logo image
  • News
    • People Moves
    • Deal Wins
    • Demand Drivers
    • M&A and Funding
    • Financial Results
    • Technology
    • Academia
    • Industry News
    • Features
    • Machine Translation
    • — Divider —
    • Slator Pro
    • — Divider —
    • Press Releases
    • Sponsored Content
  • Data & Research
    • Research Reports & Pro Guides
    • Language Industry Investor Map
    • Real-Time Charts of Listed LSPs
    • Language Service Provider Index
  • Podcasts & Videos
  • Events
    • Design Thinking – February 2021
    • — Divider —
    • SlatorCon Coverage
    • Other Events
  • Directory
  • RFP Center
  • Jobs
MENU
  • News
    • People Moves
    • Deal Wins
    • Demand Drivers
    • M&A and Funding
    • Financial Results
    • Technology
    • Academia
    • Industry News
    • Features
    • Machine Translation
    • — Divider —
    • Slator Pro
    • — Divider —
    • Press Releases
    • Sponsored Content
  • Data & Research
    • Research Reports & Pro Guides
    • Language Industry Investor Map
    • Real-Time Charts of Listed LSPs
    • Language Service Provider Index
  • Podcasts & Videos
  • Events
    • Design Thinking – February 2021
    • — Divider —
    • SlatorCon Coverage
    • Other Events
  • Directory
  • RFP Center
  • Jobs

Advertise on Slator! Download the 2021 Online Media Kit Now

  • Slator Market Intelligence
  • Slator Advertising Services
  • Slator Advisory
  • Login
Search
Generic filters
Exact matches only
Advertisement
LinkedIn Quietly Enters the Translation Market

5 years ago

October 28, 2015

LinkedIn Quietly Enters the Translation Market

Industry News ·

by Florian Faes

On October 28, 2015

5 years ago
Industry News ·

by Florian Faes

On October 28, 2015

LinkedIn Quietly Enters the Translation Market

LinkedIn has entered the freelancer-slash-independent contractor market with a quiet roll out of its new feature: ProFinder. Connecting would-be clients to would-be contractors, the ProFinder pilot was initially limited to the San Francisco Bay Area in the US and only allowed the categories of accounting, graphic design, and writing and editing. It has since expanded to other cities within California and now includes virtually hundreds of categories, including – wait for it – translation. With this latest feature, LinkedIn is directly challenging incumbents UpWork (formerly Odesk and merged with Elance) and Freelancer.com. It also moves LinkedIn very far away from its core business model as a professional social network.

How do experts see LinkedIn’s chances at succeeding? SpendMatters feels that LinkedIn might just have a shot. “If LinkedIn’s pilot eventually evolves into a product roll-out, it’s hard to predict its influence on the… locational, multi category online intermediation space, [where they have] only one truly competitive peer,” a SpendMatters article says, concluding that “the door still seems quite open for a strong company like LinkedIn to at least capture its slice of this market.”

Yet will that “slice of the market” include translation? So far, neither ODesk nor Freelancer.com have made a big impact on the translation business. One reason is because large scale translation projects are still too complex to be managed through a one-size-fits-all platform. Furthermore, neither ODesk nor Freelancer are exactly popular with quality freelancers.

Advertisement

Many freelancers bemoan how platforms like UpWork offer “rock-bottom pricing without providing high-quality freelancers with adequate opportunities to get paid more by distinguishing themselves for superior efforts.” This is how one Forbes article on oDesk and Elance’s merger illustrates these freelancer concerns. “These hubs for freelancers rely too much on the joyless mechanics of market matching,” the article goes on to say.

Beyond this, LinkedIn will also need to provide the clients looking for translators the infrastructure and support to ensure the success of their project. Otherwise, they need to find a way to effectively disintermediate even those functions and package everything. Language learning company Duolingo learned this the hard way. Just because they have the people does not mean they actually have the capability: “Though we could make [translation] a profitable business, we realized we’d quickly become a translations business as we’d have to hire people focused on quality control, sales people, etc.,” Duolingo told TechCrunch back in June 2015.

LinkedIn has a few things going for it though. ProFinder leverages LinkedIn’s user base of over 380 million members.

With around 480,000 professionals listed under LinkedIn’s Translation and Localization category, the company’s freelance talent pool should exceed well over 100,000 freelance translators and interpreters.

ProFinder will also use other factors built into LinkedIn’s system to refine its match-making process, such as skills and recommendations. An internal concierge team will supplement ProFinder’s algorithm-driven search by manually sorting potential candidates. This entire process, according to LinkedIn, will give employers using ProFinder up to five responses within 24 hours of posting. These responses will include “a personalized message, price quote, and access to the pro’s LinkedIn profile.”

It is far too early to say if LinkedIn could become a force in translation and interpretation. But with its resources, engineering talent, and vast user-updated database of skilled professionals, the company does have a massive head start on many other recent entrants in the highly fragmented translation market.

 

Featured image: Ken Wolter / Shutterstock.com

TAGS

freelance translationLinkedInProFinder
SHARE
Florian Faes

By Florian Faes

Co-Founder of Slator. Linguist, business developer, and mountain runner. Based in the beautiful lakeside city of Zurich, Switzerland.

Advertisement

SUBSCRIBE TO THE SLATOR WEEKLY

Language Industry Intelligence
In Your Inbox. Every Friday

SUBSCRIBE

SlatorSweepSlatorPro
ResearchRFP CENTER

PUBLISH

PRESS RELEASEDIRECTORY LISTING
JOB ADEVENT LISTING

Bespoke advisory including speaking, briefings and M&A

SLATOR ADVISORY
Advertisement

Featured Reports

See all
Slator 2020 Language Industry M&A and Funding Report

Slator 2020 Language Industry M&A and Funding Report

by Slator

Slator 2021 Data-for-AI Market Report

Slator 2021 Data-for-AI Market Report

by Slator

Slator 2020 Medtech Translation and Localization Report

Slator 2020 Medtech Translation and Localization Report

by Slator

Pro Guide: Sales and Marketing for Language Service Providers

Pro Guide: Sales and Marketing for Language Service Providers

by Slator

Press Releases

See all
XTRF Launches a Bi-Monthly Free Networking Event for Localization Professionals

XTRF Launches a Bi-Monthly Free Networking Event for Localization Professionals

by XTRF

150 Million Words Translated: the German EU Council Presidency Translator Sets New Records

150 Million Words Translated: the German EU Council Presidency Translator Sets New Records

by Tilde

BeLazy Announces Full Automation for Plunet

BeLazy Announces Full Automation for Plunet

by BeLazy

Upcoming Events

See All
  1. Memsource MT Post-Editing Pricing Models Webinar

    Pricing Models for MT Post-Editing Workshop

    by Memsource

    · February 3

    Hear a panel of innovative localization professionals share different approaches for MT post-editing pricing.

    More info FREE

Featured Companies

See all
Text United

Text United

Memsource

Memsource

Wordbank

Wordbank

Protranslating

Protranslating

Seprotec

Seprotec

Versacom

Versacom

SDL

SDL

Smartling

Smartling

Lingotek

Lingotek

XTM International

XTM International

Smartcat

Smartcat

Translators without Borders

Translators without Borders

STAR Group

STAR Group

memoQ Translation Technologies

memoQ Translation Technologies

Advertisement

Popular articles

Why Netflix Shut Down Its Translation Portal Hermes

Why Netflix Shut Down Its Translation Portal Hermes

by Esther Bond

The Slator 2020 Language Service Provider Index

The Slator 2020 Language Service Provider Index

by Slator

Top Language Industry Quotes of 2020

Top Language Industry Quotes of 2020

by Monica Jamieson

SlatorPod: The Weekly Language Industry Podcast

connect with us

footer logo

Slator makes business sense of the language services and technology market.

Our Company

  • Support
  • About us
  • Terms & Conditions
  • Privacy Policy

Subscribe to the Slator Weekly

Language Industry Intelligence
In Your Inbox. Every Friday

© 2021 Slator. All rights reserved.

Sign up to the Slator Weekly

Join over 13,000 subscribers and get the latest language industry intelligence every Friday

Your information will never be shared with third parties. No Spam.