BP is an annual conference that brings translators from all over the globe together to talk about industry trends, marketing, CPD and more. And network. And have fun.

Tatiana

Prompted by the EU's General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), the ProZ.com team has made several improvements and adjustments to the way personal information can be entered and managed by users of ProZ.com.

Jason Grimes

For those not familiar, a ProZ.com powwow is an informal, local get-together of language professionals. Any ProZ.com member can propose and organize a powwow in their area. Since 2001, thousands of powwows have been held around the world, in 110 countries.

So far, 454 powwows have been held in 63 cities in the UK, with 3,748 attendees total. At least 50 of those powwows have been organized by Victoria Burns and Alexandra Chapman. This May 5th, Alexandra and Victoria are celebrating 10 years of powwows in Cardiff by holding -- you guessed it -- another powwow!

I asked Alexandra and Victoria to talk a bit about how the Cardiff powwows got started, what the experience has been like, and what benefits they have been able to see from coming together in person with colleagues. Here is what they had to say:

Jared Tabor

Hi ProZ.com members. I'm Kevin Dias, founder of TM-Town and now a full-time developer at ProZ.com.

Kevin Dias

ProZ.com Mobile, the application developed by ProZ.com for use on mobile devices, now offers the possibility of updating basic profile information even when your are away from your computer.

Lucía Leszinsky

World Book Day is April 23rd. To celebrate, Amazon is offering a selection of award-winning works from around the world, all of which have been translated to English, for free for Kindle. You can grab them between now and April 24th at https://www.amazon.com/article/read-the-world

(there may be geographical or other limits on who can get these books for free-- apparently they are free to US-based customers, and discounted in other regions)

Among the books, I spotted The Light of the Fireflies, by Paul Pen and translated by ProZ.com member Simon Bruni.

Jared Tabor

A project manager pool has been launched at ProZ.com. ProZ.com Pools™ make it easier to discover freelance professionals working in certain select fields. All project managers are invited to join the pool.

Mike Donlin

Interested in marketing your application to the world’s leading community of freelance translators and interpreters? 

API integration is available for the “What I am working on” (Wiwo) feature at ProZ.com. Wiwo enables sharing projects that members of the language community are currently working on.

Mike Donlin

If you've been working in translation a while, chances are you have run into Mox somewhere, if you don't already regularly follow his adventures in translation.

"Best method to increase your productivity", from mox.ingenierotraductor.com

Jared Tabor

In case you had not noticed, you can now log in to your ProZ.com account using your Google, Facebook, or LinkedIn credentials. The Google and Facebook options have already been announced here previously, in separate posts.

Jared Tabor

• 55% of freelancers spend 3 hours a week on their online marketing efforts
• 51% of respondents considered marketing too time-consuming, and 41% felt marketing was too costly
• 83% are investing financially in online marketing of some sort
• 72% say they are spending less than but up to 100 USD a month in marketing (those who spend more than that report earning more)
• The average survey respondent had reached their income goal within two years of starting out

The survey sample were some 2,000 US freelancers of all types, so it is reasonable to expect those numbers to be somewhat different if we narrow it down to translators and interpreters, expand the sample to other countries, or both.

One number in particular that caught my eye was the monthly investment in marketing. 100 USD a month sounded pretty steep to me, but maybe I'm wrong. 1,200 USD in freelancer marketing a year. Do you spend that much on your marketing? If so, drop me a line, I'd be very interested in hearing about it and if you find it to be a good investment.

If you are already a paying ProZ.com member, you are spending between 12 and 18 dollars a month on marketing through your membership, though you get all the rest of the tools and opportunities available along with it. It's a kind of marketing that is easy to do, what we'd call passive marketing.

Jared Tabor

It is now possible to login to your ProZ.com accounts in the ProZ.com Mobile app using Google, Facebook or LinkedIn credentials.

Lucía Leszinsky

ProZ.com Plus membership comes with all the benefits members have come to know over the past nineteen years, plus a lot of new tools and opportunities designed with the serious freelance language professional in mind. This series takes a look at these additional benefits, one at a time.

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"The proof is in the pudding," I've heard, in response to the question "How do you show potential clients you can deliver what they are looking for, at the quality they seek?"

Jared Tabor

Since 2009, ProZ.com has hosted an annual, free, online event for language professionals in celebration of International Translation Day (ITD), September 30th. You can see past events at ProZ/TV. The name of the day notwithstanding, interpreters also deserve some of the spotlight at these events! Here is a selection of some recorded sessions from past ITD events which may be of interest to you if you interpret, or are considering getting into the interpreting field...

Jared Tabor