Giving Upwork tips is easy. In fact, giving tips on anything is easy. For every problem you have, there are a million “27 tips to ________” articles you can read online.
Unfortunately they’re almost all useless. Think about it: If they were really helpful then most of our problems would already be solved. Instead we waste untold amounts of time devouring empty tips, hoping for some breakthrough that never comes.
Giving tips is easy….. Giving useful tips, that’s another story.
It requires a level of experience, expertise, and thoughtfulness most tip-writers either aren’t able, or aren’t willing, to put in.
That’s what Warren Buffett meant when he said “Wall Street is the only place that people ride to in a Rolls Royce to get advice from people who take the subway.”
Most of the people offering advice online are also taking the subway. And some of them are even jumping over the turnstile because they can’t afford to buy a MetroCard.
Sorry, but it’s true. Take advice from random bloggers and your life and career aren’t likely to skyrocket any time soon.
For instance, just this morning I googled “Upwork tips” …
Some of the tips I found were OK.
Others were a waste of time, but harmless…like “make your clients happy.” (Does anyone think a freelancer’s job is to make their clients sad?)
But I also found a bunch of doozies that that can cost you time, money, and in some cases, your reputation.
And I’m not talking about the stuff that’s buried on page 796 of google’s search results, either. All of this is stuff I found within the first couple of pages.
Let’s dig into some specific examples, and my recommendations for what you should do instead.
Bad Upwork Tip #1: Only Talk To Clients Who’ve Already Spent X-Number Of Dollars
A client’s spending history is a pretty useless metric. All Upwork clients start off at zero.
Some of my best clients had no Upwork history whatsoever when I first met them. Like this one…
This wasn’t even the only job I did with her. It turned out to be a very profitable relationship.
The same is true for this client…
Even if you see that a client has spent a small amount, they may be getting ready to start spending a lot more.
A lot of clients want to get their feet wet with small projects before they commit serious money. I call these “Sleeper Hit Clients” — they start off slowly but then they blow up into heavy hitters. It’s totally normal. How many people buy an Acura or BMW for their first car?
Right now I’m talking to an Upwork client who’s spent just a few hundred dollars in the past year. We’re having a serious conversation even though my price is $250/hr.
Maybe their business is growing, or maybe they’re just ready to pay more for higher quality work.
The point is, why should I care what they’ve done in the past? If you knew a stock was going to go up, would you buy it right away, or would you sit there and think about its previous track record?
I’m not sure if the conversation will go anywhere. But it never hurts to exchange a few messages with a client and see if there’s a good fit. You’re risking nothing and your upside is huge.
If your competitors want to pass up great clients over some arbitrary number, let them. Their loss is your gain.
WHAT TO DO INSTEAD: When you see a job you’re interested in, ask yourself, “Can I add value to this project?” If the answer is yes, start a conversation with the client and see where it goes.
Bad Upwork Tip #2: Do Some Free Work For A New Client To Get Them Interested In You
When I read this tip my jaw practically dropped to the floor. I had to double check that the article I was reading was really about Upwork tips…because following this advice can get you kicked off of Upwork.
See the screenshot below, taken from Upwork’s terms of use…
But even aside from keeping your (and your clients’) Upwork account in good standing, doing free work isn’t a good way to build your freelancing business.
20 years ago free work wasn’t such a bad idea. It was a decent way for new freelancers to build up a portfolio of work.
But today that entire concept is totally obsolete. Why? Because sites like Upwork, freelancer.com, and Fiverr have tens of thousands of entry level jobs that pretty much anyone can do. So it makes 1000x more sense to get paid for all of the work you do — even if you’re just starting out.
WHAT TO DO INSTEAD: Use my Crystal Ball Technique. You’ll get paid for your work and start attracting clients in droves (even if you’re new to freelancing). Win-win. Try it.
Bad Upwork Tip #3: Search For Jobs Using Keywords And Filters
Whenever I get an email from someone complaining that they can’t find any good jobs on Upwork, I always ask them to describe EXACTLY what they’re doing.
Their answer is always the same: They’re not even seeing half (or more) of the jobs listed because they’re using filters and keywords to narrow down their results.
They do this in the name of “saving time.”
Yes, you save a few minutes. You can also save time by skipping showers and sleeping for 3 hours a night. Does that mean you should do it?
Clients are human. They don’t always post a job that cooperates with filters. In fact in many cases they don’t.
Different clients use different words to explain what they need (copywriting vs. sales writing, website designer vs. WordPress designer, etc.). Or they misspell something.
Sometimes they post an “intermediate” job when they really need an expert. Sometimes they post an “expert” job when a beginner could do the job just as well.
When you try to save time with keywords and filters, you miss out on tons of opportunities. It’s better to sift through 100 jobs that aren’t a good fit for you, than miss out on ONE great client. Otherwise you’re doing what Shark Tank’s Daymond John calls “tripping over dollars to pick up pennies.”
Great clients are worth a lot of money to you. Think about how much a client might be worth over the course of two or three years…
WHAT TO DO INSTEAD: Look at all the jobs in the categories you’re interested in. You don’t have to read every word of them, just skim the headlines until you find one that sounds good. It’ll take you 10 extra minutes and you’ll leave the “time savers” in the dust when you find great clients that are invisible to them.
Bad Upwork Tip #4: Avoid Hourly Jobs — Only Do Fixed-Price Jobs
There’s a lot of silliness surrounding this topic online so I want to set the record straight.
Some people have this belief that a fixed price job — one where you get paid a flat fee for the entire project — is somehow “better” than an hourly job (where you get paid by the hour).
Their argument is that you shouldn’t get paid for your time — you should get paid for the value of your work.
And sometimes that’s true.
If you can help a client increase their profits by $100,000 a year with one hour of work, then you should charge more than an hour’s worth of your time for that.
But in a lot of cases, charging by the hour makes sense. Look at this Upwork job I did as an example:
This client needed some work done, but they weren’t sure how much. “No problem,” I said, “I’ll just charge you $130 per hour, and we can do as much or as little as you need.” They agreed.
As you can see it turned out very well. And I’ve done even more repeat work for them since then.
Easy and profitable as this situation was, I still see freelancers making their lives difficult by trying to apply “value based pricing” where it doesn’t make any sense.
To show you what I mean:
Back in 2014 I wanted to hire a writer to help me start a new website. I said, “Look, I have no idea how long this will take, or what kind of results it’ll get. But I’m happy to pay you well for your time. What’s your hourly rate?”
He responded by saying he couldn’t work on an hourly job. He wanted to charge me for the value of the work he was doing. Except I had no idea what that value was, which made that impossible. Square peg, round hole.
I ended up paying one of his competitors $75 an hour to do the work instead. Which one of those freelancers do you think got the better deal?
WHAT TO DO INSTEAD: If you think either hourly or fixed-pricing makes more sense for a particular job, let the client know. Most of the time they’ll be happy to go with your recommendation, especially if you can explain why it’s in their best interest. But in general you shouldn’t worry about whether a job is fixed or hourly — you can be very successful on Upwork doing both types of jobs.
What’s your best Upwork tip? (plus a cool prize for the best one)
Yes, there are a lot of useless tips out there. And even some harmful ones.
But do you know what we can do? We can put a lot of good tips out there to balance it out. What better place to start this than right here at Freelance To Win?
So here is what I’d like you to do: Please share your best Upwork tip in the comments below.
It can be something for newbies, something more advanced, or anything in between.
Please help me make the internet a better place for freelancers and aspiring freelancers (and Upworkers). The world needs you.
Even if you started yesterday I still want to hear from you. Just because you’re new doesn’t mean you don’t have something valuable to add.
Drop your best Upwork tip into the comments and let’s get the conversation going.
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125 Comments on "Use these Upwork tips at your own risk"
So if you are new on Upwork and just starting out:
You create your profile with headline, overview and all the rest.. It’s basically your own personal little lead generating funnel.
Now let me ask you this: Would you ever invest time and possibly money into getting a funnel to go live online and just leave it? Or would you collect date from the funnel and keep on optimising is accordingly to improve your conversion rates? EXACTLY!
Your Upwork profile is in this case your funnel. If you are not getting desired results/response rates, you should take the data and optimise your profile. Tweak things here and there. Maybe try a variation of different profile pictures, headlines, rewrite your overview. Heck I even created an explainer video on powerpoint of me explaining sales funnels to put in the little video section when I started out.
Hope this little tip finds you well.
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Great article, as usual!
One thing I’ve learned very recently is that 60 connects don’t stretch very far when you’re new and aren’t getting the invitations or repeat work! I typically allocate myself an hour or two a day to looking for jobs and submitting proposals, but when my connects ran out, I was at a loss.
Then I realized that although I couldn’t submit a proposal for another day or so, there was nothing stopping me from finding jobs and saving them. I can go back in when my connects reset and have a smaller pool to work from to get started on a new (and hopefully more productive) month!
I’ve literally read almost all the wonderful comments here. Kudos to Danny for providing such a helpful platform for freelancers!
As a newbie, I’m currently finding it difficult to land jobs on upwork. When I started out as a writer, I was able to get hired by three clients. Despite the fact that I did my best to satisfy all of them, there was a particular client who suddenly ended our contract (I had earned $50 for the first milestone), and he left me with a bad feedback (3.95) to my greatest surprise. He didn’t have a substantial reason for suddenly ending the contract.
The second client left me a 5 star feedback, and the third client just disappeared into thin air; no feedback till date; and contract still opened.
I haven’t been hired ever since I completed these three jobs, I quite believe that the bad feedback (3.95) is hurting me seriously.
Please, any has advise for me on how I could skip past this huge challenge? I’m not happy that no job is coming forth for me on upwork again.
Thanks,
Joel.
Hey Joel, hope you are doing fine,
I recognize the struggle, i am a top rated freelancer for over 2 years, and i would like to give you some tips and encouragement. Let me just tell you right away, dont worry about your rating too much at this point, because the sample is to small to actually tell anything. I put more weight to success rate, but everything above 90% is good.
I was in the same spot as you are, 2 years ago: i had 1 job done, over 500 hours of work, 5 stars feedback, and i couldn’t get ANY work, man it was so phrostrating. So i accepted the fact that i do many things wrong. I invested quite a lot of time to understand what i need to do:
1. write less but more quality proposals, tailor them for the client, they are human like you and me, they appreciate a human connection, and they hate hate copy paste proposals.
I have parts of the proposal that i copy paste of course, like portfolio items, experiences, but i always knit it in the whole proposal for every client differently.
I suggest you reverse engineer, make a client account and post a job, so you can understand what client sees when you send a proposal.
2. You need to optimize your profile, for the work you want to do – keywords, set a professional profile picture, make some relevant exams if it is possible.
3. Also need to understand the job posts, and have in your mind that majority of the clients don’t really know what they need, (or what they want), have a hard time to describe it, is also your job to advise and give them some knowledge so they understand why they need to have this or that. It happened to me couple of times i landed a client for 3x, 5x the initial budget they stated. Simply by talking, advising, give them some information what, why and how, and to help them see the value.
Getting the right clients, the good ones, never is easy, with the experience how to spot the clients you want to work with, and how to communicate with them is a very important skill i had to develop myself. Good client = sees the value of the work you will do for them, and also backs it up financially. Good clients also more likely bring you good clients, and vice versa.
Just don’t give up, dig in, do the research, adjust, also with trial and error. Failure is the best lesion anyway.
Good luck!
Kris
Hello people. I used Danny`s crystal ball technique to get my first and only job for now. It was about history oriented blog – any period. I wrote article about my hometown Belgrade in Serbia and sent it to client. She like it and she hired me. I used opportunity to make job interesting for me because i was writing about Serbian military structure during WWI. A lot of teachers on a few Universities in USA will read my article than teach their students about my country.
I wanted to finish with Upwork when my friend shared with me Danny`s web page and i need to say that Danny is motivating me constantly. Thank you for sharing your knowledge i will follow your lead!
Great post Danny, here’s my tip for newbees:
When I was a newbie I wrote longer cover letters. I had some early success after a couple of tries when I looked at an interesting job that already had 20-50 proposals. I thought to myself if I were them I’d be overwhelmed. Then I looked at my draft and thought “no way they’re reading all this”.
But what to do? I had no reviews yet, just me talking about myself and my professional experience. I HAD to write a long cover letter.
So here’s what I did to land my 1st job:
I added paragraph titles, specifically:
About me:
blah blah
Your project:
blah blah what I would do, a couple of suggestions
Timeline:
blah blah
I believe this simple trick helped the people on the other side of the wire read my cover letter faster.
Nowadays I write much shorter cover letters but that’s because I get invited or my reviews do the work for me. Back then I had nothing going for me and that helped me get off the ground.
Getting projects on freelancing portals is not easy and when we get it from a fake client, it is worse because they will hire you, get their work done and go invisible means no reply after getting work done. So to escape these kinds of fake clients on all portals, I have spent some time monitoring jobs that are posted by fake clients, and real clients on Upwork.
Making money online used to be difficult. Today, with the right business idea and enough skills, you can too can learn how to make money online
I LOVE your post; you have just stamped everything I learned last week (my first week on UpWork), I was so happy with the results that I did two YouTube videos and I am sharing the same with colleague freelancers in some FaceBook Groups U belong.
My Tips:
I have always dreaded bidding, which is why I took forever to start working on UpWork. I am an experienced writer, by the way, having worked on “Take Platforms’ the likes of The Content Authority and Iwriter.
I LOVE your post; you have just stamped everything I learned last week (my first week on UpWork), I was so happy with the results that I did two YouTube videos and I am sharing the same with colleague freelancers in some FaceBook Groups U belong.
My Tips:
I have always dreaded bidding, which is why I took forever to start working on UpWork. I am an experienced writer, by the way, having worked on “Take Platforms’ the likes of The Content Authority and Iwriter.
*On Upwork, I have no filters. I click on broad categories (Article Writing and Blogging), then quickly scan through all the jobs – saving the ones that peak my interest regardless of their pay, client history, etc. As long as I feel I qualify, I save that job; this process ensures I do not miss out on my perfect jobs.
*Once I am done scanning and have saved my best options, I go to Saved Jobs and check the posted jobs in details; I remove the jobs I do not want to work on for various reasons from the saved list. This leaves me with fewer options that I can invest my energy getting to understand the client and submitting a proposal.
*I am not shy when it comes to communicating with clients; it is working our perfectly for me.
NB: Having started less than 8 days ago, I already landed one client (got an excellent rating too), and I have another client. In fact, with my second client (we are going to be working together for quite some time), he had to create a project for me (he has already funded escrow, and I am working on some tasks already) since in my application and subsequent communication, I do add value to his business beyond the initial project he had in mind when posting on UpWork.
My second week on UpWork, I am thrilled.
can you send me cover letter samples for my 1st job. I want to start as a copywriter on upwork
Hi, everyone! Thank you for your hacks and hope mine will be useful for you too.
My tip is based on to major ideads:
1) The keywords for some jobs don;t seem to fit any category on Upwork
2) Very often we just don’t realize that we are good at something until we get a chance to learn this new skill.
Here’s my story to show you what I mean.
I am not sure why but thanks God being a Rising talent freelancer I was noticed by a client who needed to classify his articles of an online magazine (there were tons of them). This job made my life so much easier in many respects that when it was over I couldn;t get it off my mind to find something similar. In attempt to do so, I included the words ‘classification’ and ‘categorisation’ into my keywords list and got 3 similar jobs one of which helped me to understand that I was actually a great online merchandiser.
What I am trying to say is:
– If you happen to launch a job which doesn’t look like any other or with an unusual title but from a ceratin field – analyze it to see what keywords the client uses and make use of it.
– If you are offered a chance to try something new – don’t be afraid!
And one more. If you decline a job, don’t be lazy to explain why you do it, not simply by choosing one of the options but writing a message. This approach helped me to earn one of the best clinets ever. I declined their proposal as it said ‘we need a native English speaker’ and I wasn’t one, so I stated it while declining. The answer was – ‘Your level seems to be high enough for the job. Consider it, please”. I decided to try and it was just great!
Thanks for reading this! Hope it will be at least of some use!
Such a nice blog for newbies
Thank you danny
Stand your ground! (sorry, it’s gonna be a bit long)
Yesterday, I had a potential client that made my jaw drop. He wanted a product description translated, easy enough. We start having a chat and he asks me to give my opinion on his friend’s work. Basically, it was the exact document translated in its entirety.
I answered that if 1. he wanted me to proofread it he’d have to pay, and 2. he was basically asking me to give my opinion on the competition. At this point, I already found him to be disrespectful and unprofessional. He then told me that his friend was also a candidate, and he was trying to pick the best out of the both of us.
Thought I wouldn’t hear from him again. Comes back this morning saying that if I want he’ll pay me $20 for 1000 words and 1 week to do 43 articles.
Up front, I tell him that I accept $30 for 1000 words and no less. Ask him how much words in total that is because 1 week seems short. The guy wanted 10.000 words in 1 week!!! As a reference, more than 6.000 is at least 2 weeks.
He tells me that they have a German translator accepting $20 and that $30 is too high for him. I said that I understood and that was it.
My point is: STAND YOUR GROUND!!
Don’t accept less than what you feel comfortable with. Just because a client has like 20 pages or 15 products doesn’t mean you should accept a ridiculous pay for it! I may have turned him down in a way, but I don’t feel guilt or think I’ve made a mistake.
They sometimes expect you to work for almost nothing, or respect ridiculous deadline. Stand your ground, tell them your price, you can make it vary a bit of course but never go under what feels comfortable.
Don’t accept something if you don’t feel good about it because chances are you’re gonna end up hating it!
Great article and I have enjoyed reading every one of these tips.
Here is my tip: When you come across a project or client that really interests you and seems like the perfect fit, be careful not to bid too low.
Often, it’s tempting to bid lower on the most attractive projects, because we don’t want to lose out to a lower bid.
However, what if we use the opposite strategy? If this looks like a client you would like to work with long-term, can you afford to be working 40 hours a month for this client, at your current bid rate, 6 months from now?
Sadly, I ran into this myself – which I why I recommend not making the mistake I made.
I found what seemed to be a dream client with a dream project. I really wanted the job, so I bid below the client’s minimum budget, hoping to be competitive. (I hadn’t yet read Danny’s article about bidding above the posted budget; I didn’t think that was an option.)
I got the job, and it turned out this was a great client who had a lot more work available. But I was stuck at that low rate. I couldn’t commit all those future hours the client wanted, at that rate.
On the next two projects the client offered, I tried to raise my rate. The first time, I raised it to where it should have been. The client said it was too high. On the second project, I lowered the rate by half. This was acceptable to the client, but not to me.
What I learned was that this otherwise perfect client could not afford me over the long run.
I ended up investing a lot of time and effort, developing great rapport, getting to know the client’s business and voice, coming up with lots of ideas, building a foundation of research, and positioning myself as his go-to expert … only to discover we couldn’t maintain this working relationship over the long run, because he couldn’t afford the rates I needed to earn.
Very sad tale – I hope not to repeat it, and I hope you won’t do what I did.
When you bid on a “dream project,” consider what you would need to be earning several months down the road, if this turned out to be THE client.
Best wishes to all,
Janet
Great Post yet again. Here is my couple of cents.
While submitting jobs, there are parameters client selects like Location, Hours spent, Job success rate etc. The same parameters are shown at the end of the job details where considering your profile, Upwork shows RED sign for the parameters that you doesn’t match.
If you don’t match the parameters, that doesn’t mean that you are not best fit, BUT HERE IS THE THING. if you see the total proposals, it will say 20 to 50 or 50+. Please read (?) beside the total proposals. What i understand from the comment is, total proposals that client see is between 20-50. What it means is, Upwork default archives the proposal which does not meet the parameters(This is to save client’s time). There can be additional points Upwork is considering to Archive but the still if you send proposal to jobs where you don’t meet more than 1 parameter, then your proposal is likely to go to archive and client will hardly check archived proposals.
So i would like to avoid writing proposals to the ones where my profile doesn’t meet more than 1 criteria, even if my skills and experience are best fit for the job.
Correct me if i’m wrong in my understanding. Because i am here to learn and not to teach. 🙂
I would like to learn more about what you wrote!
Does anyone have any additional insight or comments?
One of the reasons I ask is oftentimes when I click to submit a proposal, I’ll see:
– Job Success Score: At least 90%
– Include Rising Talent: Yes
With red exclamation points beside each.
Am I to understand that a client will not even see my proposal?
If so, what can I do to improve my ratings???
Many thanks!
Dear Martha,
The client will see your proposal but it will be stated that you don’t fit the requirements, which doesn’t at all mean that you shouldn’t apply. I got one of my long-term projects like this. I just started my proposal with the words:
“Dear Employer. I am sorry to apply not having the stated JSS but it seems to me that I could be the right fit for you”, Further I gave my reasons and was hired on that very day!
“
Hi Kate,
Thank you for your suggestions. I’ll certainly implement!
I’ve been away from Upwork for a bit, and am just today rereading this post.
Thanks again,
Martha
What kills me is when one of the requirements is something like 100+ hours on Upwork, and it looks like I don’t qualify, because I’ve only done a few small hourly jobs on there. I could have 5000 hours worked on fixed-price projects, and none of it counts because Upwork doesn’t know how many hours were involved. Then there are all the non-Upwork hours they don’t know about.
When I apply for one of these gigs, I explain why specifying a minimum number of Upwork hours is dumb for everyone.
Please Danny, can you show me your press release work samples. I mean the sample of your press release work you have done in the past.
These are some awesome tips! I spent about 45 minutes soaking them all in. I have created an UpWork profile, but have not submitted for the first job yet. I think I now feel ready to jump in a start cranking out some decent proposals. Thanks Danny for all that you do!
I love job postings where the client asks questions other than the usual “Why do you think you are the best fit for this job?” and “How long do you expect the job to take?” I always try to add something interesting and unique about myself as it applies to the job posting. For example, I’m a former CIA officer (editing a novel of espionage).; my family loves board games (editing 600 Q&A cards for a new game in development);; I’ve lived in ten different countries and have either lived on or visited all the continents but Antarctica .(editing a book on overseas living). By the way, all of these statements are true. Unfortunately, I wasn’t selected for any of these particular jobs but two of the clients did get back to me, thanking me for interesting proposals and advising that I did make the short list and would be invited to apply for their next projects. I hope I am. I have worked several times for one other client, but he sought me out, so I have no idea what about my profile attracted his attention.
Why don’t you ask him?
Finally, are these tips restricted to upwork alone?
*Nice tips from my seniors here.
GBU all.
Hello, permit me to call us – one big family.
I am grateful for the tips. I am a broke newbie but I really want to register for Danny’s courses.
I wrote two sales copy but my friend just tore it and called me a failure.
I felt sad and I am more determined to learn. I am just 19 years old and I don’t know if I am too young for all this things.
I am currently an editor for a small publishing company.
Thanks pals.
I’m not sure if you will agree with my tips, but here are my biggest Upwork Tips:
“Do not take a job if you don’t think you can meet most of the client’s expectations or exceed them because this might result in bad reviews for you”
Another is the following:
“If you’re working on influencer outreach projects, always go for hourly rates instead of fixed, because different niches require different periods of time to get results, and so it will be hard for you to price yourself fairly in a fixed project”
Finally:
“Try to refund clients who have given you bad feedback or reviews, if there is no way to convince them to change their minds (by offering additional work, that is)”
Thanks Danny for this great blog. And thanks too to all the relevant contributions I’ve read on this blog. Although I have managed to earn q 100% Job SUccess Score with 8 jobs in one month, I am having a hard time getting clients to believe that I can offer them great content simply because I am not a native speaker. I have eight 5 star reviews from these eight jobs but I still have a hard time getting substantive offers. Can anyone help me?
The native category accounts for those who are bilingual. So you can claim it even if you aren’t a native speaker.
Thanks for the tips Danny. I personally think that writing a good cover letter gets you a head start from the other proposals and using some call to action phrases also helps. I managed to get 10 jobs in the last two months by this way and I started as a new account. 🙂
Regards
Naser
I searched “Upwork tips” on google and found your blog. at first. Thanks for great one. I am a freelancer and your tips guided me very well
Thanks again
Whenever I look at jobs, regardless of what site or email it comes from, I always explain that I do more than what they’re looking for. Using Upwork as an example, if somebody needs a writer, I always mention that I’m also an editor/proofreader so the work I do is automatically checked for quality.
I don’t know whether others do that but I have been given jobs to edit work that other writers have done and it included a LOT of mistakes, mainly simple ones, because their writer didn’t care enough to proofread/edit it before handing it in.
Laurence,
I love this tip – Thank you!!
I will certainly offer your recommendation on the next writing job I apply for!
Martha
Good tips, but still looking forward for more details and healthy tips which really effect.
Sometimes starting an hourly contract makes the client psychologically want to come back to you for more work!
Since he already has hired you and he knows your contract is an ongoing one, he’s much more likely to come back to you asking for more work or even something he remembered later on that slipped off his mind earlier.
For me, hourly projects have been my KEY TO SUCCESS on Upwork.
P.S. I always log manual hours. its a lot of risk (no protection by Upwork) but it’s really worth it. Keep week one short to make sure the client pays if you feel unsafe.
My best tip: Write a blanket cover letter that you can tweak easily to personalize it for each client. Spend an hour writing a good letter and you can use it for most of your jobs (though you REALLY should remember to add in a few things to let the client know you read their job post too).
Angela, I agree. My cover letters are usually three (sometimes four) paragraphs long. The first always refers to the project and why I’m interested in working on it. “Your search for an editor for your board game about humanely catching ‘gators in swampland Florida caught my eye for two reasons: I live very near swampland in Florida and we’re always trying to chase ‘gators away. and my family LOVES board games! We’re very competitive, and the chance to wear the family ‘gator-chasin’ crown is just too good to resist?”
The second paragraph is almost always exactly the same for each proposal, outlining my experience (drawing attention to any specialized experience noted in the job description, and the editing methods with which I’m familiar – hard copy, Word with track changes, and Google docs, offering the client his/her choice.
I finish up by thanking the client for considering my proposal and expressing the hope to hear from him./her soon, with a conclusion that would benefit us both..
I’m fairly new to Upwork and I’ve only had a couple of jobs, but I’m n the short lists of two clients who advised me that I would be invited to bid on the next project,
Wow…. Tons of great tips in the comments!
Here’s one from me: “Ask your client to change your rating/feedback (given you’ve done a great job!)”
My client mentioned tons of time during the course of the project that I was doing a great job. Yet, when the project ended, he left me a 4.4 rating instead of 5.
Granted, I had not asked him for a 5-star rating explicitly (which I should have!) yet, I was expecting it. For me, the 5-star was important, especially since this was my first job. So, I shot him a message on Upwork:
*********************************************************************************
Hey ___,
Just noticed that you gave me a great review – “____”. Thank You for that! At the same time, I also noticed that you left me a 4.4 rating.
The rating heavily affects how I would be seen on Upwork and is the key to getting great gigs in the future. If you already considered it while rating me, I totally understand that it is a reasonable reflection of the work we did together.
However, if not – I was really hoping you’d change it to 5! Do you think that’s a reasonable request?
Please let me know if this so, and I will send across the step-by-step details on how you can do it in less than a minute!
Regardless, it was a pleasure working together!
*********************************************************************************
My client got in touch with me – and changed it to a 5 the next day!
Note that if you’ve done a great job, the only thing stopping the client would be the consideration of how much effort it would take – so, it’ll be great if you can say that you’ll send across the steps to getting it done in very little time.
Also that the first line is baked in so that the client remembers that they loved working with you. It need not be the review, it could be an e-mail/message – you’ll just have to frame it. It gets the client to be consistent – one of Cialdini’s influence principles!
Soon I’ll ask a couple of my regular clients to make a video about why they are using my services. Short, 10-20 seconds videos that I’ll upload to Youtube. Collection of testimonials, together with my intro, shouldn’t be longer than a minute. Here’s a few more tips from Upwork Hiring Headquarters on how to make a great video.
goo.gl/B94v7W
Hi Danny
Awesome post you got there.
I have worked on upwork (elance) for quite some good time now.
This is my tip.of the day:
“Dare dream again” – Never be too afraid to bid on the jobs that are seemingly
high end.
Go ahead and put your proposal out there..
When you get used to bidding too low, you are very likely to act chicken heart
on the high end jobs.
And always NEVER forget landing a good gig is merely seconds away on most
of these gigs.
If you can even pitch clients a few seconds/1 minute away (Not 1hr, Not 1 week) from the time that the job is posted, then you even stand an upper hand. (If you are newbie TRY This)
Well, you can get awarded on jobs that are 1 week old successfully, but this strategy just seems to work especially when you land a client who desperately needs to hire ASAP and get things going.
I have sealed deals where the client only interviewed me and never considered
hiring someone else. Thing is SPEED… and Money loves SPEED.
All the Best..
Ben
Thanks, guys. I loved reading this.
I’ve applied many of the techniques here listed, but to no avail so far. Perhaps that’s because I work with translation, not copywriting. Does anyone else here that works as a translator can share some tips?
I’ve been a “Rising Talent’ for a day, but that didn’t help much yet. I have one job with a single five-star review in which the client highlighted my skills and devotion.
I’ve followed Danny’s 5 tips. I write all my cover letters based on the Crystal Ball technique, trying to follow the standards I’ve seen here, and making them as good as I can: research what the client’s needs are, what specifically could I help him with, etc.
I tried bidding very low, low, and bidding a fair price (which is high)—nothing.
I’ve attached samples, updated my portfolio, tried many different ways to make a proposal, but still… nothing yet.
I’ve even tried to apply to transcription jobs. Nothing.
I’ve never been rejected this much and this often. Whew. It sucks.
Maybe there’s something wrong with my face?
Any help would be really cool. Thanks.
Hey Jack – are you applying to lots of jobs? When you’re getting started, you’re going to have to use up all your Connects and maybe even buy more. It’s not a ton of fun to do that many, but it really does increase your odds. And it seems like the more jobs you’ve completed, the easier it is to get the next one.
Hey Kate,
thanks for the reply.
Thing is, I am—applied for lots of jobs already. In fact, I’ve used up all of my connects, then got more because of the Rising Talent bonus.
I don’t know why this is happening. It’s like people don’t even READ what I wrote. Because I spend so much time polishing those proposals, they’re so bespoke to the client, it’s like they simply don’t give a damn and just choose whoever isn’t me. (Note that I didn’t say ‘cheapest’, because I’ve already been in that place and it didn’t work… lol)
Hi Jack! just wanted to tell you that starting out is the most difficult part indeed. There’s something that plays agains newbies, and that is you won’t get a rating until you’ve had like 5 or 6 jobs done. So even if you have 4 reviews of 5-stars, you profile still will show an “empty rating”.
Now the good news: It will work if done right. I promise you. As soon as you get some rating, you will begin to prosper. Press on, be gritty, review your proposals over and over, and read the course material again an again. Try setting a timeframe of say 2 weeks to try an approach (a niche, an overview), write down the results, then change it, then do it again.
For your reference (and hopefully, to cheer you up some!), here’s what my record looks like on upwork:
September (first month): 41 submitted proposals – 1 job won – 66$ (invitations=0)
October: 28 submitted – 2 jobs won – 90$ (Invitations=0)
November: 12 submitted – 1 job won – 160$ (invitations=0)
December: 18 submitted – 2 jobs won – 90$ (invitations=1)
January: 0 submitted – 4 jobs won – 160$ (invitations=12)
fast forward—
March: 0 submitted – 2 jobs won – 935$ (invitations=18)
Hope this helps! best of luck to you! (remember, it WILL work!!!)
Manuel.
Ohhh I so needed that Manny. You just made my night!
I landed my first job after about 10 proposals. Since then it’s been blanks!
But your comment gives it a whole new perspective!
For me, avoiding from hourly jobs seems like willing to get paid based on value. This was just an affirmation to my fear. Real fear is it feels like, there is an eye in the room watching me while I am working. Client will see that how I am inefficient or time to time I just surfing on the web :))
I don’t want him to see my error log, instead I want him to see end result.
this is not a tip but can be helpful 🙂
So, I think that we actually don’t trust ourselves but we should
I didn’t even know the freelancing world existed until two years ago and I’m still figuring it all out.
Thank-you for your ‘Top 5 Hacks’ and this email Danny, it gives me confidence in my instincts.
Although I’m new, the thing that I’ve noticed all my clients really appreciate is my enthusiasm for their project. As a Brit, gushing positivity is not my style, but expressing my genuine interest and excitement for jobs has really cemented my relationships with people. Obvious really, but not something I was confident enough to do right at the beginning, in case it appeared ‘kiss-assy’ (new word invention!) or somehow unprofessional.
Great tip.
Dear Danny,
You are a straight shooter with some of the most coherent advice around these parts.
Thanks,
Howard
I started reading Danny’s posts, a week ago. Also, I subscribed for the best 5 hacks. His content is, really awesome! Of course, this post is rocking, as the previous, ones.
When I started Upwork, I had no experience in communicating with clients. I was just interested in getting the gig and start working on it.
Then, I realized that, even if the job was completed successfully, the clients didn’t leave review, always.
So, my tip is to communicate with the client. Even, if you don’t talk about the job, talking with them helps you understand them, as a person and getting to know each other. Try to start, even a chick chat! Especially, I would recommend you to tell them (gently!), to review your work in Upwork, even if it won’t be a good one (don’t forget, many non-reviewed contracts will affect you success score, badly), from the start of your communication with the client.
When I did that, I never had a completed contract, without review.
That was my personal tip. Excuse my English. I am not the successful copywriter here, ha ha! (By the way, I am a Bookkeeper)
Eleni,
How do you remind folks to leave reviews? I have had a number of clients send me emails or Upwork messages thanking me for a great job, but not leave an actual review. This is so frustrating because my success score has dropped because of it.
The only way I can think of is to make sure the client closes the job. Then, I think they are forced to leave a review, but I’m not certain – I’ve only hired once.
How about just asking them?
What I do, is at the START of the contract; when you have the opportunity to leave a message in that little box – don’t just say thanks for the job and look forward to working with you – here’s what I put …
“To assimilate and research project, make notes, confer with you for further information and/or clarification,
Complete first draft.
Discuss and hone first draft with you to create notes for second draft.
Complete second draft.
Discuss and hone second draft with you to create notes for final draft,
Create final draft.
Check with you that final draft is good to go.
Complete Upwork admin; close contract, leave mutual feedback and rating scores.
Periodic check -ups on progress.”
Then – when you have finished the job – send this again as a message to the client with a note just saying, “Just to reiterate the work completed on the project and check that you are OK with it – I have closed the job this end and will leave feedback and ratings as agreed; perhaps you would be good enough to close the contract and leave the feedback and ratings too – many thanks – and thank you once again for giving me the opportunity to do this job.
I find that this works, as it is “agreed” from the start, and just seems, then, to be a normal part of the process.
Hope this helps …
There are 2 major Upwork tactics that I wanted to share. I have learnt both of these from Ramit Sethi – both were for different use-cases – the first one for building your own business, the second for resume makeover but I’ve found them to be very applicable!
[Also, I have written these bearing in mind a copywriter, but these are just as applicable – in fact, more potent in other roles such as web design.]
#1: Position Yourself – When they zig, you zag
I see 2 kinds of mistakes being made w.r.t Upwork Profiles (I have made the same and am working on it now):
• Assuming what the client wants (instead of finding it out)
• Saying the same thing as everyone else – if you do this – you’re practically invisible to clients who search for say, “Copywriters”
Hence, it is a must to position yourself – it is hard work but one that pays for itself over and over again.
So, before you write your Profile Overview, do the following:
1. Go through the last 20 job postings in your niche (ones that you would work for, given a chance)
2. Scan through them cover-to-cover – keep re-reading them till you get a hang of what clients are really looking for (or use Tactic #2)
3. Note down some of these points. For example, here’s what I figured:
For the E-Mail Copywriting niche, client does NOT only want sales – there is subset that is looking to build/nurture relationships with their customers and to send E-Mails that add value to their customer’s lives
4. Now, go look up 10 freelancers who you would be directly competing with – re-read these profiles till you understand the underlying theme – ask yourself did any profile stand out to you? If so, why? (or use Tactic #2)
5. Mostly, you’ll find that even though these freelancers are PROs and even though they can write copy that skyrockets conversion rates – they just haven’t paid attention to their own sales copy – their overview!
6. And now for the final step, you know what your client wants, you know what the freelancers are providing and what me-too promises they are making – position yourself to appeal to a different client need and to stand-out from the crowd! (Many-a-times everyone would be trying to appeal to the client based on what they think that the client wants not what they actually want!)
Pro Tip: I found lots of freelancers who had positioned themselves as the specialists – they had done all the work to make themselves stand out. Yet, for some reason, at the end of their overview, they wrote something on the lines of:
“I also write email follow-ups, presell pages, and sales pages” or
“I also do: ✔ Sales Letters ✔ Web Content ✔ Content Marketing ✔ White Papers ✔ Landing Pages ✔ B2B”
I don’t think it’s a great thing to do (and I could be wrong) because it is contrary to what you’ve said about being a specialist all along!
#2: Plain English Principle
Tactic #1 explains how you can do your research but how do you actually write an overview that is NOT like everybody else’s. That’s where the Plain English Principle helps:
• Make an outline of what you want to say in Plain English
Example:
I want to emphasize how important it is to connect to the audience, to speak their language – quickly educate on lifetime value/back-end sales
I want the client to know that the copy I write will move readers to open and read their E-Mails
Client should be able to connect the two above and “get” that what I’ll write will lead to more revenue
• Ask yourself – Is this compelling?
If no, eliminate points that don’t seem compelling
• If yes, polish the overview.
How do you polish the overview? (There could be many ways – I use this one!) Inject vivid details – write things that will conjure a picture in the reader’s head!
Example: (it’s from the top of my head – we can probably make it much better!)
Imagine opening your inbox to a barrage of E-Mails. What? How do I have 132 unread messages? I think I’ll archive all of these. Oh Wait! ABC has sent in a new one – let’s read that first!
This is the kind of relationship that I want your readers to have with your E-Mail, they should look forward to getting one – and to devouring it! You shouldn’t have to hear back crickets when you send an E-Mail! Heck, your peeps should be replying back telling you how you have changed their life or how your last tactic brought them results that they thought were never possible!
Pro Tip: You can practice the Plain English Principle on Upwork job listings and the competitors you listed.
• Use it to understand what the job listing really said
• Use it to understand what the competition is really trying to say! – This helps immensely in developing a positioning for yourself!
The Plain English Principle is deceptively simple. But you realize how effective it is as soon as you put it into practice!
If you find it useful, please let me know by replying to the comment!
Thank you Danny! My best tip is for newbie Upworkers like me!
1. Apply for jobs you are absolutely sure you can do very well. This will earn you 5 star ratings and attract more jobs from clients who view your profile.
2. After getting a 5 star rating, take note of the particular kind of job you did and apply for more of such jobs. Even though you do not have much Upwork experience, clients will trust your ability to deliver based on the rating on your profile.
3. Take Upwork tests and work hard to be top 10% or 20%
4. Keep your description brief and speak with authority.
5. Check out my profile for more newbie inspiration: http://www.bit.ly/TokaUpwork
Thanks for the great post, Danny.
My tip is to think about your proposals as copy writing tasks and apply the same strategies. Grab attention, establish authority, and offer value.
For e.g., the first proposal I won as a newbie asked for “an amazing writer” to draft a LinkedIn summary. After my introductory sentenced, I wrote this:
Do you know what the #1 mistake people make when writing bios and resumes? Most people who apply for this job don’t. But I do.
I went on to list my experience and differentiators. And I concluded by saying that I could be reached on Upwork Messenger, where I could also tell him what the #1 mistake was.
He was sold, and I knew I had a solid strategy.
Love these three ideas!
Create circumstances so people can’t compare apples to apples.
Upwork is a “bidding” site which means a lot of clients want cheaper work. Even Ramit Sethi admitted to using Upwork to find cheap work.
But the easiest way to avoid an apples to apples comparison is making the work more than just the job. For example, share what a client will get working with you.
Some ideas could include:
– Reliability.
– Communication in the form of being available 24 hours a day. Agreeing to respond within two hours of a sent email.
– Organization in the form of keeping track and managing projects efficiently.
– Expertise in the form of experience, knowledge or portfolio
– Relationships in the form of being able to connect your client with other workers. For example, if you are a copy writer, could you also find a way to take care of the design for them?
The idea is to avoid an apples to apples comparison so you’re work can’t be evaluated on price.
I do this by branding myself as an expert in the IT and data industry. Something very few people in America label themselves as. I’m in a field of my own with zero comparison on price. It’s either the cheap unreliable writer or the expensive reliable experienced writer… The decision isn’t hard.
Alex Craig
As a newbie to Upwork, I found I often felt fatigued after looking through jobs after awhile. I created a tactic for myself to ensure I sent the best job proposal I could to clients by separating days in which I did research and when I applied for jobs.
By separating the days, it gave me time to consider what jobs were best to use with my connects and to ensure I gave a client my best. So far it has worked out well for me! I would highly suggest to any freelancer to separate tasks into different days. It certainly gives better clarity of mind.
-Bethany
Great blog post Danny. I am really thanking my lucky stars I found out about you when starting out on Upwork, your posts and emails as well as comments from others have really given the confidence I lacked in believing I could use my God-given talents to make instant money for myself and get myself out of the mindnumbingly unfulfilling 9 to 5 grind.
My Upwork Tip: Fake it Till You Make It (Google is Your Friend)
There are some jobs that usually sound enticing but then you realize you have no idea how to do it. You’ve never written a Press Release before or a marketing email. That’s where you Fake It Til You Make it! Go on Google and you will find a jackpot of tutorials and templates and samples that you can use as inspiration to do your own and convince the Client you can do it better than an expert with 10+ years experience under their belt.
Why go back to college and get into debt when Google has tutorials and examples of everything you want to learn to do for free?
I like this tip but this isn’t faking it. Anyone can learn to write a decent press release, etc., in a short time frame using google. These are real skills you’re building.
Number One Tip From Me (from a middle of the pack Upworker):
Don’t have more than 20+ hours of billable work a week. (Unless you are beast, then more power to you!)
Let me explain.
Danny says something along these lines on his course, but I just noticed why it is so important.
Right now I’m doing a keyword research job for a client at $30/hr. I just received feedback from my last turn in of work and am ready to start the next set of keywords.
But I can’t make myself do anymore intensive work today!!!
Why? Because I want to produce a good quality work, in a timely manner, but I don’t think freelancers have quality output 40+ hours every week.
So instead of putting in 2 hours of work to produce keywords right now, I will wait for tomorrow morning (when I work best) to produce keywords when I will be faster and smarter.
When a client sees what I did with just 2 hours of work, they’ll be happy (probably impressed) with the amount of work that was finished (and happy with the quality). Sure, I could take three hours of my tired self to do the same thing right now, and I’d get paid more an extra $30, but that isn’t a smart business strategy.
I value the client thinking, “wow, he does a great job! And quickly, he’s worth every cent and more!” more than a few extra dollars.
And this ties into the second tip:
Charge a rate you are happy working with
It is hard to invest yourself 100% in your work when your rate is not where you want it to be. This shows in the amount, quality, and communication of your work towards your clients — and sure, maybe you get clients who are happy with your work, but I prefer clients who leave raving reviews.
I started at 10/hr, and now I’m at 30/hr, but I feel like I’m starting to charge a little under my worth, and in the future, if I don’t raise my rates, this will be a problem.
Although not unique advice, I think these are standards that help freelancers and the freelancer community.
We need to understand that an hour for a freelancer needs to have a higher rate than an in-house employee, but at the same time, freelancers need to treat every hour of work with respect and fervor for the work they produce.
I mean, why not treat our work like we are trying to put in-house employees out of business! (not that we are trying to)
=)
Also, thanks for the article Danny! I’m always surprised by how easily your emails keep taking me back to this site…
There are two tips that I’ve been using that have allowed me to get jobs within just one week of actively applying for jobs ( I signed up years ago when it was Elance but hadn’t done anything):
1) I always give specifics on what strategy I would use to create their product, and why. For example, if the client wants someone to create a webinar script, I point out that I use psychological techniques within the webinar to encourage the registrant to stay for the full webinar.
2) I also offer a freebie in addition to the work they have asked me to do. So, if they’ve asked me to write a series of 3 emails for new subscribers, I’ll throw in two free emails that will promote a specific product or service. I only offer something that is super-easy for me to do…usually it is something that I have a template for.
Seems to be working…I stopped writing this comment to speak with 2 clients about projects – both have hired me. Estimated earnings of both: $1600.
Great article, thanks Danny!
My big tip…CLEAR COMMUNICATION.
I recently had a job invite where the client was looking to improve her sales pages, increase conversions and drive traffic to her YouTube site.
So I accepted and said I could help her out.
I said I could improve the specific pages she requested, make them easier to read for her potential clients, and get all the pages looking the same in regards to writing style and format (they were all over the place).
It turns out, she was expecting me to re-design the web pages as well–although she’d never mentioned this in her job description.
So I sent her a detailed message about exactly what service I would be providing to her (sales copy only) and said: Writing is my strength; not so much web design 😉
She was ok with that and finally understood what hiring a copywriter would do for her!
She admitted she did need help with her website but also decided to go ahead with my proposal to re-write her sales pages.
So, my learning is….be very clear about what service you’re going to provide. Try to avoid any miscommunication with your clients (or at least, catch it early before you’re well into the job!). It seems they don’t always understand what they’re asking for 🙂
Cheers!
Hello everyone,
My tip for Upwork is pretty simple:
Connect with the client, and think over the long term. When writing a proposal, I try to understand the client vision, and what are they trying to achieve. I build a connection on this, and show them I am the appropriate freelancer to move forward towards their goals, even the ones who are not specified in the job posting.
For example, if a client is looking for a ppc manager, I tell them that it’s great they are doing lead generation, and that you can test every component of the funnel starting from the landing page, to their thank you pages.
Great article as always, Danny!
Here’s my tip:
When you have completed a few jobs with a client with who you get along well, don’t hesitate to make suggestions on what could be done to improve their website, service or anything.
I’ll give you an example of one I client with whom I got plenty of repeat business last year.
So the client had hired me to translate his website to French. The work went very well, and I really enjoyed working with him.
On his website, there were testimonial videos and other how-to videos in English. I told him it would look awkward for a French client to see English videos, as he wouldn’t understand anything (if he’s not fluent). So I suggested it would be nice to subtitle them in French.
He thought that would be great, and even added it would be nice to caption them for English deaf people. So I got to subtitle the videos in English and French.
Afterwards, he even said French voiceover for these videos would be even better, and that’s what I did.
When the videos were complete, I eventually went on Amazon and saw there were listings for his products that had been awfully translated to French, and told him I could proofread them if he wanted. And he asked me to.
So that’s how you can get plenty of repeat work, while showing the client you really care about him and his business.
When you niche, forget about targeting a specific audience. Target a specific person.
That’s right: target ONE person who is in need of your services.
-“Copywriter who writes copy for PT’s selling low back pain recovery e-books”
-“Web Designer who builds websites for Dog Kennels”
-“Social Media Marketer who manages social media for Liberal Arts Professors”
It’s scary to niche, and you’re right – you will close yourself off to the majority of jobs on Upwork.
But when the right job is posted (and it will happen more often than you think), it’s as good as yours.
When I decided to niche down hard, I had 3 private offers sent to me at my highest rate within 2 weeks.
Who is your target profile? How much further can you niche down?
I am embarassed to admit this but I am a sucker cause I had believed and used most of the tips you have described here. Seems like I have been following the wrong blogs. Lol.
I have been on Upwork (Elance) for the last 6 years and I have never won a single bid. I guess that makes me an old newbie. lol. I have gotten more advice on this single blog post and comments than I have gotten in many years of reading the bad advice you are talking about.
The single most important thing I have learnt about Upwork is that I have to invest my time and money if I want to be succesful on the site. I derived this conclusion from my general freelancing experience. I used to use free advertising methods to try and get customers but it was not until I started paying for adverts that I have become booked by clients, I had to hire my sister to help me with some of the jobs.
So I figured that if I want to start bidding again on upwork, I should find someone who knows what they are doing, even if it means paying for a course. That is why I am on this site. Hopefully, I will save enough money to enroll for the course because I know that I will gain it all back through the premium tips I will get.
But even if I don’t win the challenge, I am just so grateful that you share these tips here free of charge. It is so much valuable information that I haven’t seen anywhere else online.
Hi Julie,
Although I haven’t yet taken Danny’s course (and I am signing up VERY soon!), I’ve followed Danny’s tips from the blog and his site.
And although I am a complete newbie to Upwork (active since February 2016), I’ve won several bids and have been invited to apply for at least 5 projects…and I got all of this work because of following Danny’s tips and recommendations.
And I mean I followed them exactly. They WORK! I just wanted to let you know that even if you can’t take the full course for some reason, there is a lot of great stuff on his blog and website.
After you’ve applied some of Danny’s teachings to your Upwork profile, please check in again. I, for one, am looking forward to hearing about your successes!
Hello Elaine,
Nice to see you motivating a newbie 🙂
I am a newbie myself and I have applied for 6 jobs using Danny’s crystal ball technique but sadly it has not been possible for me to crack even a single job. It would be great if I can get a certain help for your side on the same.
I aspire to take Danny’s course in future.
Regards,
MIHIR
Hi Mihir,
Don’t give up.
I applied to hundreds of jobs before anything really worked. Do your best to think of your proposal as your first contact or message to the client.
I know this response is long after you posted.
So I hope you are doing better by this time 🙂
Great post as always, Danny!
My tip is one I haven’t used yet (so does it count?), but I certainly plan to soon.
As I’m scrolling through jobs, I see plenty that are not appropriate for my specialty, but that are related to what I do. Or they signal that the client is in a phase of growth that will probably require someone like me some time soon.
For instance, I write marketing content and strategy, but I notice a lot of jobs for web design, graphic design, social media management, etc. Often the client is in a branding or re-branding phase. Sometimes the job will ask for too many of these tasks in one project, because the client doesn’t realize they really need several different freelancers to do several different jobs.
My tip is to partner with freelancers who offer related services, maybe even creating an agency. In my case, I would do this by posting several jobs (as a client) looking for freelancers whose work I like (one for a graphic designer, one for a web designer, etc). I might even go so far as to add a person to the agency to find and bid on the big branding/re-branding jobs on behalf of the agency. We’d all still bid on jobs separately, but also get a chance to work on bigger projects that involve more steps and freelancers. And we could refer clients to each other when we see that they’re ready for the services of someone else in the agency. The bonus is that this saves time and energy for the client, and gives them the confidence that they’re working with freelancers who have been vetted by freelancers whose work they like.
Like I said, I haven’t actually tried this yet, so I welcome any attempts to poke holes in or question this approach.
Great Post, Danny.
Hi Rodney Williams,
Hey. I agree completely. I am in the web developer business with web design skills, but I am not a Graphic Designer and I do not have much time left for writing content or building backlinks or doing social media.
I am very interested in growing my virtual team with good freelancers. Please contact me if you are interested as well and see synergy.
My Upwork profile is here : https://www.upwork.com/fl/henkjordaan
Hi,
I have over eight years experience in Development and design implementation. Let me know if you want to work in collaboration
you can review my profile here
https://www.upwork.com/freelancers/~01ec1823001e55ba44