative?