Transcripts
1. Welcome to the course!: freelancing online is an excellent way to find work, whether you're trying just to supplement your income or you want to create a full fledged career by working on projects that you love. Forbes dot com did a study, and they estimate that there are over 56 million freelancers in the United States alone, and that number is only expected to grow globally. The average hourly rate for freelancers is almost $20 an hour. So this is an incredible opportunity for you to take the skills that you have no matter what industry you work in, and put them to work for yourself so that you can make an amazing living for yourself and your family. Hi, my name is Jenna, and I'm excited to teach you how to leverage the up work dot com platform into high pain, consistent freelance gigs. The gig economy is only expected to grow on up work dot com alone. There are over 80,000 freelance jobs listed currently, with hundreds more added every single day. This course will walk you through everything from setting up your profile, populating your portfolio, submitting proposals and communicating with clients. I even give you access to dozens of pdf pages outlining proposal templates and real life communication that I used with clients. Toe land, high pain work over and over again. One of the most difficult things about freelancing is the fact that it feels so isolating from time to time. So in an effort to create more of a community and provide you with accountability and networking, make sure that you join the Facebook group. It's called the Freelance Circus. It's linked below, and it's also link in the description for this lecture. One of the things that I'm hoping that you'll get out of this course is the ability to understand what projects work for you and to gain a better understanding of how you work as a freelancer. Also, in one of the best ways that you can do this is by balancing ideas off of other freelancers and learning from what they've tried and what has worked for them or what hasn't worked for them. So when you joined this group, what you'll have access to is myself and a handful of other freelancers all over the world who are all going through this course together so I can't wait for you to check it out. Make sure that you join and let's dive into the rest of the content in this course, yeah.
2. profile and account setup: So in this lecture, we're going to talk about getting your profile and your up work accounts set up from start to finish. So in order to do that, we need to create an account. So come with me over here. If you go toe up work dot com There's several different ways that we can navigate their site. But the most important thing to recognize is that right off the bat here, if you click it started, it's going to get you started as someone looking to hire freelancers. You don't want to do that. You want to make sure that you set up your account to be a freelancer, someone that is offering work that people can can purchase. So screw all the way down to the bottom click find jobs, and then you are in the freelancer. Ah, format. Here, click gets started and then we're going to go to our free account. So we start with first name, last name and then a work email address. This could be a Gmail. If you already have a portfolio site set up and that you have an email that is, you know, linked with that, I would recommend using that one instead of a Gmail account. But otherwise a Gmail account will do. And that's what I will be using right now. Then we click, sign me up and notice. Here they will say we notice you're using a gmail dot com address. Would you like to use your work email instead? I'm just going to go ahead and keep clicking through, okay? I want to work as a freelancer. Okay. Now it's going to prompt you to set up your user name. It gives me several suggested user names here. I can either go with one of these if I like it. Or you could try for a custom user name here. So let's try my full name. See what it lets us do type letters below. All right. Okay, so it looks like this user name is already in use, which is fine. If this happens to you, just come back in here, delete it and start over, create my account, and then, boom. You will have to verify your email to proceed. Okay, So you went to your email and you verified your email account. It says admission is competitive as there are limited spaces for freelancers that they will notify you of their decision by email within 24 hours. This isn't always the case. Um, I, in preparation for this course, set up a few different profiles just to see how the process was and one of them it did take the full 24 hours and the other was approved immediately. So if it's approved immediately, awesome. Good for you. If it takes little while don't stress. I think they probably get quite a few people trying to apply to join every day. So if it takes a little while for them to approve your application, don't worry about it. Okay, so now it's time to tell them a little bit about our services that we want to provide. So for me, for what I am trying to dio, I would probably pick something in the design and creative or the writing, because that is what I have the most, um, work experience with. However, if you let's say you are a designer, but you also have experience with Web and mobile. Don't worry about it. You can adjust later, and you can set up specialized profiles for different types of service offerings. They just want to know your main one right now. So if you're, you know, struggling knowing which one to do, just pick one and move on with that. So I'm going to go with design and creative. And now it's asking which types of design and creative do we dio We can slept up toes, weaken, select up to four types of work here, lots to choose from. For the purpose of this course, let's click this one and this one and this one and perhaps let's see other just to see what happens. And then down here, we get to get more specific. So they want to know what kind of skills we offer clients. So, for example, we could start typing logo and see it already comes up and prompts you with different options. So if you're a logo animator, this would be a great spot to collect this. I'm going to click on that and let's enter in a few more. Just around this out. Okay, so now that we've gotten some skills entered in here, we have to select our experience level. Now, the most important thing in this area is not toe over sell yourself. You don't want to build yourself as an expert if you've only got two years of experience. Likewise, you don't want to say that your entry level if you've been doing the type of work that you just listed above for 456 years, So I would recommend finding yourself somewhere in this middle zone this intermediate, unless you truly do have 10 plus years of experience in your field. So we're going to select this and we're going to save and continue. So now it's time to flesh out our profile, starting with uploading a professional photo that clearly shows your face. And this is very, very important because the photo that you upload really sets the tone. So to kind of get you thinking here what that means, Um, I have four different photos here that I picked. I could use this one, this one, this one or this one. Now all of these have varying degrees of professionalism. All of them clearly show my face. So the trick here is to select the one that showcases the most about what I'm trying to communicate to put to potential clients, in which case this one a little bit too relaxed. This one. You can't see my eyes. This one. It's fun, but maybe not super professional. So we're going to go with this one. We click. Add photo now select image, Choose and then we get to scale it. Make sure that your face is front and center here. Easy to see. We've got good, um, composition Here. Save room. There we go. All right. Moving down the list here at a professional title. They give us an example. Logo and branding design expert. I am going to say graphic design and content creation Specialist. Okay, so there's that and now it's time to write a professional overview. This is the biography area of your profile, if you will. And it is the place where you want to sing your own praises. You want to tell potential clients everything that they may need to know about what you bring to the table and what sets you apart from the hundreds of other freelancers on the site that are also competing for these jobs. Okay, so first you can see I have two sentences here saying a little bit about myself. I introduced myself right off the bat saying, My name is Jenna Mitchell and I have been a designer and content writer for more than 12 years. This sets up my experience level and also lets them know a little bit about, um, how long I've been doing this. Ah, and then I say, I have worked for clients in my community, and I have also worked remotely for clients all over the globe. And this is an important piece to include because a lot of people don't understand what it takes to work remotely, and a majority of the work that you are going to find on up work is going to be completed virtually meaning you will never have a face to face interaction with this client. So letting them know from the very beginning that you have experience working remotely sets the Mehdi's. It lets them know that you are likely a good communicator. You likely are good at time management, and this is not your first rodeo When it comes to working from a distance remotely for someone next, I would recommend typing in a little bit about your skill set and letting them know a little bit about your top skills and experience. For example, you may list things like logo design. You may list things like magazine design. I could also say article writing Web design. Okay, no matter what you specialize in, whether it is Web design or its writing or its accounting, make sure that you think broadly. You don't want to just say I am a great accountant or I am a fabulous designer. And leave it at that. You want to find very, very specific needs things to say that well, one help you with S E O and two will give perspective clients the chance to see if your specifics, experience and skill set lines up with the project that they have listed. You may end up updating your professional biography here on up work over and over and over again, and that is totally finds. I have actually gone in and and updated it based on a specific project that I was trained to win because I wanted to make sure that I highlighted certain skills and experience that they were looking for. So this again is your time to shine and is your time to share a little bit about you and what you bring to the table. So now they want to learn a little bit more about your background, including your education, your employment history in your English speaking proficiency. If you have completed a secondary degree at a college or university, this is the place where you would want to go in and add that so the dates attended her optional. But I recommend putting them in the degree you hold is also optional. But again, I recommend including that now on to employment history. This could be a really, really tricky thing for some of you, especially if you are fresh out of school or if you have on Lee worked as a freelancer. Ah, you may not have actual employment history, and that's okay. What I would say is, if you if you haven't spent time working for an actual employer, then you're going to come in here and you're going to put yourself so for me. I may say company Jenna Mitchell, my city where I'm at and then my title. Okay, now, remember before when I selected my professional title, I put graphic design and content. You want your title here and your title in your up work bio to match, if at all possible. My role was owner, period. You would put from when you started freelancing. And then you would say I currently work here. Now again, If you have experience working for an actual employer, you can always put that in. Essentially, if you've worked, many places you want include your most recent two or three and call that good. OK, now it's time to select our English proficiency and then set our hourly rate. Now, the important thing to notice is that up work charges a service fee of 20%. When you begin a contract with a new client, once you've built over 500 with that client, the fee drops dramatically to 10%. So keep that in mind when setting your hourly rate. So this is the hourly rate that the client will see, and then you'll see this 20% up work. V takes quite a hit out of that. So when you're setting this rate, make sure that you take this into consideration. All right, add your availability and location. How many hours do you have available for work each week? I would always air on the side of more. Even if you only have about 20 hours available, I would still recommend clicking this. And the reason for that is because if you put that you only have a few hours available every week. Potential employers may see that and think that you either have too heavy of a workload happening right now or think that you're not capable of taking on their project when in reality, even if it is a big project, you may be able to work around your schedule in orderto land that job. So set yourself up for success, and I recommend selecting this option. Next. We need to say what type of projects were interested in long term projects of three or more months, short term projects that are less than three months or both, and I recommend selecting both. Next we have to entry in our address. All right, it auto fills our country, so the last step is to verify your phone number for added security. So you're going to come in here, enter it in, click verify, and then they will text you a security code. That's it for this lecture. Make sure that you go through all of the steps. Take your time, right. A great biography about yourself and entering all of the skills that you bring to the table . And in our next lecture, we will dive into setting up our portfolio.
3. Portfolio Setup: in this lecture, we're gonna talk about flushing out your profile even more by adding portfolio items that really tell the story about what you're capable of and showcases your skill set. Let's dive in So you can see here in this test profile that I have set up, I already have my bio in my photo is there just like we did before. And now if I scroll down a little bit, I can click on portfolio right here. I need to enter in a brief but descriptive title and then a related specialized profile. Now, we haven't set these up yet. We'll do that in the later video, so just leave this blank for now. You also have the option of setting up setting up a completion date. So ah, if you completed a product at a certain time and you want to highlight when that when that completion date was, go ahead and fill this out, otherwise we can leave it blank. So up here, I've come up with some writing samples here. Let's pick one. Let's see, we'll do the webinar script. Okay, so my brief but descriptive title might say something like two person webinar script. Now it's maybe not the most exciting of titles, but it definitely gets the point across. And if people are searching webinar or script writing, it'll pop up because I've included those two key words here. Go to select template. Now, this is really cool. Ah, years ago, when I was using up work to get all of the the work that we landed for our design agency, this was not an option. All you could do was just upload some nails. It was really tacky looking. This is very cool, though we have the option to select a gallery where people can click through images. We can do it as a case study, where we're really getting in depth with the project problem and the solution that we've come up for it, or kind of this classic view here that lets them scroll through your work. So I am going to go with the Classic and Goto add details. OK, so with this version, we have to add a project description. We have to upload project files and then down here we get the chance to get a little bit more in depth as well, selecting the delivery bubbles that the project included the type of writing that it that it, um involved. Or if it was a design project, you'll select the type of design. It really is a smart ah platform in that depending on the type of work that you have signed up to do the type of skills that you put in when you set up your profile, it will try toe auto, fill these things for you. Okay, so you'll see that I put in here a brief project description. Feel free to include bullet points. If you have that much information to add, I would stay away from including more than three sentences, though, just because as clients air skimming through this, the chances of them stopping to read, you know, a six paragraph description just isn't feasible. So keep it brief and to the point, and when in doubt, use bullet points. Now we're going to drag files over here, so all select it from here. Dragon drop, Boom! Now we're going to select the specific services and skills we demonstrated while working on this project, so we have the option to scroll down and see if it fixes. If it fits with any of these, and if not, we can try to search as well. No results found. So unfortunately, we can't use that. Let's pick one that they have automatically selected here. And if it's not a perfect fit, that's okay. Let's go with landing page and Web content. No, it only allows me to select these four right here. It's really not any of these. So we're going to go with S E O and narrative, because at the end of the day, the story Italian piece is bigger than the fact checking in research peace, at least for the specific project. Now again, if you are trying to sell your services as a designer or a Web developer or a coating specialist or a bookkeeper, what they auto fill here for you to select is gonna be vastly different than what you're seeing here for a content specific profile. So just do your best, and again you'll have the chance to refine as you go. So now we need to select the industry, and that's not the industry that I find myself in that sea industry. That this was that this was created for, so I scroll kind of get idea for what's available here, and then I just select the one that is most applicable. If there's a project URL associated with it, make sure that you include it here. In this case, there isn't. So now all I have to do is go to preview, make sure it all looks good and hit. Publish. There it is shows up right on my main profile page right here. All right, let's add a few more. Okay. Now we have a fairly well fleshed out portfolio with several different types of writing, covering things from destination features to a informative tech article to a webinar scrip . So the main thing to remember when you're setting up your portfolio pieces is to include as much information as possible without getting too wordy, utilized bullet points as much as possible. And if you can link to the finished work online, make sure that you do that as well
4. Find Your Niche: so know that you have your profile set up and you have your portfolio items input into your profile. It's time to really dig down and figure out what your special sauce is. What your unique skill set is. You bring to the table so that you know exactly what types of jobs you want to bid on. And you know how to sell yourself to potential clients. I have created a short four page document for you to go through to make sure that you download it. And then we're gonna go through together in this lecture and talk about each line, items that you understand how to pull an understanding of what your specialized skills and your niche items are. All right, let's do it. First of all, we're going to uncover your skills and preferences. So the very first question here in this worksheet is what are the top 3 to 5 work related skills that you bring to the table? Thes may not be things that you love to dio the's maybe, just, um, you know, maybe it's data entry, and maybe it is business car design, and maybe it is ah, you know, coding and Maybe you don't like any of those things, and that's okay. Ah, this isn't the part of the worksheet where you're gonna put what you want to do. This is where you put what for? Better for worse. You are really, really good at. So, Philip, those things in here and then next you're going Teoh input 3 to 5 of your hobbies, special interests or life and work experiences. This is when you get to think about what matters to you, what you enjoy. So maybe you enjoy hand lettering or you enjoy painting on the side. Are you love to dabble in blogger writing? Ah, whatever it is, write it down here and then below that, you'll see this kind of adorable little diagram here. Um, there's there's three main areas que there's the stuff you love the stuff you're good at, the stuff people want. And that sweet spot in the middle is where they all overlap. And that is a goal of this worksheet to kind of help you start to think about where your passions and where your skill sets meat. So scrolling down here is there any but into over that between your skills and your hobbies and special interests list them below. If you if you want to go ahead. And you know, if you're a visual thinker and you want to dry out, draw out a little diagram like the one above, go for okay, get creative and come up with some overlap areas. Okay, Now that you've done that, let's talk about what projects or services excite you the most. This could be a project that you've done in the past and you fell in love with and you want to do more of that type of work or it could be even just an idea of something that you haven't had a chance to do yet, but that you're pretty sure you would enjoy doing Write that down here under number four and then we're gonna move on to number five. What projects or services pay you the most or have the potential to command the highest hourly or per project tree in the marketplace. Now, if you don't have a lot of work under your belt, you may not know who what is going to be the highest pain work for you. So instead of guessing, I encourage you to do a little bit of research. You can do the research right here on up work, just by filtering by by price and seen what jobs are available on. Def. You do have work under your belt. You Congar back through and see. Okay, What kind of work pays the best you're gonna list that here and then number six. Just like you did up above. If there is any overlap between the projects that excite you and those that command top dollar, you need to write those down. Okay, Number seven. Can you think of any underserved areas in your primary service industry? So, for example, let's say that you are a web developer and your challenge would be OK in my industry as a Web developer, what are some businesses or some other industries that maybe historically have terrible Web presences or don't have any at all, or maybe can't afford the high price. Said that normally comes along with having a good Web presence? Um, if that's the case, if you can think along those lines, maybe you would come up with some ideas like nonprofits or private schools or, um, tech based companies. Often they're you know, text heavy and dry. So whatever your industry, whether you're a Web developer or your writer or you are a accountant, come up with some ideas here, think of some underserved areas and list them when you're done with that Number eight, it's time to start thinking in terms of local work. What are service needs that you can uniquely provide a solution for So in the community where you live, the town where you find yourself doing business, what are some service things that you can provide a solution for? And then once you're done thinking locally, number nine expand that and start thinking in terms of remote work. How can you provide a solution for needs for companies beyond just where you live? Once you're done with that, we will move on to the second section of this worksheet, which is understanding your target audience in your client base. So number one what would your ideal client look like? That means, you know, in a perfect world, what would your ideal work relationship be? What kind of industry are they in? What kind of products do they sell, or what kind of a story do they have to tell, Really? Just try to define what your optimum client would look like. Here. Number two in your mind. How would the perfect project go from getting to end in order for you to feel like it was an amazing success? Um, maybe for you, that means they loved it from round one and there's no revisions to be had. And you get paid within a week. Maybe you prefer a longer, more drawn out project. And so for you, in order for something to be a success, there has been five or six revision rounds. And you really feel confident that at the end that the clients vision is represented with what you created, No matter what success looks like for you, make sure that you write it down documented so that you have it toe. Look back on next number three kind of pulling a little bit more from that first question. What is your ideal client demographic? We're getting really specific here. So company size location, really nailing down their industry. And if if you don't care, that's okay, maybe instead of what your ideal client demographic is, then maybe one that is interesting to you. So, for example, maybe you are interested in working with someone in the snowboard or skateboard industry. Or maybe you would like to get into video editing specifically for podcasters. Whatever it is, this is the spot where you're gonna going to jot all of that down. All right, moving right along. Number four, What is your ideal project? Timeline and milestone deliver Verbal set up. This is going to be a super super individualized to the type of work that you're doing. So make sure that you take the time to really think through again what a good project looks like for you. If you're in the creative arts industry, you likely need to have a very defined timeline with a very defined set of deliverables and milestones. Ideally, they, you know, correlate to payment milestones. Also, to make sure that neither you nor the client over or under extends yourself at any point along the process. Um, if you're in a more technical line of work, maybe your your writing or you are coding in an app for somebody. Ah, your timelines and your project deliverables will likely look a lot different than someone in a very creative, open ended industry. So no matter what it looks like for you, this is where you need to outline what your ideal project would look like. And then, lastly, what is your ideal project? Budget range. Now it's super easy to just say, you know, all of the money, because, of course, we want to get paid for the freelance work that we're doing. I challenge you though, to be really pragmatic here and honest with yourself and figure out OK, what do I need to do in order to make ends meet? And then what would I need to do? You know, financially on each project, in order to feel incredibly comfortable with income that I'm making, find those two bookends on the spectrum and then pick a sweet spot somewhere right in the middle. All right, it's time for the last section of this worksheet dialing in your unique marketplace. Offering number one what are 3 to 5 things unique to you in your skill set in your work experience that other freelancers would likely not share in common. So the purpose with this section is to really identify what makes you special. It's important, you know, when you are finding freelance clients, you're not just selling your product or your service or anything like that. You're you're selling a relationship with you. You're selling your story. So you know, people that are looking to hire freelancers, they're going to look at your work experience in your skill set as much as they are going to be looking at whether or not they will enjoy doing business with you. So make sure that here in this section you look at what your kind of unique special sauce is that other people may not have. You know, maybe you are a single mom with five kids, and that's a unique thing that you bring to the table. Is that kind of family oriented work perspective? Um, or maybe you are in your late sixties, and this is kind of the 2nd 3rd or fourth career change that you've jumped into, and you bring ah, wealth of wisdom in other industries and other job opportunities that you bring now to this new endeavor. No matter what's unique to you, write it down here. Okay, Number two, we're going to write down 2 to 3 things that set you apart as an expert or unique talent in your specific field. So this is a necessarily you and your personality, like we did in number one. This is the specific experience that you have that that makes you unique and different. Okay, blazing right along Numbers three. What are three things that your main competitor or competitors are doing well, and two things that you do better now, you may not know who your competitors, even our if your brain into the freelance game. You may be like, I don't know. Um, I don't know if I even have any competition. Ah, the answer to that is yes, you definitely dio, um the difficult thing with for moat work, especially on a platform like up work is your competition is virtually anybody and everybody. So I recommend that instead of pinpointing one or two specific freelancing individuals that you think of kind of, ah, character in your mind. So what would a kind of fictional competitors look like? What skills would they bring to the table? Put yourself in the mind of a client thinking what they might be looking for and see if you can come up with a few things that your competitors may bring to the table that you don't and then a few things that would set you apart. Once you finish that, I want you to think about number four here. How can you take what that competition is doing well and position your services and skills to be equally as enticing? You may not be able to directly compete with, for example, a logo designer that has specific experience working with up and coming cos if you yourself don't have that experience. But how can you position the services, skills and experience? You do have to be something that an employer may want to hire you for instead of your competitors. Er, this roles directly into number five. How can you build off of the things you're currently doing better than your competition to keep your mo mentum going? So, in other words, the things that you're doing well and crushing it at, how can you keep that going? You don't want to get sailing stagnant in that you want to keep growing your strength so that they are even stronger of a skill set for you. Okay, great job filling out the worksheet. I challenge you to really take some time to die justice information and figure out what it means to you. Go through with the highlighter if you need to, or, you know, a bright colored pen circling things and and really take the time to figure out where your were your passions and where your skill set and where your special sauce, where they all overlap. And that is where you are going to find your unique value proposition and your niche.
5. Specialized Profiles: all right, so now it's time to talk about specialized profiles. So as we can see here, I have a sample profile set up for my husband, Derek Eso. When we set up in the section to our profile, we had our kind of general profile area where we get upload portfolio items, set our skills, our employment, education, history, etcetera. So we also have the option with up work to create thes specialized profiles. And the benefit to specialized profiles is we can use them to strategically apply to jobs in a way that highlights on Lee the work that pertains to that specific type of project. So for derricks, I set up to you. I set up a brand identity design, and I set up a video editing and postproduction. The reason that I decided to separate these out, and that you may want to do that if you're in a creative field, is because these two service offerings are very, very different. So let's say that I was applying Derek for a podcast production project on and they went and they saw my general portfolio and or saw his general portfolio, which is great. But there's a ton of, you know, logo design and website stuff in here. I guarantee you that that client is gonna feel like this person doesn't understand what I'm going for. They don't understand that I need video production done. And they're going to round file or ignore or trash our proposal versus if when I apply or or Derek applies, He can select on Lee. The projects that have to do is video editing. Ah, then that client can see right away the relevant experience that he has in that area. So you can set up to two specialized profiles and again, I definitely recommend doing this. So let's look at how I've done this year. Let's hit at it on this video editing. Okay? So it allows me to create, like I have done here a separate title. Now, if we go back to his general profile here, we will see. Um, graphic designer, podcast producer and video editor is kind of his generic title here. And then in the video editing, it's even more specific senior video editor and podcast producer. The reason and the benefit for this guys is not only a CEO. Ah, but it's also a way to just really dialled in for that client that you know exactly what you're talking about. That you're definitely qualified and that you are ready to take on the project that they have listed. So I have a unique bio, um, unique project information right in here that again is different from what's listed on the general profile. And then we have specific portfolio items that is here. And then when we scroll down, we can see very specific skills that Onley have to do with this specialized profile. Okay, so if we click on these, let's click on this one. For example, this portfolio item, you can see that I could drop down and I could change what profile I wanted to to go with here. If I wanted Teoh, I again, I still have the option to select one of these three project templates. I have a details area. Now It's important to note if you're uploading video currently up, work on Lee supports YouTube or VIMEO files. So if you're planning on just uploading something directly from here or from from your desktop, you won't be able to do that. You have to have it on either YouTube or the V meal platform. Okay, so you have a project. You are l area product description area. It allows you to preview it, and then you publish easy as pie. All right. So let's give this a go for the brand identity and design because I have a simple here. So if you want to add to your portfolio, you come in here, you click this hand Little Plus, and here we go. Project title. This was a complete brand redesigned for Alil Diagnostics. It's hard to talk and type at the same time. All right again, I have to select which specialized profile I wanted to go to brand an identity design. I can put in a completion date if I want. I'm going to skip that for now. Now I'm going to select the templates. So for the others in the sample profile, I had done a gallery. Instead. Let's talk about case studies because again we've colored that get covered the gallery. I think we've also discussed classic too. So let's do the case Study. Go to add details. Okay, so right off the bat, it wants to know the roles so derricks role in this project. Waas All right? He was the lead designer and strategist for the entirety of this project. Meaning essentially, it was only him. No other team members weighed in. We didn't hire out a contractor. It was him from beginning attend. Now we have to input here the project task and challenge. So in other words, what was the client brief? What was the creative brief? The project description. What were they looking to have done and how did you uniquely approach it? So for this, we're going to say Okay, so we think it as detailed or as brief here as we want. Teoh. I opted for something short and sweet. I said the client needed a complete logo overhaul and then wanted that local applied to multiple brand assets. They needed me to stick with their current color scheme, But other than that, I had free rein to create something unique and fun. Now, the reason that I'm keeping a short and suite is because this is a very old project, and so I no longer have access to or, you know, recollection of the specific, you know, Project Brief. And I don't know the client email, you know, things like that. So if you don't have, you know, hard and fast specifics, that's okay. Uh, just come up with a kind of well rounded bird's eye view of what the project overview is. And again if you if you actually have the the creative brief or whatever, feel free to put it in here in its entirety. All right, so now we want to drag him and is over. So I'm gonna come over here. I'm gonna drag my images over, make sure that your very first image shown is going to be the one that you want featured. So in this case, my very 1st 1 is kind of this art board that kind of outlines how the entirety of the brand looks, and I can also enter in captions. So here, I'm going to say this is the final logo Art board. This is the trade show Booth mock up, and this is the web site home page. Mock up. Okay, quick. Simple. You can see right here. The website mock up. It isn't even their their final fleshed out page. Um, it has, you know, stock images and things like that, and That's okay. What I'm showcasing here Because again, this is my, you know, comprehensive branding and logo design. Specialized project. I'm showing that that we can take, you know, create a logo. And then how we had shown the client it could be applied to different brand aspects. Now, down here Because again, this is the case. A study option. We had the project task and challenge up here and down here, we get a chance to say the solution how we took the client parameters and, um, met or exceeded their expectations in a very creative way so we could say something like this. Okay, it's another. We have the solution in place here. We have an option to put project. You are l. If this had actually gone to a full web development, I would definitely link it here. In this case, it didn't, so I'm going to leave it blank. And then down here, we need to select the specific services and skills we demonstrated while working on this project. So they suggest a list of options here. So we're going to go with brand guidelines because, as you can see up above, we outlined all of their color values and everything and how it should be used. Okay, we've got brand positioning digital marketing materials, and since we didn't actually come up with packaging or social media, items were gonna leave that the link right there. Okay, now we're going to go to preview. Oh, I see what I did wrong here. Okay, so this is different than the others in that they want to see, um, the solution images down here and not up there where I put them. So where you are going, Teoh? Reload them here. And that's the thing with up work is it is always changing. So even just in the last few months since I last did a case study style ah, portfolio upload, they've changed how how it works. So if you come in here and something isn't as it was before, don't panic. They've dis changed it a little bit, so and it looks like this could only be 70 characters now. So we're going Teoh, take that off and we should be good then. Okay, so it looks like what they're hoping for up here with a project task and challenge is they are looking for, um maybe like a before slash after, Um, since we don't have that, I'm going to go ahead and upload just the generic logo thing here. Just that there's something to show because it cannot be avoid feel that can't be empty. And then down here, we need to re enter our captions now. Okay, now we should be good to go. Go to preview, double check that everything is spelled right. Looks good. And then we had published. And if we did everything right, then it should show up in our portfolio. There it is. All right, now, remember, we did this under the brand identity designs, specialized profile. But if we go to our general profile, it's going to show up there as well, which is awesome. So that means that prospective clients that stumble across our profile can see everything we have listed. But when we are applying for jobs again, we have the chance to filter what the client see based on the specific type of project that we're applying for
6. Other Experience: Okay, so we are almost done completely rounding out your up work profile. So now it's time to talk about the last piece of the puzzle of the very, very bottom of your profile. You have the opportunity to input other experience, so let's take a look at what that would be. So here on the sample profile I have set up for Derek if I scroll all the way to the bottom past employment history, past education, we have other experiences now. Upward currently has this just wide open. It's very possible that in the future they will kind of automate this a little bit more and give you more parameters. But for now, it's very open ended. So here are some things that you I would recommend in putting. Let's say that you do a lot of volunteer work. I would put that in here so I would say for the subject. My other experience is volunteer at the local Humane Society, Let's say and then we need to give a description of the work that we dio. Um, it's ideal if this experience, ah, lines up with our skill set in some way. For example, maybe you donate time each month to design and social media graphics. Okay, maybe you do that. Or let's say maybe other experiences that you have is you took an online design sort of occasion course from you to me dot com. Then, in the description, you could copy and paste your certification information from you to me or maybe the course outlines, saying the things that you learned. Either way, this is the spot toe. Add other relevant experiences that maybe it don't speak specifically to your skill sets, but that rounds you out as a service provider and also helps the client get to know you a little bit better and helps you stand out from the crowd.
7. Filters: So one of the most important things in utilizing the up work platform is learning how to properly filter and save your job searches. So there are thousands of jobs of, um, uploaded to the platform every day. And if you're not careful, it's easy to get overwhelmed. So let's dive right in, and I will show you how I go about this process. So when you log into up work right away, you come to this find work tab, and here is what it looks like. Now you can see over here on the left. Ah, some of the recent searches that I have had come up as well as my categories, and you might be wondering, what are my categories? Well, in the very beginning, when you set up your profile and you selected the main services slash skills, you offered a client's, it saved this information, and then what it did waas it, pulled it in here so that you're showing or it's it's showing you on Lee things right off the bat that apply to your immediate service area. Now there's ways around that, but for now we're just going to stick with it, as is So I recommend coming in here to the advanced advanced search options and familiarizing yourself with it a little bit. So if you know I only want to do logo work, you could say logo, the exact phrase. Logo redesign. Let's say if you only want to redesign existing logos on Weaken, search that. Let's see what happens. No, right up here. 10 jobs, Air found. I have the toggle for us only on if I take that off. It gives us more than double the jobs, the jobs solutions so we can come down here up. Work will flag things by whether it's interesting, whether it's brand new on. And then you can also see right here without even having to click on any of these projects . I can see the, um, if the client is payment verified or not, I can see how much they've spent on up work. I can see like where they're located. I can see what the skill set. If it's a beginner, intermediate or expert that they're looking for. I can see how long ago it was posted and their estimated budget. That's a ton of information right off the bat, so I would come down here and I would look through and say, Okay, well, this was posted a month ago. Interesting. Um, it's curious why they haven't hired someone yet. And look what it says. Interesting. If we actually click on it, it opens it here and you can see Okay, a little bit more details. They're looking for an expert freelancer. They are rated almost a perfect five star review. You can see their average hourly rate paid. You can see how many jobs that they have posted, and you can also see that they have a 41% higher rate. That means that out of the 1000 and eight jobs they have posted, they have hired people for 41% of them. So for me, as someone looking to bid on these potentially, um, I might be a little bit wary of this. Even though they have spent almost $100,000 on the platform, they've only actually hired for less than 50% of the projects that they post. So it's possible that I might waste my time in in bidding on this. So depending on what you are interested in, you may or may not want to submit a proposal to something like that. So continuing on down here, we can see a fixed price project, an hourly project. There's a little bit of everything We're gonna scroll back up once we are done with this search. You want to go back to where we were before, we can either hit the back button or I can just clear this out and hit. Enter. No, I'm right back at the main search area. But you'll see none of my information is here on the side. Toggle back on the U. S. Only. And now let's talk about the actual filter button here. This is one of the best little secret weapons that I have. When I'm searching for work here, I can come in here and you'll see there's 22,811 jobs found, and I don't think that that is total jobs. I think that is in my immediate service area. There is no way I'm going to make it all the way through those without feeling overwhelmed . I mean, I don't think it's even humanly possible, so we start the filtering process. Now if I don't know what I'm looking for. I may want to specify hourly versus fixed price. As you can see, this is a huge divider. There are many, many more hourly projects versus fixed price that are available, But depending on what you prefer, you may want to select one or the other. So let's just say we go with fixed price and let's say we want any experience level, any client history, but we only want to work with payment verified clients. Well, right away, we've gone from over. What was it? 20,000 projects down to 5000 job listings. Now, this number of proposals is interesting. This means this is the number of proposals that each job posting has already received. Now, if you're very, very confident in your proposal abilities, you may not care that if if there's a lot of them, however, if you are nervous about competing with a ton of proposals, I would recommend sticking with these low numbers here. So instead of clicking the any number of proposals, I'm going to click less than five. 5 to 10 in 10 to 15. And now I'm gonna come over here to budget. Now, remember, we selected the fixed price option up here. Now I have the option here of really filtering by what I'm hoping to make. They even have a custom custom area here, which is nice. So let's say we're looking for something in the 100 to $500 range. Look at that. We dropped way back down. Now we're looking at less than 1650 jobs and then thes two sections when you select a fixed price job option. Um, fixed price job postings don't often require an amount of hours per week, since you don't have to track your time because again, it's a fixed price project. Lastly, we can come over here to categories and and narrow from here. So let's scroll down and let's look at Let's say, um, I want to look into general graphics and design. 130 34 jobs found perfect. That's something that's easy for Meteo to go through. I'm gonna close my filters because again, I don't want to be waiting through, you know, 50,000 jobs, so I want to sort by relevance. Newest clients spend our client rating. I want to sort by newest and I want to view expanded. If I compact this down, I only see the title and that's not enough for me. I want to build a scam through and see more. All right. So as I scroll, you can again see right away. Ah, specific information. So, for example, for this e book formatting project, they are only willing to accept freelancers located located in the United States. And why is that? Because they put the U. S. Only toggle on. If I take that off, Look at how much that jumps up. That's incredible. So for the purposes of this lecture, I'm going to leave it on just so that it's easier to get through all of this. But depending on what you're looking for, you may want to play around with the toggle on enough and just see what you find. Okay, so we've made our way through this. We're happy with this. We feel like it's a good representation of the type of work we want to dio, Let's say and we love it and I don't wanna have to go back through and input all this information every time I can come here, I can click, save search. I need to give it a title. Let's give it a 500 budget. Us only well helps if you spell it. Right. Design jobs. Okay, I hit Save. And now it's Safed. So now anytime I come my profile I can hover over this. Find work tab. I can go down here and Oh, no, just kidding. They moved it. Well, let's figure this out. Then. Let's figure out how to get back to this advanced search. Nope, It's not there. Here we go. They moved it to the side. Well, there you go. Like I mentioned it in a Nurlita. Her lecture up work is always evolving and changing and trying to make things easier for both clients and freelancers to navigate. So in this case, they moved the save search feed over here under just the generic feed. So when you're looking for this, we can look right here. Boom! There it is. And it will always be updated with the most recent projects that fit the specific parameters that I have set. Now, one other thing that I want to talk about before we end this lecture is the recommended search filter. Now up work will take everything that you've input in your profile, and they will use it to filter job postings that they think are specific interest for you. I don't always utilize this, but every now and then, especially if I have extra time on my hands or I'm really hoping to kind of expand and add to our to our schedule and really fill it up. All look here because sometimes they will recommend jobs that I wouldn't have considered to be a good fit for the type of work that we dio. Um, but every now and then, you'll find something where you like that. That's actually an interesting project, and you may decide to apply to it. So again, you have recommended you have your saved searches. Over here, you can see your recent searches here. You can search by your specific categories over here, or you can always just go back to the beginning back to the home page and work your way through the advanced search and the filters
8. Project Diversity: Okay, so in this lecture, we're going to talk about the importance of diversifying your work portfolio. Essentially, you want a good mix of the types of projects that you're bidding on so that you don't ever get too overwhelmed when you're scheduling your calendar and so that you always have a variety of projects coming through your door. So there's two main types of diversification that we need to consider when we're filtering work and saving ah, potential projects to bid on. So the first thing is we want a good blend of low pain and high pain projects. Now, with that, you want to keep in mind that the higher pain projects are often more time consuming. They're often more stressful, and they're often more demanding because the more a client is financially invested in a project, ah, the more they typically want to be involved in the more revision rounds that potentially will come your way if it's a creative project. So ah, you want to be saving work and bidding on a mix of those high high, um, you know, pain gigs and quick projects that you can get done easily. They maybe don't pay as much, but they really help still the gaps in your schedule with that kind of ah, little side tangent bidding on both hourly and fixed price jobs. Hourly work is great for many freelancers. It's their bread and butter. I know for myself and my husband. Over the years, we've done a lot of hourly jobs, and the nice thing about that is you get paid for exactly the time that you put into it. The downside to an hourly job is you get paid for the time you put into it. And with many industries, the better you get at something, the more quickly you're able to do it, which then often, unless you're raising your rates to go along with, that means you make less because the faster you go, the less money you learn when you're working hourly. So from that perspective, working in fixed price projects as well could be a great way to ensure that you're getting fairly compensated for your expertise as well as your time. Um, you're essentially selling your services as a value based product instead of a time based product, so that's kind of the financial diversity that we want to find what we're looking for. Work. And then the other piece. The puzzle is work style. You know, You want a variety of projects that are gonna be like your your bread and butter like the thing that you are most qualified in and good at. Maybe not your passion. Maybe, hopefully, but but maybe not so of those types of gigs and then things that are more in the realm of like what you want to get into, because chances are depending again on your industry. You are always evolving as a freelancer and as a service provider, so bringing it back into the design world. Maybe you are currently a Web designer and a social media graphic designer. But you want to get more into the corporate branding. So you would want to diversify your job search and the things that you're looking at to be a good mix of the stuff that you're really good at and you have a lot of experience in and that you're confident you can showcase. Ah, you know, a stellar portfolio of these Web pieces and then also bidding on work that's along the lines of where you want to go because if you're never bidding on those kinds of jobs, you're never going to land them. And your your work landscape is never gonna change. So to recap, you need to have a diversity in mind. When you're setting your filters, you want a mix of hourly and fixed price projects. You want a mix of high pain and you know kind of lower and jobs, and you want a mix of work that kind of feeds your soul and and work that you have established and you know you can deliver on.
9. Weeding Out Projects: So I'm very excited about what we're gonna be learning in this lecture. We are going to look at some specific projects and discuss how to weed out ones that aren't right for you and how to read between the lines to figure out, um, specific ways that you may be uniquely suited to bid on certain projects. So let's get to it. All right, So I'm here and I left the recommended job filter up just because Why not? Let's go through that and let's find a few. So let's start right. Let's let's look at logo projects. Let's say Okay, so what I'm gonna do is I am going to open these in new tabs. I'm using a Mac, so I just hit command and click to open a minute. Newtown. So we're gonna do that one. Let's see the hourly logo creation. Let's click on that one. Brand design guidelines help their payment verified. Sure. Let's check that one out local for a film company. That could be fun. No notice. As I'm moving through this and again, I have years of experience doing this. We've been on up work for oh golly, since before it was upwards since it was the land. So for almost 10 years now, and so I'm very, very comfortable just at a glance knowing if a job may or may not be a good fit. So just to reiterate for you as I'm going through this, I'm looking at the title. I'm looking at the payment structure. What level of experience? They're looking for their budget when it was posted where they're located. How maney proposals they have again. All of these things can at a glance, paint a picture for you for, um, what the project may entail. So as I'm going through here, this is what we're looking for. Ah, need new company logo will click on that one. Um, won't click on that one. Their budget is too low. Let's see. Here is one. They have a decent hourly rate. Continue on down here. Let's get a few more added for us to go to ah company logo. Well, this one's featured job. That means that they've paid to post their job. They're serious about finding a freelancer and actually hiring one. And then let's see the sleeping find one. No, no more listed. Okay, so we have 1234567 toe. Look at. So let's start with this very 1st 1 Okay, so they're looking for only freelancers located in the U. S. Check. And now, remember, the goal here is to figure out how do we quickly and efficiently weed out ones that aren't a good fit while simultaneously saving the ones that we want to circle back to later? Because they could be a good opportunity for us. So, um, since I'm looking for logo jobs right now located in the U. S. Check, um, they're willing to pay higher rates for the most experience. Real answers. That's a plus to me. Hey, no. Here they are. If if the client asks specific questions and they don't always. But if they if they have specific questions, they want you to answer the list. Um, here. So some of them are generic, and sometimes they get very specific. So I always check this to see, like, I love this number five. Do we have suggestions to make the project run successfully? That tells me that the client is interested in a collaborative process and they're looking for feedback, okay. And then down here. I look at the skills that they're looking for to see if it's a match. And I love to see how many proposals that they're having if they're currently interviewing . That means entering into conversation through the up work platform with, you know, other freelancers. It'll show people here, and if they've actually invited specific freelancers to bid on their project, it doesn't mean that there necessarily going to award them the job. But if they have sent specific invites, it'll be it'll show up here. So at a glance, this might be when I want to spend more time looking into So what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna come over here and I'm gonna click, Save job. I don't wanna do my proposal submitting right now. I want to come back to this later. Next I opened up my next time brand design guideline help was posted three hours ago. They promised they won't be difficult to wear. Quist Sometimes humor in a ah, job posting like this. Let's you know a little bit about what the client is like. Um, it looks like they have some fonts and examples of what they're what they're wanting to have done, um, they're looking for, you know, quite a few skills here. But what I am concerned about with this client is that or with this job posting, is that they say we need help polishing our current design and putting it down on paper design guidelines. So I'm assuming they just want help laying out there kind of like brand document. But because they say they want to polish their current design, it makes him because they've listed things like logo design, print designed down here. It makes me nervous that they potentially may also want actual design work done. Not just strategy, but I look over here, I see they're highly rated. They have a reasonable higher rate. Um, I'm I might flag that one has saved and just come back to it later, okay? Branding logo for film photo company They're looking for freelancers in the US Gives a little bit about them. It's a fixed price project. They give you a ton of information about the design sales that they're looking for. However, they already have 10 to 15 proposals, and it was only posted four hours ago. So for me personally, if it was me bidding on this project, I would I would weed it out. And I would say, You know what? It's not for me. That's too much pressure of time to come up with a solid proposal in, you know, the next few hours to feel like I can get it in there before that before they have too many proposals. Because there is such a thing is over saturation. Um, so I think I I would weed this one out, and so I would just come up here and I would ex out of it. It's no longer saved in my tabs, and I can go back to these and I connects out of them as well because I saved them. Okay, let's get through these last couple. No, I am in need of a new logo from my digital media agency. So right away I have some red flags, and the red flags for me are, um, the poor English grammar. So I'm a little bit nervous that there wasn't a lot of care put into posting this job description, and if there if the client doesn't take a lot of time and care to accurately put out a project description. Um, then the chances are high that they may not be organized and may not communicate with with me well down the line. So depending on what your personal preferences and what your bandwidth for crazy is, you you may be OK with taking a chance on a client that you know, posts grammatical errors or doesn't post complete product descriptions. Um, but if that isn't something that you're comfortable with, don't feel bad to sweeting this out and saying, you know, you know, that is where I draw the line that says we know comfortable with and just moving on. I mean, when lead looked earlier, there were literally thousands of jobs available. So it's not going to be an issue of Oh, no. If I don't apply to every single job that crosses my path, that might be a good fit. Then I'll never find work. That's not the case. New work is posted every single day, and you have the right and the responsibility as a freelancer toe on Lee. Take the time to apply to work that either inspires you, or that you're confident that you can, you know, have a good showing in and perhaps get land that that job because you have to remember that all the time that you spend searching for work and applying for jobs is time that is not billable, and it's time that does get taken away from doing actual pain work. So you really have to find that balance of, um, really looking for and hunting for work, that you think you can land on the upward platform and in temper that with the fact that if you're always hunting and and never actually doing work, then you are never going to get paid. So it's It's really a both and situation. So going back to this, I think for me, even though they kind of pull it together and they give a lot more information there, fixed prices low, and I just don't have a good feeling about it, for lack of a better word. So we're going to decline that one as well. All right, three more to go through. This one is a very, very short project description. It's literally looks like three sentences. However, what I like about this one is they give you the link to their existing website so that you can see their logo. They're very specific with their hourly range and down here they have a lot of proposals, which tells me there's high interest. So now I just need to decide again. OK, am I willing to take a chance on a new company that has, you know, one job posted? Or do I want to move on and only work with? You know, someone who's verified? So in this case, I would choose probably to skip it. Now this one again, it's It's a very brief project description, but their budget is excellent. They have two jobs posted and nothing hired yet, so they're very new. But this one has a big enough budget that it might be good to take a chance on. But if you look down here ah, high proposal volume, why likely? Because they're fixed price budget is I mean, it's It's a very, very good budget. So because of the proposal volume and it's only been posted for six hours, I'm going to decline that one. Okay, so for this last one, this is an excellent example of an incredibly detailed project description. Thes ones take a lot of time to wade through so often. What I'll do is I will look at peripheral information to see if I think it's a good fit or not before I actually dive into, um, spending a lot of time digesting all of this. Because if I don't need to spend 20 minutes to understand this and if I can make a good decision based on the periphery information that I've just saved myself time. So as we look down here, um, they have no reviews. They have three jobs posted in a 67% higher rate, which means they've hired for pretty much every job that they've posted. They spent 500 total dollars and as we come down here, they're looking for an expert. These are the skills they're looking for, but right away I have a red flag. So they're looking for ah, freelancer with a job success score of at least 90%. If your brand new toe the upper platform like I am with this profile for Derek that I have set up, you don't have a Tom success score yet, Which is a bummer. You Onley get a job success score after you've, um, you know, completed a project and you have been rated. So me bidding on this, it's unlikely they would even consider my proposal. Now down here, it says, include rising talent. They say Yes. So that means that they are open to new service providers, however again, because I don't have any job history on here yet. It's still showing up as a red flag. The system is actually flagging what I have going on. So I'm going to come up here and I'm going to decline. And I think what happened here? Oh, we have one that we missed. Look at that. Need Art Deco logo designed for small business posted 20 minutes ago. Less than five proposals. They're giving good information. Sure, we'll go ahead and save it. Okay, so now that I have weeded through all these jobs very quickly, it's only been about, what, 10 15 minutes. We can come up here, have over find work, click on save jobs in Boom. There they are right here. Easy peasy for me to find. And now when I have time, when I have banned with, I can come back through and I can individually evaluate thes based on, um, the diversity that they bring to the product. I'm hoping to bid on. You know, what is the price range for these? What is the proposed timeline? How many proposals do they have? How involved is the project? I can spend some more time with these individual job listings and decide whether or not I want to actually submit a proposal. So that's it for this lesson. Guys, take some time, get familiar with the up work job filtering platform, go through practice, weeding out jobs, practice saving jobs. And in the next lesson, we're going to talk about how to get in a consistent project. Search flow because efficiency is key.
10. Efficiency: So before we move on to the next section, I wanted to take a minute to talk about workflow and efficiency. Ah, I know from experience that it can be very, very easy to get bogged down with the project search process. And the problem with that is that again, it's not billable time. So where for Derek and I with our agency, it worked out well because he could be designing and doing billable work for clients while I, as the project manager, helped to find this jobs. No, All of you have that built in solution where you have someone who can partner with you to do the job, hunt side of things. So if you are a freelancer who's doing this, you know all by yourself, and you're doing both the project finding and the actual work. You want to make sure that you're making the most of your time in the best way that I have found to do. This is to get on a schedule and to stick to that schedule as much as possible. So my recommendation is that Monday, Wednesday and Friday are your project bid days. That means that three times a week you're spending an hour or two and you're going through and you're actually bidding, submitting proposals for the projects that you have saved. And then on Tuesdays and Thursdays you go through and maybe even you could do like a Tuesday Saturday If you prefer toe to, you know, do something on the weekend, and that's when you're going through and you're looking at your saved searches. You are, you know, playing around with filters. You're saving work, you're weeding out projects, and you are doing the hard digging, un billable work of of finding projects that may be a good fit for you. Um, I would recommend keeping it at first to under three hours a day, so that would be every unit two days a week. That's six hours of, you know, project finding. That's a pretty good ratio compared with than the rest of the time in your week that's available to actually put towards advancing your portfolio, connecting with local clients and doing real work. And as your up work portfolio of projects grows as you win jobs, you may be able to spend a lot more time hunting for work. You may find that it pencils for you. Um, but until then, I would just caution you against get going, too. Deep down the rabbit hole. And because I've been there, I know what it's like. I know. I know what it's like to be like I have no work lined up. I need toe find work and use end up spending, you know, an entire week, just hunting for projects. Not only is that a little bit demoralizing and very stressful, but again, it also takes away from other work that you could be doing, whether it's a side hustle or a side job, Um, that you have until you're freelancing, stuff takes off. So all that to say, uh, make sure that you are being productive with your time. You're being efficient. You're sticking to the schedule that you've set for yourself and that you you're you're giving this time to develop. Um, even though Derek and I have been doing this on up work for over 10 years now, we still see Evan flow where we may win a bunch of projects in one month, and then we may have a month go by where we, you know, we're nothing. Pans out. And that's that's just the way it goes in this crazy life of being a freelancer. But take heart. Um, do your best to come up with a schedule that works for you and your workflow, and I can't wait to see you in the next section.
11. Connects: So in this section we're going to talk about submitting proposals for jobs that you have narrowed down as potentially being a good fit for you. Um, but before we can really dive into the meat of that, we to understand how proposal submission on up work actually works and how it works is they have virtual coins called connects and each project, depending on its size and scope and its budget, they assign it a connect number of value that it costs every freelancer that wants to apply for that project listing. So let's take a look at what that actually looks like. So if I'm here in my main up work dashboard over here on the right, underneath my proposals tab, I can see the available connects that I have. So if I click on that, I can see kind of a at a glance snapshot of my membership and connect picture here. So currently I'm on the freelancer Basic plan. The available connects that I have are 90. Now I can click here and I can see my connects history and I can also add more. They have kind of a list. If I click on this you can see they have it in kind of tears here, so you can purchase 10 for a dollar 50 20 for $3 all the way on up to 80 connects for $12 so you can always add more if you need them. No, If you have a paid membership, you get a certain amount of connects allocated back to your account per month. Now the great thing is is up to 140. Connects will roll over from billing cycle to billing cycle. If you haven't used them, this is great. If let's say you had big plans for the month, you loaded a ton of connects on to your account, and then maybe you had an illness. Or maybe you landed a local project that that was awesome, but it kept you from applying for work on on up work. So instead of just losing the money that you've invested into those connects, they automatically roll over one month to the next. So that's kind of a nice built in security feature that they have. But let's look at their membership plans really quickly. So you see here they really only have two options they have the free plan, which for this profile that I have set up to teach on I I utilize. The free plan so connects AR 15 cents each, and unused ones will roll over up to 140. Now if you want to upgrade and you pay the 14 99 a month to upgrade to. Plus, you also get 70 connects per month added to your account. So if you were to purchase those outright, um, using the the ad connects like I showed you earlier, it would cost you about 10 to $12. So realistically is it's still cheaper to, um, out of them as you go. Yes, but if you anticipate that you want to really a dive into up work and utilize some of the advanced features, I think it's worth the extra couple dollars a month to upgrade. Because, as you can see here, you can see competitive bids for any job, and you can also customize your profile girl, both of which, while not necessary, are nice toe have. So to recap, connects are how we kind of bid. I guess you could say on projects and as I go back, back, back here. Here we go. So if I click on this e book formatting, let's just say I can see right here on the on the right hand side the required number of connects to submit a proposal. And it's for it shows how maney I have available. And then I just have to decide. Is it worth it to me? And honestly, sometimes it isn't depending on how many it may cost you, you have to weigh the likelihood of you landing that project with the cost. So if they're 15 cents apiece, essentially, this is costing me 60 cents to bid on this project. So depending on again, how high of a value u you place on your time in bidding and whether or not you're really confident that you can land the job that you're bidding on, um, you may or may not want to spend your connects in that area. All right, good luck. And let's move on to the importance of working off of proposal templates
12. Templates: he everyone. So in this lecture, we're going to be talking about the importance of benefit, of working off of proposal templates. So I have been a writer and an editor in a proposal responder, I guess you could say for my entire career, and I still find ways to mess it up. Um, part of the problem is that we when when we are re reading things that we've written, we see what we meant to say. So it's difficult to catch errors in our own writing. Um, and using a proposal template kind of gets us part of the way there so that we're not reinventing that wheel every time and having to to rethink it every single time. We want to submit a project proposal. Um, it's also a huge time saver. In an earlier video, we talked a lot about the importance of efficiency. Um, you know, unless you run an agency and you can work billing for project management and product discovery into kind of your whole billing structure, unless you're able to do that, all of the work that you do on up work to find jobs to bid on jobs, it's it's not billable time. So you want to make sure that you're making the absolute most of every minute that you spend. And again, one of the best ways to do that is to utilize project proposal templates. So over the years, I have created dozens of these. Sometimes they're very detailed. Sometimes they're just a brief paragraph. Um, but what they dio is they minimize the chance that I will overlook something or or leave something out. Some days you might be in a hurry and you submit a few proposals and then you realize I turn it. I totally forgot to fill in the blank. Maybe who forgot to include your contact information. Or maybe you forgot to address a direct client question that was in the project description or maybe new failed to upload work samples. I've done that before, and then you're just kicking yourself afterwards because there's no way to go back in and really edit things without the client knowing that you've edited. And anyway, it just turns into ah hole thing. So project proposal templates to make it easy on you cause I know not everyone comes from a writing background. I've included three project templates for you to kind of get the ball rolling. One's a generic template. One is a design related template, and one is a writing specific template. But no matter what your industry is, whether again going back to that accounting or maybe you do photography or maybe you're a bookkeeper, whatever it is that you dio, you can feel free to take the generic temple that I've provided and then just tweak it, too, so that it fits with the types of projects that you will be applying for. I guarantee you, if you take some time up front no more than 1/2 hour to an hour and 1/2 if you if you take the time to really develop, um, one or two templates that you're proud of and that you feel really get your messaging across, it is going to save you so much time in the long run
13. Project Plan: Okay, so at this point, you have probably familiarize yourself, either with the project proposal, templates that I provided or you've taken the time to create your own. And now it's time to really consider what it means to flesh out those templates and to create a project plan. Because one huge piece in the up work job proposal puzzle, so to speak, is making sure that you're accurately laying out the project plan from start to finish. And this will likely change, especially if you end up getting a word of the job and then are able to communicate with the client to understand more fully what they're looking toe have done. Ah, the scope will likely change some, however, in order to set yourself up for success and to make sure that you've budgeted the project properly and to let the client see that you've taken the time to really think through their project from every angle. It's important that you include a detailed project plan in every proposal that you give out . This could be as simple as a bullet list of milestones with dates, um, and it could be as extensive as a separate document that you've uploaded that really outlines every minute detail of how you see the project proceeding. So, in terms of the project templates, let's look here at the generic proposal and see what we can dio with that. So here, you'll see, I say, hello. My name is you would feel that in, and I would love to be considered for this project. I have worked quite a bit with insert your project or special skill here. For example, I have worked quite a bit with logos or I have a ton of relevant experience being a bookkeeper for small businesses, whatever the project is that you're playing for, and I am confident that I could create something you love. Now here is the thing with these templates. Okay, um, it needs to still read in your voice. It needs to be true to who you are. So if my husband, Derek, were the one pulling this together and presented it to a client, he would never in a 1,000,000 years speak in this way. You would never say I want to create something that you love. He would probably say something more like, um, I am confident that I could create a killer finished product for you. You know something a little bit more. I don't know, edgy and manly. But whatever the the the voice or the tone or your unique style is, make sure that you update these templates or the ones that you create for yourself to to truly reflect that. If if the style that you are creating your proposal and doesn't matchup at all with your email communication style, you're going to throw your client for a loop when they start communicating with you throughout the project and they may even wonder. Hey, is this even the same person that you know submitted this proposal to me to begin with? So I have reviewed your project description and all supporting information you included, and make sure that you Onley include this little bit if they actually provide supporting information. If they don't take it out, I always recommend trying to come up with at least one question to ask them. This does two things. One. It shows that you are invested and engaged with their project from the very beginning, enough so that you have come up with questions and to let's say that they get 30 proposals . The chances of them responding to you are high if you've asked them a question and given them something to respond to. So it's just kind of a subtle way too set your proposal apart and do more to ensure that they actually will reach out to you for a follow up conversation. Okay, so after these question information here, we say something like Aside from the above questions, I feel that I have a solid grasp of what you need to have completed. And I believe this project could be completed in approximately 5 to 7 business days, and then I put a little note in here. Turn around. Could be much faster to pain on availability to review and give feedback etcetera on. Then I am available to begin immediately. So this section basically sets the tone for the project plan, so you need to have thought through how long it will take you to complete the project. Let's say you think it will take you 3 to 5 days. Give yourself of buffer. So if I think it's gonna take me 3 to 5 days, I tell the client 5 to 7 days and not just days but business days. Okay, because you have to take into account the fact that depending on the type of project your plane for there will likely need to be some client input slash revisions, etcetera along the way. In any time that there's client involvement like that that's necessary for project completion, you half to allocate and plan for some delay. Ah, lot of times they're very speedy to get back to you, and that is great. But maybe they're in a different time zone than you are O. R. Maybe they don't work on Fridays, but they work on Sundays. And so, depending on all of these factors, it's just always safest to take your initial estimated timeline, give a buffer and then make sure that you give them a range. I didn't say five days. I said 5 to 7 days, because again it just gives yourself that much more peace of mind. So then the next paragraph talks about past projects and how you envision attacking their projects. So we say something like, based on past projects I have completed that are similar to yours, I recommend we work on a milestone schedule This will keep the project moving forward smoothly. And we'll also help both of us manage expectations and communicate clearly throughout the project. Okay, so right off the bat here, we use this as an opportunity to establish experience we have with similar projects. Um, and we outlined the fact that hey, constant communication is important to me needs to be important to you. And you set that expectation from the very, very beginning. Now, this is where your project plan can really shine. It could be like I mentioned before, as simple as just a few bullet points here outlining the milestones and product deliver Bols. And it could be as detailed as you want it to be as well. A depending again on the type of project that you're taking on. Let's say it's a website and it's gonna take a month to complete. You may want to have weekly check ins weekly milestones that also correspond with ah weekly payments. The benefits of doing it this way is it it really safeguards both you and the client. They know when they can expect you to be in communication with them and to have things for them to review and you have accountability in the form of a contract, essentially so that you aren't tempted to procrastinate because we all have that in us. It's it's difficult to self motivate, so it lets them have some peace of mind knowing that you have a plan for deliver bles in it , and it holds you accountable to actually hitting your deadlines on DWhite in you can if you can attach those payment milestones as well. It also ensures that you have money kind of slowly coming in and you're not waiting till the very end when we when we set projects up this way, Um, and it doesn't happen very often, but every now and then a client will flake out on you. And if that happens, you wanna have at least been compensated up to a certain point so that it's not all. For not. I then recommend ending your proposal in like a neat, tidy little package by saying something like my up work profile provides several great samples, and I have also included several links or attachment below of rubber relevant work for you to review, and I recommend doing this because not always well, a client take the time to go navigate through your portfolio to hunt down. Ah, work that you have done that similar to other looking for it just makes it easy for them to to see why you stand out. And then I always end it with Ah, thank you for their consideration. Include your name. You may also want to include your contact information here. No matter how you choose to kind of sign off this, this puts everything in a neat and tidy memorable Bo. OK, well, that's it for now. In the next section, we're going to talk about the special sauce how to add in your U V P or your unique value proposition to really help you stand out from your competition.
14. U.V.P.: okay, It's time to talk about your special sauce. A k a. The unique value that you bring to the marketplace and how you communicate that to potential clients. So before you should have filled out the worksheet that kind of helped you. Hopefully, um, dial in your niche, your special skills that helps you kind of navigate and understand that sweet spot where your skill set in your passions kind of collide. Um, when you did that, hopefully it brought some skills or project direction into focus for you so that you know, Hey, this is something I'm really passionate about answering I'm good at. And this is my sweet spot. So whenever you can, if you can find a jobless teen that you know is along those veins or if you can find a way to tweak your proposal to include that information, um, it's going to be all the better for you. But the big question is, how do you communicate this to the client? Is it a line item in your proposal? Maybe, Um, is that something that you include in your profile bio again? Maybe There's also some out of the box options that you have, so you could record a job proposal video for the client, and that would serve to showcase your personality. Um, you're speaking style, and it would help them develop a rapport with you even though you're not sitting face to face, you know, over coffee, hashing out project plans. If you choose to do so in that way, you could just upload it to your proposal, and that would be a good option. You could. Also, if you've taken the time to create a portfolio website, perhaps, or if you have a thriving social media presence, you can always link that in your proposal as well. Because again, the more that a client feels like they know you, they understand your story, that they've made a connection with you, the more likely they are to choose you instead of your competition.
15. Proposal Submission: Alright, guys, it's the moment you've all been waiting for. It is time to submit our first proposal. Let's check it out. So if I come to me up, work dashboard for this sample profile that I've set up for, um, Derek Right here. Let's go to the saved jobs Tabs that we pulled up earlier. And let's pick brand design guidelines up. Boom! There it is. Okay, now, if you'll remember, this is for a CBD company that is looking for design guidelines. So right off the bat, what we need to dio is willing to come over. And I am going to open my design a project proposal template because the number one rule that you want to always follow is you do not want to write your proposal directly in the up work area because take it from someone who has accidentally hit send before she was ready, there's no quicker way to lose out on a potential project than to send a halfway done proposal. So we are going to open this up. We're going to copy all of it. We're gonna open up a new document and we're going to start working off of that Okay, so I can take this off of here. They don't need to know. It's a template. And then what we want to do is we want Teoh. It's easiest if I can get both windows right here so that I can see everything right at the click of a button. Okay, so let's read through their project description one more time. They're a CBD company, soon to be launched in both the U. S. A. And Mexico. So right away There's an international flair to this. They need help polishing their current brand design, and they want to get everything down on paper in a guideline format. So they have a logo that they like. They kind of know what colors to use. They have some sketches of packaging and some fonts they think might work and examples of websites they think would fit their brand. They're looking for design guidelines for print, website and social media. Essentially, what they want, based on my understanding of how they've written this, is they want a brand book and a creative brief generated so that when they are ready to have a design team flesh this out for them. All of the research has been done and they're ready to go. So here is how I would go about doing this. I would take this out. Add and Derek. Hello. My name is Derrick, and I would love to be considered for this project. Now, remember what I mentioned earlier about making sure that the tone fits with who you are and how you naturally speak. So I'm going to go ahead based on what I know about Derrick and the way that he speaks and interact with clients on. I'm gonna update the way that this template says this information here really quick. Okay, so now we want Teoh insert the project and skill information here. So they're looking for someone who knows how to essentially build a brand strategy. So we're gonna put brand strategy here. I have worked quite a bit with brand strategy and have helped many clients come up with brand guideline documents. And where does gonna put a period after that? Okay, All right. Now, I have reviewed your project description and all supporting information you included. Let's check. Did they attach any supporting information? They did not. So we need to take this out So I have reviewed your project description and have a few questions. Okay, so the first question that I have is their desired timeline. How soon you hoping to have this completed? And I'm curious how they envision the process going because with something open ended and creative like this, it's easy for scope, keep to happen. So essentially, what that means is that when there's not a completely hard and fast description of what the delivery bols, our scope creep can inevitably happen where you start with one and result in mine and slowly but surely other things get added in. So we need to make sure that we ask clarifying questions here that will give us a very clear understanding of the expectations for the project. So in this case, I might ask something like how maney revision rounds. Are you hoping toe have included? Okay, so now that we've done that, we weaken evaluate the next part of the template, which is, aside from these questions, I feel I have a solid grasp of what you need to have completed and leave. This project could be well say, finished in approximately well say 3 to 5 business days. Based on past projects I have completed that are similar to years, I recommend we work on a milestone schedule. This will keep the project moving forward smoothly and will help us manage expectations. That part I would absolutely leavin. Now let's talk about setting up milestones essentially that project plan portion. So Milestone one is going to be the client. The Project kickoff milestone to in this case is going to be initial research and idea presentation. And then we will have refined design submitted for review. And then we have Milestone Four, which in this case would be all project files delivered. Okay, so I always include X amount of revision rounds in my projects. I am going to take this out because up above, I asked them a question directly correlating to revision rounds. So now we can work on wrapping this up. Um, we want to have a project kickoff call because this is open ended and we mean to tighten up the scope. So we want to say I reckon we begin this project wist a Skype or phone call, and then let's read it through one more time to make sure that it makes sense. So I think we'll take this part out and we'll just leave it at that. And then let's list some availability times right here, Monday through Friday from nine. AM to six. PM, And that includes your time zone. Okay, Now back to the up work profile. It provides several great portfolio samples, and I have also included several links and attachments below of relevant work for you to review. The tricky thing with something like this is they're looking for brand guidelines. So unless you truly have created something exactly like this before, you don't really have 100% relevant things to show. So it would be better to leave it at this and say, and I am happy to provide more upon request. Okay, there we go. Thank you for your consideration, Derek. All right, so we're happy with this. We read it over. We copy it when we come back over to the up work window here, I'll make it bigger. All right, Now we are ready to submit a proposal, so come up here. Hit, submit, and watch the magic happen. So this proposal requires four connects. So essentially approximately 50 to 60 cents. And when I submit this proposal, it lets you know how many that you'll have remaining. Kind of like a last ditch effort for you to say Yes, I want to do this or No, I don't want to want to do this. Now, since the client is looking for someone who specializes in branded and brand identity design, we will submit your brand identity design profile because Ding ding ding, we had set up a specialized profile before. So they ask if I want to review it. I do. I click it, it opens it in a new tab, and I can scroll and see what I've got here. Definitely something that I'm proud of that it speaks to my capability derricks capability to complete this project. We're good to go. Okay, so we're going to come down here. Scroll, Scroll, scroll! Starting right with terms. How do I want to be paid by milestones? I don't want it all at the end. I want it kind of metered out and right here because I still have this up. I can see the four milestones. So I have initial project kickoff. I typically do about 10% of the project for these. So assuming that the project, these could be updated later, of course. But let's say I get, you know, we get hired over the weekend. Project Kickoff Call is on a Tuesday, so 10% of the project hole would be $50. Boom. Now we need to add our next milestone, in which Waas initial research and idea presentation copy and paste set in here. Okay, so I if we remember, I had said 3 to 5 business days. So if we're starting on the 15th that gives us 123 for five. So I need to have my initial research done right away. So we'll say bye Wednesday and we want $100 once that's complete. It's about 20% of the project total. Our next milestone is our refined design guidelines submitted for review. That's assuming that they have reviewed all of our initial are our initial research and our ideas they've given us feedback will make that on that Thursday. So right now we're in that three day window, all right, and then the final milestone project completion. We'll set that up for Friday, the 18th and are remaining project amount of 200. Okay, Now remember, up work is going to take 20%. So that's a pretty big cut for a project this size. However, $400 based on the work we estimate it will take, it's probably not too bad. So how long will it take? Less than one week. All right, additional details cover letter. That is where this comes in handy. We're gonna copy and paste it right in here and then make sure that your proposal does not include specific contact information up work terms of service state that you have to work on up work. Part of the reason for this is to protect you. Because what can happen is I am. Sometimes if you have a claim that says, Hey, how would I pay you off of up work Upward will not guarantee to reimburse your payment or to go to bat for you to mitigate losses with that client. If you aren't getting paid through their escrow system. So in many ways it does benefit you. It also ensures that they get their their cut of the work that you're doing because that is how they're able to maintain the website and keep the service going. Okay? We didn't include any specific information there, so we're good now. If we wanted to drag her, upload other specific project files here, we could. So let's come over here. I have some design samples waiting and let's see. Let's pick. This is for branding. Let's pick one more to show that we are capable of coming up with brand guidelines will drag that one here. And they are a CBD, which means that they are, um, that's kind of like a medicinal type thing. So let's see if we have any work that's going along with that. Not that one. Sometimes it can be difficult to pinpoint. Um, you know, work that's relevant. You never quite know what the client is looking for. So All right, Boom. There we go. Here it is. We've checked it out. Double check. Make sure that all of our dates are correct. All right, take a deep breath, say a quick prayer, submit a proposal. All right. Three things we need to know. They want to make sure that we understand that we're submitting for a fixed price project. Make sure that that's good. We have to click that we understand. Continue to submit. Boom. Your proposal was submitted. Congratulations. We did it. All right. Now it's your turn. Make sure that you take what you've learned. Pick a project, submit a proposal and let us know how it went. Good luck.
16. Under and Over: Okay, guys, you did it. You submitted your first proposal and so proud of you. Hopefully, you have learned a lot along the way so far. And you can take a deep breath. Oh, I let the stress of that first job proposal to smelled off of you. It will get easier the more that you do it, I promise. Eso in this lecture I want to talk to you about over promising and under delivering its that right. No, you don't want over. You don't want over promise and under deliver. That'll get you fired. All right, starting over. So for this lecture, I want to talk to you about under promising and over delivering it's kind of the next step . I guess you could say in, um, creating proposals that stand out and in managing your clients in a way that is successful and really sets of expectations well, from the very beginning. So let's start with the first piece of that puzzle. The under promising when you are crafting your proposal and you are figuring out your project timeline in your milestones on what you're actually delivering to the client, it's really, really important to set the bar. Not low, but not really high, either. You want to find a nice, sweet spot that hits the things that they're asking for but doesn't give away the farm, so to speak. So, for example, let's say the you applied for a logo design project and the client wanted three initial looks and they wanted to You will have two rounds of revisions. So, in your project proposal, you said OK, Yes. I will give you the three initial looks and I will give you two rounds of revisions. Um, you know, and I will complete it all within three days. That's reasonable. You're giving them exactly what they've asked for. You have essentially under promised. Okay, If you normally include, say, four looks or three rounds of revisions. This is a great time to kind of keep that in your back pocket as a way that you can over deliver for the client. So if you've promised three initial looks and you show them five, that is a great way to say Hey, like I went above and beyond for you. It didn't necessarily take you a lot more work. But on the flip side, if if they ask for three and then in your project proposal, you say I'll give you seven. Then you are setting that bar unnecessarily high for yourself. And then, if you want to, then go above and beyond that, you know, toe over, deliver. Then you're looking at 89 10 initial looks. You're just making your job that much harder. So at the end of the day, what you want to do is set realistic expectations. You're essentially training that client what to expect from you. Clients don't know right off the bat. You know how to be a good client. You have to train them. So setting that expectation very clearly, very honestly, making sure that you're delivering what they ask for. But you're not way over promising and then finding ways along the life of the project, where you can over deliver, whether it's extra communication, you know, an extra revision round or an extra look or defined on your industry. You know, maybe you're throwing in a little bonus, you know, an extra 20 minutes that you don't build for, or whatever it may be because at the end of the day, every client that you come into contact with has the potential to be an ongoing client or to be a client that refers brand new clients to you down the road. So you want to nurture those relationships, cultivate them, take good care of them. And I guarantee you it will come back around to bless you in the end.
17. Deadlines and Communication: So once you have landed work on up work, it's time to start figuring out how to manage those clients effectively. So two huge things to consider with this is your communication and your deadlines. Both of those are things that you want to stay on top of, and you don't want to have kind of dip below in tow into a gray area. Because once you lose a client, trust in your ability to communicate or in your ability to deliver on time, the chances of the project ending while are very, very slim. So first things first communication. Communicate early, communicate often and communicate clearly. I'll say that again, communicate early, communicate often and communicate clearly. So we want to make sure that we are up front with things as they arise, whether it's a change in scope that we see coming down the pike. Or maybe it is, um, we have something company, our personal lives, and it's going to change the project timeline a little bit. Communicate that early to the client, give them as much heads up as possible to give them as much bandwidth to offer grace. Understanding this possible communicate often doesn't matter If your project is a two day project or a two month project, you want to communicate consistently with your client so that they can grow comfortable with the cadence of that communication. Um, remote work is not something that comes naturally to most people, depending on the generation that they fall into and the demographic that they fall into. They are possibly way more comfortable with, you know, traditional work relationships where they can walk down the hall, knock on your office door and have a face to face conversation with you whenever they please. So this whole online gig economy work situation is something that takes time to build that trust and that report with client and freelancer. So by communicating often, you are effectively helping ensure that that relationship stays strong. So there are a couple different ways to handle this. Some freelancers prefer to kind of like send a daily email digestive work that was completed so that their clients know what's going on. Ah, some people like to schedule kind of consistent daily or weekly or whatever makes sense for them phone calls or Skype conversations so that there can be that kind of in person face to face peace. Whatever works for you, just make sure that you set that up is an expectation from the beginning so that the client feels confident working with you and then that last piece of that puzzle that communicating clearly don't assume that a client knows what you're thinking. You have to always again going back to that over delivering idea. Always go above and beyond in your communication instead of just dashing off a quick email saying, Hey, you know, getting close on the project, tell them exactly where you are. You know, um, if you are supposed to be working on ah sub page for their website, you could say something like, Hey, I completed X, Y and Z on the sub page today. I'm still waiting on product photography. As soon as that's in, Aiken, send you comes for review. Um, essentially your commuting. You're communicating the same thing. We're almost done or you know it's going well, but you're giving them something tangible to hold on to. That makes them feel that they're more a part of the process and gives them that peace of mind. So, to recap, communicate early, communicate often and communicate clearly eso now to wrap up this lecture of just a brief conversation about deadlines. Don't miss your deadlines. The end. We could end it right there on that would be enough. But sadly, a lot of people don't respect deadlines. And there is no quicker way to lose the clients. Respect and toe lose respect in the freelancing community than to become known as someone who doesn't value other people's time. Um, at the end of the day, you're only as good as your integrity and your word. And if you say that you're gonna have something done by a certain date, you need to do your level. Best toe, have it done by when you said it will be done. And if something truly does come up unforeseen emergency, that makes it so that that can't happen. That is where that early communication with the client comes in. You know, be upfront, be honest, and then don't just present a problem. Don't just say I'm going to miss our deadline present. Also a solution. Like I you know, I had a flat tire and didn't make it into the office until noon. Um, I will not be able to have you things by 5 p.m. Tonight. But I will work late and will have everything in your inbox by name AM tomorrow or whatever it may be. Don't just present the deadline problem. Also present the client with your solution and then stick to that solution no matter what. All right, communicate well with your clients. Hit your deadlines and you will be well on the road to keeping your clients happy.
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