Mathieu Marechal, Bewords CEO, talks about his experience as a Founder and the early stage of development of a platform like Bewords.com.
Dear Readers, please fell free to react and discuss/comment on this article (here on the blog)
The early stage of the development.
The development of the platform was more difficult than we expected. One reason was our low experience, limited budget and wishes to provide everything from the day one of the opening (I must say that we failed in this goal).
The second reason was that we also had to drive the development of our translation company at the same time…and as we are neither hundreds of people on the team, nor even dozensof collaborators, the load of daily work is far more than 35h per week.
Many of what are called "details" (I would say hassle…) appeared very quickly. This is the drawback of wishing to do everything by ourselves…due to our limited budget and a bit also by "pride", will of controlling everything and building a strong and real asset (depending on any SAS solution, external code, etc.).
I don't remember all of them but let me think…
- The terms of use…what a fight…it is not that our lawyer was not as good as we would have needed but the process of describing every detail of the platform and what it does, doesn't, can not do, should do if, won't do unless…., every little detail of the features, trying to anticipate every misuses of it, etc…I let you imagine what have been our dreams/nightmare at night…
- The translator database : how it is structured. How to build the algorithm of searching among translators (why translator X appears before translator Y, what are the levers we want to give to the translators to allow them to appear among the first providers in the results, in other words, the structure of the ranking, etc.). How to invite translators to join Bewords? Etc.
The long road to determine the best compromise between offering a lot of features and keeping the simplicity of use. A daily concern for our team.
- To conclude, it has been a very rewarding experience. Bewords is growing day after day, we’ll keep working as hard as we have done until now to bring clients and translators together, the challenge has only just begun!
About Mathieu Marechal
An entrepreneur with a passion for the Web and languages, Mathieu Marechal has lived in several countries (Belgium, United States and now France) and has launched the translation agency Trad Online, which is headquartered in Paris and also has offices in 4 other countries in Europe.
In 2010, Mathieu launched a totally new and innovative concept which aims to revolutionize how business is done on the translation market: www.bewords.com
BeWords is a marketplace enabling translators and customers to work together directly, with no constraints. The site includes community features, a personal profile for each translator, a project management tool, online payment, etc.
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Why is Bewords better than other translation portals? What are its "innovative" features?
Hi Laura,
Sorry for the late replay!! Thank you very much for your question.
BeWords works on the basis of a community, we offer a free and open marketplace in order to give clients and translators the opportunity to work directly together, to socialize and make teams with the purpose of increasing their chances of working in larger projects and to extend our member's network.
Among our innovative features we have our Escrow service which works very well. It provides the security that many of our freelance translators need, it is a service enabling customers to pay upfront for their translation projects and for providers to have the guarantee that they will be paid. http://www.bewords.com/escrowservice/. We have other interesting services such as our Google Ads offered to our translators along with a 12-months Premium membership, etc.
Do not hesitate to contact us for any further information you might need, and if you wish, please share with us your BeWords experience, ideas, suggestions/comments here on the blog! We would be glad to hear you!
Have a nice day!
Hi,
Well after reading your blog, visiting the platform and starting to build a profile I have a few questions to ask (hope you don't mind too much);
How does this site differ let's say to others that initially appear to be a platform geared towards bringing professionals together and then turns into a site that drives down the rates of translators thus saturating the market with price-dumpers?
Don't get me wrong nor think that I am being negative; I ask these questions because for a long time I have been defending professional translators against the constant crticism from the many out there who have received shoddy translation work and mainly due to the fact that if you offer 4cts (often less) a word for a technical translation, that takes research, you are not going to get a serious professional doing the job that the customer expects. For this reason I started the QUIT (quality in translation stamp) to advertise that translators are worth more. Indeed if a translators work is to be deemed professional then there needs to be something in place to endorse that. I am hopeful, after reading your founders words, that your platform just may well be the thing that we, as translators, are looking for.
I too strated a project, with an associate, with no financial backing & know how tough it can be & so hats off so far. My experience says that if you stick to your original principals & goals you will go far.
I look forward to your response
Samantha – Paris, France
Bonjour Samantha,
Thank you very much for your comment! We are glad to have you as a member and of course we are more than glad to answer to your question.
BeWords is a platform for professional translators, we have created several features in order to give our clients the opportunity to deal with real professional translators. As you might have seen on your BeWords profile, you can add your translation examples, upload your resume, and give full professional info wich confirms your professionalism and expertise on the domain of translation (that's why it is very important to fully complete your profile as it is your online CV!), they can also ask for a project's small translation before deciding to work with the translator, this way clients can be sure of the quality of the translation for their project. Clients can also leave recommendations on the translator's profile they have worked with, this helps to increase the translator's credibility as well as it helps him/her to get higher ranking in research results. Also, with your Premium account you benefit from our BeWords Profile Certification service, http://www.bewords.com/profilevalidation/, which completes your profile and gives clients the opportunity to work with the translator en toute sérénité !!
On the other hand translators can easily find clients and work with them directly, they can benefit from our Escrow Service, http://www.bewords.com/escrowservice/, wich guarantees Secure payment for both Translators and Clients.
I hope that this answers to your question, in case you might need any further information or help, please do not hesitate to contact us @ customer-service@bewords.com.
Feel very WELCOME to Bewords. com Samatha
With warm regards,
Evelyn.