There are a lot of different ways to market yourself as a freelance translator. One of those ways is by using ProZ.com. ProZ is a translator portal with a global community and a good number of jobs and projects even nowadays (especially if you have invested in membership for visibility).
That said, navigating all the different pages of ProZ can be tricky. The website itself is guilty of not having everything under one or a few places, and you'll have to search in different submenus and settings panes to find what you're looking for.
This might also be the reason why not everyone might know a handy way to quickly find agencies that are looking for candidates/are open to applications from linguists signed up on the platform - we're talking about the 'Blue Board outsourcers accepting applications' section.
Blue Board for Cold Applications
Quite a bit of a name, huh? Indeed, it's a section of the more famous Blue Board - the one where you can find translation agency scores with relative reviews by colleagues who have worked with them.
To access the specific section of the Blue Board where outsourcers accept applications, you can go from ProZ.com to the upper menu > Jobs & directories > Submit applications (as displayed below).
Or, you can follow this direct link (https://www.proz.com/blueboard/?sp_mode=applications) and bookmark it on your browser for easy access.
Please note that ProZ members can send unlimited applications to agencies looking for applicants, via this page. Non-members may be limited in terms of requests.
Once you are on this page, you can pick some agencies (or any number, if you have a membership) and start applying to each. I suggest you show 50 outsourcers per page, so you don't have to switch pages - you'll only need to scroll down as you apply.
The page also keeps track of your total number of applications under a record window in 'Total applications sent'. Here you can review the date of old applications and also see the status - if your application was accepted or it's still pending, for instance.
Helpful Features of the Application Window
Let's now talk a bit about the main page, and how it works: each month you can apply to agencies with application openings (some will also have specific requirements detailed before you send your form as per subfields or services required).
You can also see the linked business page and score related to the Blue Board entry of each agency. And - quite useful - you can create templates for your cover letters in the form application window. This way, you can quickly have ready-to-be-tailored text to send to the agency.
In the form application window, I strongly suggest all applicable boxes that would benefit your application - such as adding a LinkedIn page, website, portfolio, client feedback (very important!), and other useful contact information you might feel worth sharing with the client.
Although the effectiveness of this type of method is variable, having the right tailored email to send, paired with the right profile (yours) for the client to review, can be a useful tool for marketing clients, to pair, of course with other methods such as directly applying to jobs on the ProZ Blue Board and messaging businesses from the Blue Board. Stay tuned for the next post!