Upwork just not happening??

I use Upwork on the client side (for copywritting, ghostwriting, translation, webdev/seo and sometimes android dev).

For Webdev/SEO, I receive around 50 proposals. I rarely read cover letters, after reading the first 2 sentences you can see they are just copy/paste where they just modified a sentence to fit the job. From time to time a freelancer takes the time to read the project description and write about it. Bonus point for him.

What is important for me for webdev projects:
1) Portfolio, is what I'm looking for?
2) Work history, is there any bad reviews?
3) how the communication is going, is the guy reactive enough? Does he elaborate his answers regarding specific questions (more than "yes I can do it")

Sadly it's a game number. And if your work history is pretty empty, it's even harder for you.

Don't give up, at some point, you'll get recurring clients. For me, it's easier/faster/more convenient to hire again a freelancer I worked with, even at a higher rate, rather than find a new one.

I also have upwork account and to be clear is pure luck it seem to get any job there.

Take time bro

Scorpion Ghost said:

Bro this is the biggest mistake I see people thinking that SEO is the be all end all (be all end all <- is this correct? English is my third language, not sure)

Anyway you don't need ranking in order to get clients. I mean, sure, you rank high and you can make out like a bandit. Yeah.

But you can always go find your customers on social medias and leave comments on Q&A sites and on blog posts/articles relevant to the services you offer and Youtube videos and all sorts of places. Some may call this spam, but fuck those guys

Anyway my go-to is always hunt them down and spam them or position myself in a place where my target customers could find me (like a BHW BST), never SEO and ranking.

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I know mid 5 figure business owners. They don't find their clients through Google. And if they do, they just put simple ads with optimized cost per click.

I also know someone who has negative ROI from SEO clients and it's just not worth it if Google doesn't bring you more than connections in your industry.

You don't invest more than you earn. Afterall, you are investing to work more than you earn. It's silly.

Google is good if you can do it with little efforts and that's only a long term bonus. But even better is building e-mail lists and collecting data.

And who the hell is buying services over google. I've never done that. I either list my needs on a job board or pm people on Facebook groups.

LinkedIn is easy for people who have or want to have some sales background. Freelancing is the best job if you do it wisely.

If you are still one of those people who call themselves blackhat, just make a website like odesk (you can buy some script online), make a fake base of workers using db seeder and invite people there to list their jobs. Now all jobs belong to you while you appear as someone who has a lot of capabilities. Good luck.

LuckyGamble said:

Well, as always, keep spamming COUGHsendCOUGH proposals. That's just the name of the game.

If you send 1 million proposals, I bet you will get a couple of jobs.

Variance is a bitch

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I agree with this. This is the best approach to get gigs on Upwork

lepman said:

Hey everyone,

I'm about to lose it. Any advice is appreciated.

11 years in web development I decided to re-activate my old Upwork freelancer account with zero work history and bought the Freelancer Plus plan.

Week 1) I sent about 10 proposals, Got 4 interview requests. Closed 1 small job for $4.50. 5-star feedback. 9 profile views
Week 2) 15 proposals, 1 interview request. Closed the deal for $100. 5-star feedback. 2 profile views. Pretty excited at this point because now I have $100+ in earnings.
Week 3 12 proposals, 0 interview request. 0 profile views
Week 4) 17 proposals, 0 interview request. 0 profile views

What the hell is going on? I follow every single guide on how to write a proposal. Profile is filled with portfolio items. Right keywords in the title and description. Oh and I boost each proposal with 15 credits. Nobody ever outbids them. I also include my website portfolio link in there. Google Analytics shows 0 referral traffic.

Upwork support tells me my profile is "not" blacklisted and that I need enhance it more. Really? I feel like the algorithm is playing games with me.

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This is happening since corona. People working from home found new opportunities online, the competition is crazy.