Transcripts
1. Intro to the course: Welcome guys to my guide
to a por freelancing. I'll be happy to share
everything with you that I know a little about
me. My name is Misha. I'm from Ukraine originally. A work help me to achieve
financial independence. Have an online income, travel to different countries, stay as long as I want it and just give me
freedom basically. I am a freelancer on work
for a few years, at least. I have more than 200
completed jobs and almost 3,000 billable hours. So I'm sure that
I'm more confident, maybe the most confident person that should actually
talk about a work here. Also, I'm top rated plus. We will talk about it
later what exactly of this badges from a
work achievement means and how it will help. The most important, I know
all ins and outs for 110%. What should be done,
how it should be done, how to attract clients, how to convert them to potential clients to an actual customer
to an actual client, and I know every detail
about this platform. This is the only course that you actually need
to succeed there. I will not get
anything from you. I will show as much as possible, and I hope it will
help you the same way as work in general help
me. Let's get started.
2. My Story: So this is my story, how I started working on a. Few years ago, I found myself
in a very bad position. I leave my previous job. It was unbearable,
just impossible to work I was very toxic
and just a bad place. I'm from Ukraine originally, and as you understand, money was not as great
as it could be always. Yeah. And I remember this
day when I go to food store. I bought a little meat, a milk and a bread and all that left was just
$3 on my account, and I should leave
a month on that. So I was sitting and just not sure what
to do with my life next. And It was a very bad. I was in a very bad position
in my life in that time. So Before I was just flowing, I was not making
decisions in life. I was just doing
something, somehow, just without any I just go with the flow and looking at
$3 at my bank account, I decide that I need
to change something. I always have a dream to be
financially independent. Also, my income, I have a dream. My income will not be connected to some one
place and I can travel. I can see a world. I can basically earn something online just with my
phone or notebook. I decide to go Allen trying to catch to make this
dream come true. I knew about work, get a freelance,
and other platform, similar people per hour. And I test. I check everything and I realize very fast that work is the best place with the
biggest amount of job, a lot of clients, potential clients, a
lot of freelancers. I create my account of upwork. I had zero skills
that I can actually. Use online for online work. I spent 16 hours per day, just trying researching
what can be. What I can actually learn
very fast or relatively fast. That can actually bring
me some kind of money. And I select a few skills that I that I
consider to master. It was not something
that I'm passionate about It was a question
about survival really. I select two different things. It was searching in optimization and it was website development. And I spent every day, 16, 17, 18 hours per day,
just loading it. Just learning everything
that I could, consume information
as much as possible. I had no money for paid
courses or something. I basically use YouTube read every piece of everything
that I can use. And In the same time, I spent 15 minutes every hour to bed
on uplok for different jobs. When I start doing that, I don't actually have
any skill, good skill. I was like, what if someone
will hire me to do something, and I will be like I was
desperate, you understand. And after one month of
learning everything I can, after one month period, I managed to to close a job, like a person Harvey. She had a problem with her
website and it was due to a very bad fork from a previous search
engine optimization and website development
consultant. Basically, if you know
something about a, it was a person or a
company, I'm not sure. They change a website
without respecting site structure and without
ecting 301 redirects. Page ranking and
like everything will be redirected basically
to your website, and this website lose
a lot of traffic, ranking, like everything and basically what should be done. The person that hire
me want to restore it. First step was to restore an
old version of a website, to like to go back to
how it was before, and the second part
was to develop a new website with a
proper site structure, with proper indirect structure, just a proper
structure in general. I was feeling confident
that I can do that. Yeah. It was very
stressful for me. I was sleeping for
four, five, 6 hours. Per day, I was working for
a week on this project, and for 16 hours in more. I was sleeping for you
sleep 2 hours and wake up, working and you sleep
another 2 hours, you wake up and working. It was very important
for me. Yeah. In a week, I receive a payment. Client was very happy
with result because like everything came back to
normal with a new website, actually, she started ranking way higher after development. That it was before with an
website and I managed to she paid me $1 minus a fee. It was just incredible
money for me. It was like In my home country, it was two, three
months of work for a ordinary general job. I managed to receive this
money in just seven days. I was like, I can work. That's something
that I should do. Yeah. T people that never experience these situations when you don't know how
you will survive. They just don't understand. Yeah. I decide to go in into work and
sharpen my skill. I start learning a but
it's another story.
3. How you can get a new skills: How you can understand
what kind of skills are actually
in demand on work? It's actually very easy to do. All you need is Google work skills in
demand and plus your year, Ifield mint in 2024. If it's your here when
you are looking at it syn create literally the
first links that will appear will be a resource
like a block post from fork where they are showing what kind of skills
in demand actually right now. For this moment, it's top ten, for example, it's data
analytics, machine loading, data visualization,
data extractional lot data related skills, deep loading, generativeI model, and top most in demand from coordinated
web development is full stock development
from pen development, website design, XY
design and et cetera. Top three fastest growing
skill, for example, is ccrypt in atomation,
database development, and web design, and so. All you need to do
is to just open this record and
check your skills. Maybe if you are
doing, for example, digital marketing in general, it will be a good idea to create your profile profile as
social media marketing, market, it will be a very high very high
probability that a work will accept you
from the first or second. You understand what I'm tras
as specific as possible. I will talk about I
will talk about it later that you need to pick a niche and I will
talk about it later, but be as specific as possible, re about where you can
actually learn new skills. There is a lot of
places. I can recommend. YouTube is always great. There is a lot of what
educational videos from YouTube from YouTubers. They're not always correct, actually right now
when I consider my sales very
professional and things that I'm doing and YouTube
videos are not great, but to start somewhere
to understand to start everything rolling
to have initial skills, is a great option. Skills. I don't know. There is a lot of great places where Kg can learn something. In general, YouTube is
a very safe suggestion. Tu, should be fine.
4. How you can get a new skills - 2: Later, when a work f lectal aspa profile and you
will be inside a platform, you will have ability to browse all other
different free answers. You can actually check
the profiles, starts, what kind of jobs
they was doing, what kind of niches
they're working in, how much they was paid. By clients, and so on, you will actually can analyze, maybe an accountant,
for example, and you will check
other accountants. You can actually analyze and understand the amount of
work you can actually get, what money you will receive, how much you should charge for different type
of jobs, and so on. The first step is to
get into the platform, and you are basically
making educated guess based on the data
that work provided to you and then when you will
be inside the platform, you can actually research
is and tailor everything. To be as good as possible.
5. How to get approval on Upwork fast: How to get approved. This is
a very interesting question, and I have a few tips for you and I hope they
will be helpful. In general, a work
have like a limit. A inviting, accepting invites from
different type of flancers, different niches, and
have a specific quote. For example, he can it can accept 100 copywriters per week. 200 web developers,
5,000,000 designers, 25 legal guys, and so on. I just make this
number from my head, so don't think about it. But basically, the
days that I work have a specific quota per week. And when you are submitting your profile and
register on the platform, invite maybe we will not
come to you this week. And you will receive
that there is a lot of revisers of your type, and please try next time. It's totally normal. You should resubmit
your profile job work next week and then next
week and again and again. Eventually, you will
receive your invitation. I managed to get into the
platform on a second week. First week, I submit nothing happens not approved
second week, basically so A your skills like there is a lot of people recommend like a little trick. If you are I work is not
inviting you because your niche, your skills, there is a lot of other people
already on the platform, and you spend a few times a few weeks trying to get in and a Pk is not inviting you. A lot of people suggesting
to write in your profile, something like a different. If you're a copywriter,
people suggest you to apply as a web developer, for example, front
and developer a developer designer, and other. Type of niche or skill. Then when a pork will accept
you into the platform, they suggest you to
change this profile to your specific the
original profile, original niche that
you was applied to. I can't recommend that
it's a little No scary, it's like not against the rule, but I hear stories that if you are doing
something like this, work sometimes ban people because you can have only
one account of work, and when you're
submitting your profile, we ask for your ID, your passport, some
kind of identification. You can't resubmit it
again with the same ID. You can create a profile
with the same ID. It's like we don't
want to do that. Can I recommend to
use this three TP? Well. It's up to
you, but in general, in general, it should be safe because I hear only
rumors about it. I don't know any single person
that was banned for that. But I was reading it
on for. Up to you. As a temporary solution, you can create a profile. For example, your copyright
and you create profile as you are a W press or
reactive developer, and work have this feature. You can create three different internal
profiles inside work. Theoretically, it
should be For example, if you are a developer
because I'm talking about development and things
like that because it's very like something that
I'm doing actually. But it's relevant for
skills, any issue. If you are a developer, you
can create one profile. We like specify everything that you are a front
end developer. Another internal
profile that you are back end developer and another profile that you
are full stack developer. Basically, if someone is
looking specifically front end, you your profile will appear. If you're looking
someone for a back end, someone is looking
for a back end. Again, you go the
idea. The same way you can like trick I know it's
like if it's a trick, maybe you have a
different skills. What else? You can submit your profile to work for something for a popular niche. But then when it
will be approved, you can create this like two and other internal
profiles with your skill specific skill and just be from from other profile, not deleting the first
hope to make sense. In my case, for example, I'm doing development, and I'm doing such
a gen optimization. It's they're related, but
basically completely different. Skills niches, really. Everything is okay. I really have these
skills and I really have a lot of jobs in both. Everything is bef in general, it's up to you to decide. I hear stories that people
was banned for that, but they was banned
only when they change profile completely as soon as
they get into the platform. If you like your
profile will stay on a platform as you created
it originally for some time, I don't know for a month, maybe, or at least when you will have a few jobs on your
actual skills profile. Then it will change it.
Hope it was helpful.
6. Understanding Upwork: So let's assume that
you already have a membership on work
and plus profile. So we will see more
information about jobs, and when you actually
open up work, we will end on this page. It's like a list
of jobs here that recommended based on our
profile settings by work. I would say that work is not very good at
recommendations, at least from my point of view. You'll also have most
recent safe jobs. I'm not using safe jobs because
if I if I see a good job, I just beat it.
Beat on this job. But if for some reason
you can beat right now, maybe like you using your phone and you're just checking
jobs, you can save them. Basically clicking
on this like hard and it will be appear
in the safe jobs. Most recent it's
most recent jobs. Anyway, I'm not using best much as I'm not using
most recent save jobs, not very from my point of view, they're like, how you should think about jobs and
finding jobs in general. Your clients, you should place yourself in
your client's boots. Maybe they are not as
technically advanced as you. Maybe you are, for example, react developers doing some
complex things with like react helmet I don't know
something technical, and they don't know about it,
they don't care about it. A they they just want to have website on react
or just a website. I suggest you to think
about very general keyword. For copywriters,
it's like article. For example, a keyword article. 100% or a block post, and someone will want
to hire a copywriter. In a job title, job description, will be article or
block post or you know, if it's developer with a
website, it will be a website. If it's like mobile
up, it will be up. I suggest you to use a
very general keyword. Let's select I know website. And every shop with a website title or
description will appear here. If you want, like pork originally showing
ten jobs per page. Let's specify 50. So And you can see right
now that 15 seconds ago, someone posit the job that Clon our product page in
M page on Shopify. If you are developer, you know what the am page is. It's like a vis builder,
basically, and. You're clicking on a job, you're reading title,
reading description. We need like someone
very familiar with Jm Pay blah blah
to call you know. If you think that
the job is okay, you're basically clicking Apply. I will not do that right
now because I want you to go over or for on this page. Basically, you will need to
apply and you will write like your proposal that I'm very familiar with N page can clone any product page in a
couple of hours maybe for. What kind of info
we can see here? I assume that you
have membership plus. On work and pork we'll
show you mod for about client, other things. Right now we are if you on a free planet will
look a little different. I will not have access to
some kind of information. Theoretically, this
client specifies that this job will need less than 30 hours per week and it's okay to hire worldwide for any
place in the world, in India, in
Philippines, in Ukraine, in USA, in Argentina, doesn't matter for our
client, worldwide, basically. Yeah. He's looking for an export and willing
to pay high rates. Great. Project type,
one time project. It can be pork, have a
different type of project. It can be one time, it can
be how to say it correctly, like a retainer, different
type of project basically. Submitting proposal to this
job will cost 14 connects. Right now, I have
available on my account, 125 and is in for
above the client. So he have five star reviews. H at least work with four
other peoples on work. This is clients location. He posts 16 jobs, but hire only 90%. Right now we have to open jobs. Basically, open jobs
is great because you can check other jobs that open and maybe you can talk you submit in your application
just for this job, but if other jobs that open, you can do that also,
you can talk about it. Basically, if he
have to open jobs, you can submit for this one and talk about the other one
if it's okay with you. Right now, this client
spent this money. This is a low amount, but how
pork actually calculated? If client have an open
contract and not like pain, for example,
$100,000 already for this for his for freelancers
that was hired before. Contracts are still open. A por will show you will not
show like this $100,000. A pork will show here only amount that was actually played on
a closed contract. This number is not very
representable really. O H rate for this
client that he was paying to the four
guys was this much. It will help you to
consider if you want. If your rate is $20 per month. You can adjust your profile rate to 30 and submit for this job. On all I don't know. Maybe your hourly rate is $100 and you know that an average client pays
30 and it's not enough. It makes no sense for you
to apply for this job. But usually, I'm applying for
a job with a lower payment. I'm writing something like I
know that my rate is higher, but I'm working fast. I'm very professional. Even you are paying me
like double or triple, I will deriv and
work way faster. You understand. You can work. With everything really. This client is member
since January 15. Anyway, client have
additional question when you will apply for a job. Client have additional question. Have you use Jam page before. Basically, you will type like it will be
like a new field, and you will type yes, I'm professional Jam
page and blah, blah. Also, the skills client specify when he was
creating the job and In this particular case, they are not very
important for us, but maybe if description
and title was very general, I just need to clone
a product page on my website and we
don't know that it's shopify from title description if client specify shopify here. We understand that soif. Hope it makes sense.
Preferred qualification, Europe and Americas. It's like, A
activity on the hop, we can s. This is a benefit of a plus membership that
we can actually say, see how many people already
apply for this job. In our case, it's like s five, and we can see how
many was interviewed, all my clients send it
by to someone else. We can see an activity. If we will see here that 100,100 people already
submit a proposal, maybe it will be way
more challenging, of course to get this job
if we like less five. You undertake it's
like common sense. Client history here basically
you can ch previous i Rs. I was talking about open jobs. This is another
open job by client. It looks like he just
clone the same job. He have two job posting with
the same title description, but in general, it
will be different. You will click apply. Here all maybe save. I don't know if you need to
save it for some reason. I don't know. Yeah. Not sure why it's
load in so slow. I will pause the video,
but finish loading. Oh. My Wi Fi for some
reason, is gone. I will just connect to
my phone right now. Things like this happens
when you are showing some. I'm sure you know
how it's working. I have three different profiles
global profiles on work. This is my freelancer profile. This is my client profile. I was talking about
client profile before and this is
my agency profile. If you have an agency profile, you will have ability to select, I want to beat to the
job specific from a freelancer profile or
from an agency profile. If you just have a
freelancer profile, you will have just
one option here. Then I have a
specialized profile on my freelancer profiles. This tom tom tom phone This
is a specialized profile. I can select that I want to beat on this job from a web design
and development profile. It will cost this money. I have this number of connects
on my frencer profile. Basically, it's like
repeating itself. I want to beat on this
profile, $75 per hour. But I know that
client is willing to pay he was paying
$30 per hour and I don't want any rate increase, but you can specify
that in a three months. I want to increase every
three months by 5% and $75, we will transform in
82 in a 12 months. I will select that I
don't want to do that, and by the way,
this is important, so my rate is 75, but freelancer fee like
a pork will take 10%. From this number
from any number, and I will actually receive 67. Basically, if I don't
remember correctly, but if your contract
exceeding $10,000, the fee will be 5%. Yeah. Next, about protections. When you are working
on an hourly contract, if you are using and
track your time tracker. If you are tracking
everything correctly. In that case, you are under
upwork hourly protection, basically work guarantee that you will receive your money. In case you will have some
dispute with the client, I can't suggest you to
go to any disputes with the clients because they will
just ruin your reputation. It's one of the downsides
of work that you are like You don't want
to have bad clients, you don't want to
have bad reputation, don't want to have
negative reviews. Yeah. But in general, if you're working
like an hourly rate, pork protects you and guarantees that you
will get this money, even if client will not pay to work because
pork is a mediator, a middleman client will pay top pay to minus
the fee, of course. Even if client will
not pay to work, we pay to you, makes sense. I will write my proposal here. Upwork suggests it's
mindful AI Basically, if you will write enough
information here, pork will recommend you to somehow make a proposal better. In my case, I will
type something like i. Shorty i is my second. Nature. I'm working
with it for the gate. I'm not working
with for the gate, maybe like for six or seven
years, for six years, and I was using pages multiple times, also. So basically, I highlight that I'm very experienced and sapifi that I
was using Jam page. You can write anything a
lot more here, up to you. Again, I was talking about
it in another video, but people submit
proposals were different. Someone submitted
like business style, someone submitted very
casual up to you. You will just convert
different type of clients. This is like
additional question. Have you used mage before? Yes. Yes, more than ten times
Yeah, if you want, you can aplod an attachment I know with your CV
or I don't know. I personally will never
applod anything here. If you have a portfolio, you can add something relevant related to this
job from your portfolios. I will just click here
and if you completed jobs. Maybe like this one. Let's say that this
one was Ci gM page, I will just click select
Highlight and highlight and it will be added
to the proposal. Automatically. You can
get certification, you can at previous sub work
job up to you and yeah. This part is very interesting. Also, you can boost
your proposal. Basically, you will
pay a set a number of con connect connects to
submit this proposal. It's 14, but you can pay more. And if you will pay
more and it will be the highest place, for example, I want to pay 20, not fatim M proposal will be at
the top for this client. If someone will not
outbid me of course. If I will be not
selected for the job, this additional conex
will return to me basic. It's not exactly
working like that, but no, if client will not
hire anyone in a month, then connects will
be returned to me. This is the correct from
ulation. And basically, yeah, I will just click sent. Send for this
number of connects. That's all you submit
your first proposal. Good job. I will not do that. I don't want to
waste my connects on something that I'm
not planning to do, but that's all basically. About this screen, when we just type our
general keywords, you will have a different
sort and options. Of course, this is no brad, nothing to explain here. Really. You can tailor so like this
world, not that world. I'm not using it.
Really never used it, but maybe for someone, it will be helpful. Not in my case. Next, you can have
these categories, and if you are not willing to buy a lot of connects to submit for a jobs. You can specify here I want only jobs in
NIT on something. I don't know, relevant
to your keyword of co. I want only expert level jobs. I want fixed price or hoy rate. I want a fixed price
job and for mo $5,000. Budget for a job, and I don't want it to be like to have
more of this number of proposals with
verified payment, client history if you hire someone or that
in this location, maybe like you want to work
only with US United states, for example, and in time
zone, project lens. Basically, we tailor
just a website, general key to a very
specific set of jobs. You can just beat on these
jobs. They are opened. I don't know, this one is like developer based in enter
under match system. I don't know that even
without reading it, I think it's like
it should be more. But you always can negotiate. Depends. This is a basics and
actually an advanced level. Super easy, don't aid to click everything play with it for a couple of
hours and fell. There's nothing challenging.
7. Different types of membership: So about membership. Upwork, you can create
a free account on pork and it will come
with these benefits. You'll have ten s and you
can read it basically. Ten con will be enough to
submit proposal to one job. It's definitely not enough. But you will have
an actual account. Someone can hire you, send you tation and
actually hire you. So It's something like I can't recommend you to have a basic plans just ten
connects just not enough. I was talking one
of the video videos that when you are bidding
on different jobs, you actually climb within a upwork hierarchy and your profile will
be higher in such and upwork will
recommend a profile to your clients and
they will actually invite you to different
jobs for free. So a pcs of have
this monthly plan. It cost this money right now, and it comes with 100
X and it will show you a different like no
different more information. About jobs. We will talk about jobs, how to find jobs in videos. Strong suggest you to 1999, for a profile, you can read
benefits, but main benefits. For this money, you
will have 100 connects. In general, if you will
buy connects by yourself, 150 connects will cost you $10. Minus. You paying
twice the price, you get 100 less con, but 50 50 less connects. But you will receive more
information about jobs. You can update it
on your savings. Yeah, that's all basically
about memberships.
8. Setting up your Upwork profile: So, Mike, congratulations. I'm sure Work approve your profile and you
inside the system. Basically, this is
how your profile will look and how you
should set up it. First, this is your name
and like your so name, and this patch means that Fans ID has been
verified by pork and blah, blah, blah, you can
read it right now. Nothing complicated. Pork will ask you for additional
verification maybe. After you will successfully
complete your first job, maybe, they will
ask you some que. Maybe they will ask you to
app some of documents maybe. Usually, they're not
asking anything and just You will have this bag automatically or maybe they will have
some kind of concern, and I know some
kind of concerns. They will initiate a video
conference with you interview. I will be like super
simple like i, i. All they want to do
is like to actually understand that you
are real pay person that applaud government ID, and they will check your
video. Hi, how are you doing? This is me. I I was doing this job and it's
really 30 seconds. All they care is like
your real person that you don't submit a fake
ID. That's all. Next, your profile photo. It's very challenging. Really. I can't recommend you to use any a specific style
of a profile photo. People are judging and theoretically it should be something on a wide background, where you look professional
and all things like that. But relevant only
for someone who are doing accounting maybe or legal service on work,
things like that. If you're in a creative space, it can be something
more creative if you. I don't have really any
recommendations real that I can safely say that
they really make a difference. I am changing my profile
picture every couple of months. Right now, as you
can see, I retinal add this profile photo like
a couple of hours ago. We will see how it will work. I'm trying to track if my conversion rates are higher or lower with different
profile pictures, but it 100% attract
different type of clients, but I don't have a statistics so I don't want to
suggest to something. Just you can change it
as much as you want. It just shouldn't be alter age, so you can't applod
generated Avatar here. It should be like
your real picture, but you can change it literally every day if you want.
To make sense for you. Next, we will see you will
not have as a new account, but you should have in the
future, these two things. This one upper pages. I was talking about
in one of the videos. You can read it there. But basically it's
an achievement that you're an awesome guy. You're in the top
10% and top 1% of the upper freelancers
and Good job. This one is super important. I was talking about it
again in another video, but it's basically
job success score. The higher it is, the easier it will be for you
to get new clients. You don't want to fail your
jobs, it's super important. Consider having it
as high as possible. 100 is like ideal. Yeah. Next, this is your
profile title. Super important. I was talking about it
again in another video, but just research what other
people in your niche are using as a title and to use like compile it and use
something unique for you, or maybe just copy it from
someone that you really like. A work will understand keywords in your title and also in
your profile overview. Consider somehow add
important keywords to your title into
your overview. Basically, this one is overview. Y. Again, that's like write
something that makes sense. Again, I suggest you
to just research other freelancers
and that's all. This is your hourly rate. I was talking again
about hourly rate, or fixed price in video, how you understand how
much you should charge, but this is an hourly rate. So makes sense, I hope. Next important things. I was talking again in another video about
internal profiles, and you can have three different internal
profiles on pwork. This one profile,
as you can see, when I'm clicking it,
everything is changing. This one is about such generzation profile
on work for me, and this one about work press, Shopify, element or development. I add KRS here. It's still made sense
and readable and Yeah. I can do a way react like I can do a way
way more complex things, but majority of jobs that somehow I landed
usually with Wordpress, Shopify, and specifically
with lament, visual builder on a W press. I ad it here.
Again, you can have a specialize title specialized
profile description. Overview here and you can
have a different price. For this kind of jobs, I have $75 per hour, and for such an
organization, $100 per hour. This is a total earning. On this account, number of jobs completed and number
of hours built. Next, what is important? You want to have your
profiles 100% completed. Actual work will notify
you if it's not 100% completed and it will decrease your chance
of getting new job, significantly if it will
be not 100% completed. Do that. Also, you
can have ability to have like a currently, consultation book
a consultation, and someone like we open. It will have ability to
actually select a schedule, a book like with you on your
terms and online meeting, video meeting with you. In my situation. It's $700. For 60 minutes, why? Because usually people
come in to me when they booking this consultation with
the very complex problems, and I can explain a lot when we actually communicated and talking
when you just t pipe. I hope it makes sense. Next, you will have different things here. You open to hire 27. You can set up it here. On main page of up work. You can set up an
availability bate I'm available for
work right now. If I want, I will go to
sleep soon and I don't want to turn on online consultation. But if I want, I will click
here and just turn it on and I will specify
that I will be online for the next 8 hours, for example, I'm open to offer to work on
hourly as needed, I can work like 20 f seven. For a correct amount of
money. You understand. My profile is publicly divisible and I am open for
contract to hire roles. What does it mean open
for contract to hires? It's like a permanent hi. Basically, a person will
find you on work and but hire you permanently as
an employee full time. I'm open for this things because usually,
I'm a workaholic. I'm working for 16 hours
and more per day rely, and I can handle two, three full time jobs really. Yeah. Here, you will
have proposals. Maybe someone invite you to a chop and it will appear
here, project catalog. Basically, if you are
about fiver, five, you can create the
same things like a fiber chops on a
porkes project catalogs. I'm not using that because it's like I'm just not using
it. I don't like it. Usually it's very low
offers. I'm not using. But basically, upwork have the same functionality
that Fiber. I suggest work over
fiber, always. Anyway, Next, here you will
have a list of languages. List of languages that you
can actually communicate. I speak fluent Russian, I am Native Ukrainian, and I speak fluent English. And actually, you can see every fed batch here.
What does that mean? When A person, your client, especially at the beginning, close a job, a por will
ask additional questions. Basically, it will ask if this guy is okay if
he communicate well and when your clients will ask for a couple of times
that everything is great, he's like fluent in everything,
you will have this badge. For some clients,
it's important. For some, it's not so you I don't have
verification. Military ID. If you have military
D, you can edit. If you don't have not edit. Then this is my education. Yeah. I'm working in a
brain work agency on work. That's like an
additional information about an agency, really. That's all about sidebar next. We'll be or history, and, basically you can check. I was telling you that
you need to research as a freelancer and based
on a freelancers, you like, you can
understand everything. Your titles, description, how much you should charge
like everything. If your niche is very
broad or very small, you can understand everything. Basically, I was talking about this part that you can easily
access and about this part. Complete the jobs, you
can actually click here, for example, on the job, and view entire job post. You can actually
read a job post. This one is not
very good example, but you understand you can actually read a job post and you can understand what job was done and how much I charged for the job or for uns are
charged for the job. You will have also rate here, how much it co, was it fixed price or was
it an hourly rate? 6 hours, I was working here, less than six, but Yeah. Every piece of
information that you will need you will have here. Next, if client,
for some reason, not give you a feedback,
it's okay also. It's like you want to
have a no feedback or positive feedback that
negative feedback. It's okay. As you can see, I'm talking just basically people are lazy and to give a feedback is like
an additional job. Someone sometimes people
are not leaving feedbacks. It's totally okay. I like a mix of feedbacks and
all feedbacks here. So not a big deal, really. Not a big deal, I also
don't stress about feedbacks if you
don't have them. If you if your relationship
with the client great, then maybe it's against up for guidelines to ask
for positive feedback. You can basically just be nice if you leave me a feedback, and I hope everything
goes well in. Situation. The
formulated somehow don't ask bluntly that leave me a five star feedbacks
or I don't know. Don't do that. Next. This is a portfolio that you
can a plot to work because this profile about
such engineeriization, come on, about such troization. I have a lot of things here
about such gerization, that like 66% increase in clicks in one month
on Chi, commerce store. I attached like some
kind of screenshot, a small explanation and when
you are like you are adding, actually the profiles, this portfolio items
to your profile. I suggest you to think about titles here about description again
because of the keywords, and also you can specify
different skills. Here that you was using.
I select HRS here, scream and F Fc
spidedr, and Shopify. Yeah I have like a
bunch of items here. Next, field that you feel field that you can feel
is like you can specify your skills for the
specific profile and Think about them. Basically when someone
will Google for SO audit, I will appear. Someone will Google for
local, I will appeal. Basically, think about your
skills and you can add 15 or 16 skills here. No brain. Next certifications. I had a couple of certifications here just to have something, so it will not be bland. Add something easy to get
and don't leave it blank. You want your profile to
be completed for 100%. Next, employment history. I was like working like I'm confound you can add anything. Meaning who of course here. As experience like
I'm software engineer and I write a very
short description. Basically, that's all.
I don't have Also, you can add here,
I don't have it, but you can add video
presentations of you. I need to film it, I'm
forgetting all the time. Basically, you will have
Screen here with your video, I suggest you to film
something like Hi guys, thank you for visiting
my account, my profile. I specialize in blah blah blah, basically, I was t again. I was talking about
it with my clients and they are checking
usually this video and they are selecting all
the care really that you are an person and that you actually speak English if
they care about video calls. You should be like
at least some hw. If you are not like, I can work, I can work for money, I work very quod. It will be enough. People are different.
I have I know a person that when He
submitting proposals. He write it in very
business language you know, thank you for your in a
business way, business. I know another
person that writing the writing proposals in very informal like I can do
that, it's not a big deal. It's very easy for me, blah, blah blah will be done
and you understand. You can get very different
clients on our work and Yeah. So just don't force yourself and use something that meaningful in
your situation. Also, just in case if
you are not from a US, Pork will ask you to
sign a W an form. Basically, it like
be an tification, where you Pork will ask you
if you are US citizen or not, and you will just click. That you are not your citizens and submit and basically
you're submitting this form. It's important why
I'm mentioning it because people afraid for some
reason to sign this form. But, you know, US
citizens global. If for example, Ukraine, if I receive money from
Ukraine, they are not taxable. If you are from US and
you receive money, not from US, they are taxable. Well, that's all about
the profile really. No.
9. Communication is key: So you receive
your first client, you was hired and what actually should done
next. Few things first. You should install
official up workout, and if you're working
on an hourly rate, you will log in sign
this up and you will see your hourly rated contract. You need to click
on the contract and when you are working, On a job, you turn a Switch ho. It means that work will start tracking your
hourly, your work, hourly, your time, and
you will actually be paid and protected
by por prot program. We will talk about it in later
videos about protection. If you have a fixed
price contract, depends on the sating can
show inside this up or now, but it's like for fixed price,
it's not very important. For our re rated contracts, super important to track. You need also to relatively often update stats like
I'm working like D, I'm working on and so on. Yeah. Hope it makes sense.
The most important part actually is communication
with the client. You always need and want to be on the same page with
the client very often, very often, your client don't know exactly
what should be done. If they hire a developer
to build the website, they not sure that this parts will take
I don't know 5 hours, another part will take
50 hours and so on. They can expect that it will
take way more or way less. If you never actually talk about details when
you're communicating, before you was hired
with the client. It's a very good idea. In general, you should always talk with your client
and explain every state. Right now, I will do this. It will take approximately
I don't know 5 hours. That amount of time. Next step, I will do that, it
will take another. Amount of time and so on, and then you understand that you and a client
on the same page, and there is no surprises because there is
no surprises real. You want to be as
safe as possible. You rate in for, your success on a fork based on clients review
when the job is completed, clients have ability
to rank you, give you one star, two
star, three, four, five in different categories
like communication, delivery, responsible
and things like that. You want to have five
stars everywhere. If you will have five
stars everywhere, you will have ideal
job success score and with very high
probability, will be higher. Again, by this client
or like someone else. You don't want your job
success score to drop below 90% because it will be
just tell from experience, it would be very challenging
to get new clients. This job success score will
reset in a six months, but we don't want unnecessary
challenges really. All you need to do is to be very clear and very direct
with your clients, keep them updated on your steps on your work
and communication is key. You will solve
99.9% problems with communications with proper
communications. Do that.
10. How to price yourself correctly?: How to price yourself. If you are new to a pork, you maybe struggle to
answer this question, and let's just remove gassing
from the equation at all. I suggest you at
the beginning to create also a client profile, not only freelancer profile. Basically, what I
suggest you to do. You will switch to
a client profile, and you will start analyzing
other freelancers in yours. How much they're charging? What kind of job they
are doing and you do. Read a job title, job
description and how much are the clients
paid for these jobs, that's all basically
it's very simple. You will spend an hour or two
or I don't know how much. I don't know how long
it will take you, but you'll have a very
clear understanding what kind of jobs are the frencer are doing and rate
that they're charging it. Our or fixed price
doesn't matter. Because you're very new, It will be smart to charge a little lower the rate
that all other peoples are charging and don't cut your rate to 50% or
something like that. Charge it a little lower. It will increase your
chance to be higher and as soon as you have 510 completed jobs
on your account, you can actually return to your normal rates
and, that's all. It will really help
you to be hired more if you already have some
kind of completed jobs. Never, never, and
never low ball, never charge like 5 hours/hour for web development or
something like that. Very very low prices are
very suspicious for clients, and they are usually not hiring someone like charging
super extremely low. Of course, if you are from not as developed
country as you say, money that you can
earn will go very long way for you that for
someone in the USA, for example, you have fertile
assistant and in USA. If you charge 5
hours/hour on a work, it will be strange because it's a very low amount if you
are for Philippines, and you will charge $5 per hour. You can afford way more for this $5 in Philippines in US and
then it makes more sense. But still, I can't
recommend to charge super low because it will
not increase your chances. It will lower your
chances to get a client. Also, when you're
creating your profile, you will have ability to set up if you are like a UB or an expert
or something like. I suggest you always to set your profile as
you like an expert. Of course, clients. Client client creating a job. It's possible to select if
you want to hire someone. A new come or neb super
experienced one and a work will recommend a price per hour or fixed
price for the job. It's always for client. It's always good to hire someone who claim himself
or herself as an expert, even if client specify in his job description that
he want to hire someone. Always select expert.
11. Video proposals: Usually when you are submitting
proposal to a client, you are just typing
it basically, the original way to do that, and it's working great. But I want you to consider another way to submit
your proposals. You can film videos. It will take more time. Maybe they maybe it
will take less time, the typing debates on like
on different factors. If it depends on
different facts. I want to dig deep side. I can safely say that if you
are filming your proposals, you are typing some kind of
information and in the end, I suggest you to
type something like I film this for you when I like explaining something about your tasks that you
want to be completed. Deeply and blah, blah, blah. And usually from my experience, this video proposals
are converting way better that just text proposals. I can't tell a specific number, it's just my feeling. But I would say it maybe like two times
more and it's huge. If you are comfortable
with the camera, if your English
level is on k level, I strongly suggest
you to do this.
12. How to pitch correctly: How to pitch. It's great that you right now
have a profile map, but it's time to actually pitch clients and offer your
service for their jobs. How to do that correctly. If you knew, you always not
sure what to do exactly. Maybe you think that
you understand how everything should work and what exactly you should
say, but who knows? Maybe you I can suggest the best way to
find your pitch for you. On a pork, you can create a freelancer account
and a client account, an NHS account, but it's
like Not Potters right now. I suggest you to create a
client account and I suggest you to create a job in your
niche with your skills, like pretend that you are
trying to hire someone. And write your title
description and everything. As the funcers, will
bid on this job. You actually can see what
exactly they are saying. You can see their pitch pitches, and you can you should
be data driven. You will analyze what from your point of
view should work, you will see the best pictures
you can combine a couple together and easy you
will have your own. Also, you will see who
exactly begin for your job and how much that trying to charge you what kind
of profiles they have. You should also
understand ptology, you should see, you will see the profiles that from
different freelancers. You should think
about why I stop and check this person
or not that person. What exactly catching attention, and you should implement it for your profile also. Very easy.
13. Degree, certificates etc. Are they important?: You are not an employee. You are a freelancer, and a lot of people
are coming to up work with the
mindset of an employee. Basically, I'm 18-years-old. Am I young enough? I'm 60-years-old, am I old
enough to do like something? Should I have a degree?
I don't have a degree and I will be unable
to take this project. Qualifications,
things like that, that matter when a company hire a employee really for
companies matter, of course. You are on for, your clients all
they care, usually. Of course, someone will care
about degree and everything, but usually they care
only about results, and if you can deliver results, that's all basically matter. It doesn't matter if you are
a school draping himself, or you are 70 80 old
professional in your field, that someone like a
company that consider himself not able to work in
a company as an employee. And all that matter
is just a result. S. If you can deliver
result, zero questions. So there is another challenge. In order to hire you, your client trust
you and you need to somehow convince the client that you can
actually do the job. You can do that
with your previous work profile or maybe just a good and negotiation. Who knows? Basically, you need
the main barrier basically is like trust. You need to convince your clients that you
can do the job and client can trust you and you can do this job in
the client's budget. And yeah, that's all. All these challenges
will disappear really when you will start
having a very good profile. You will naturally
grow your portfolio. Clients will saw that you have a number of successful
capleit jobs, that you have 100%
success score, or you are raising tail and
top top rated plus or expert. We will talk about this like
things right now later. But basically, all these challenges
will resolve by itself, the longer you spend
your time on work, the more work you have,
the more work you had. But you are not an employee,
you're a freelancer. You need all your clients
care is to get the job done. A is not important, your degree is not important. You certificates is not important, they
are not important. That's all. Everything is in your hands really
and it's great.
14. Job Success Score (JSS): Let's talk about the
most important factor on work that will
bring you clients. It's job success score when
you are you to the platform, you will have you will
not have it, actually, as soon as you will
start closing contracts, a job success score
will appear on your profile and you want
to be as high as possible. It's it's crucial for
your success and work. If you will have low
job success score, it will just in your profile. In general, in general, upwork revaluate
job success score on 612 and 24
months time frames. But again, we don't want
any unnecessary problems. That's why I can't
stress enough how communication with
clients is important. Maybe you can't finish
your job for some reason, I don't know if you have
a good communication, if you have a good relationship, you can just explain
it to your client and He will or she will
not leave your bat review. You understand. Job
success score should be, you don't want it to
be lower than 90%. Everything that lowers the 90%, have a very negative
impact on everything. First of all, it's very
challenging to get a new clients. Next, you will lose your badges. I will talk about
badges in next years, but job success score
is just more important. If you will have
it lower than 90%, you will lose your badges. 22. Basically lose your pages. How you can read more about it because
it's quite complex. In general, you want to have a five star everywhere
on your reviews. But it depends, for example, if you earn on a
contract most $100, it will bring you more success score if
it's like for example, if you earn from $1 to 250, the closed contract
that is positive or negative will have an
impact of one point. If you will earn on a
contract $251-1 thousand, this job will have 1.25
points, it's points, and if contract, and if
contract is more than $1,000, it will qualify at 1.5 points. Basically, It depends on the amount of money
you will receive, and impact will be different,
positive or negative. It depends on the contract lens if contract was really long. I have bigger impact and
client satisfaction. You can read about it
more when you will click on your profile and when you will
start having action. Jobs Score, you can click on it, you'll redirect it to a page. This page have a video and
very detailed explanation, and you'd click
everywhere and read about different factors
that actually impact. On the job success score. Yeah. Just try not to fail. If you failing, try to
communicate with your client, explain what exactly
is going on. Maybe refund a mine, maybe it's better to
lose to work for free. Not for free, if you like
if something goes wrong, it's better to refund this
mine to clients that have a negative review
on your profile. Negative reviews very
impactful. Try not to do that.
15. Badges on Upwork: Let's talk about pages that
are assigned to you and what exactly they mean and if they are import
in general or not. We have a few different pages, rising talent, top rated
top rated plus x part. What exactly all
these pages mean? Basically, if you complete
your first job successfully, if you have 100%
completed profile, if you upwork ify your profile, after the first
successfully completed job. You will get your
raising talent page. It will not give you
actually anything. I just like a mark for clients that you are a person that
they can actually work with. That's why it's very
challenging for new profiles to receive any jobs
because clients try to hire someone
with experience already and the pages are showing
this experience basically. Next page is top rated. Basically, it means
that you are in a top 10% of a for users. And to be liable
for a traded badge, you need to have, again, 100% completed profile be
at least 90 days on floor. And out like you need to close a job and after the closing job, you need to be at least
90 days on upwork. Basically, if you
are not failing, if you working, you are not
failing after four months. 3.5 months, you will
have a operating page. Also, you should have job
success score over 90%. If it will drop lower, a work you'll just
remove the page. That's also additional things that you should have to
maintain your top rated. You need to earn at least
$1,000 in the last 12 months. For completely off
line accounts, automatically pages
will be gone. Yeah, that's all
top rated plus page is like another level of top rated this page
means that talent, a profile and freancer, have experience in working
on a larger projects. Usually with a higher
budget and long term. Basically, to be liable
for a top t plus, you need to have an
earning up to $10,000. In the last 12 months, funds should be earned
on a large contract in the past 12 months and
no negative feedbacks. On a large contract
should be on account. What exactly it means
funds should be on a large contract in
the past 12 months for different niches. It's different, for example,
for administrative support, it will be a contract is up
to $10,000 on a contract. It will consider for
a customer support, it will be 20,000. For a copywriters, it
will be 5,000 and more. So Theoretically, having
operated plus should increase your chances
to get new jobs. Practically, it
makes not a lot of difference from a operated, but I'm talking with my clients from time
to time about it and sometimes they consider it
matter for them, sometimes. Another badge that you can
have is expert v. Basically, you can get this expert vet
badge in a very specific a. You should be in the
very specific niches like a mobile or
software development, you should or design
and creative and sales and marketing and specific niches inside these niches
also You need to be, for example, react developer
in a mobile development, for example, and fork will
contact you directly, and you need to pass a
hard skill assessment from a talent manager on
for pass other tests, and then you will be awarded
with expressed badge. Let's say it this way, because
there is a lot of people, freelancers on fork
and p we don't have a lot of people again that can wet all the freelancers and because it's very like
a very specific niche, very specific skills and
a very specific niches. Getting expert ted is
very not challenging, but for example, content
writers can't get it. That's just impossible. For 99.9% of rencer work, operated plus will be the
highest bade that they can get. Hope it makes sense?
Again, does it make any difference sometimes? Usually no, but it
definitely increase possibility to get new contracts and that's all we
care about really. We just want new
clients, new contracts, so you should to
achieve it really.
16. Your level of English: I have a lot of questions
about English level, and some people if they are
not an English speakers, they are not very comfortable, not confident enough in the ability to actually
communicate on up work. I would say that if you have at least basic level of English, you will be 100% fine, especially with all
the new tools of the translators,
you will be fine. If you if your
English is near zero, it will be Of course,
way more challenging. But you can use translators, especially with the
CarGPT right now when you can actually talk
in your own native len, because it will translate everything like
great, really great. So you should use up work, even if your English
level is not very high. I encourage you to do that. You will be 100% ok. Yeah. If your English levels is basic, you will be 100% fight. Also, I encourage you to use some AI maybe to
prove reto messages to upwork health integrated grammarly that feel just like check if Spelling is
correct and et cetera, but how I'm using GPT, for example, I need to write
a report for a client. This client don't want
don't have ability or don't want or I know to
communicate via a Zoom code, for example, Video
conference code. Basically, what I'm doing. I'm opening GPT and I'm clicking just like a button
where I can speak to it, and I'm just start speaking that GPT I'm writing a
report to my client. I will just explain
everything how I can. I want you to organize it, make it like this task was done, organize it
professionally. I'm speaking for a
five 10 minutes, then just click
submitting it and GPT, organize my speech into, very good, very
detailed document. It compile everything logically. If I'm talking about something at the beginning
and forget to mention something and I can
add it in the end of when I'm just talking,
it's super useful. I out AI, it was for
people with near zero. Language skills, it
was challenging. Right now, it just a
breeze off course, you will not have ability to
communicate in Video calls, but you can safely say that
like I can do this job. I'm not an active I'm not
a native English speaker. I don't feel confident. Talking with you
or a video calls, if you that, let's just communicate via
text messages only. But again, from my experience, clients communicate
via text only. I am as a freelancer
initiate a video calls, I suggest let's talk
over the video. I will film you a video
and explain to you how to do certain thing
because I'm talking way faster that I'm
typing brew and I can express and
explain everything way more deeply when I'm
actually talking to the camera that
I'm typing because typing is not for a person. You'll be 100% because
majority of clients prefer text communications and not initiating any DO calls. You'll be fine. No worries.
17. How you can receive your money?: So you complete your first job and money is on your
upwork account. What now, how exactly you can
receive it into your hands? Very easy. It depends
on your country. In general, you can
connect your bank account to an upwork and you can initiate withdrawal
to your account. It will take a couple of days. Apork will tell you how
long it will take but Yeah. So easy and very
straightforward. If for some reason, you don't want this money
to go to your account, or if work you'll take
big fee or I don't know. For some reasons, you don't want money from Pork to
relent on your account. You can create a pioneer car. Basically, the payment
system is like revolute, is, Pioneer, all this brand
names means nothing to you. It basically. In general, I will talk about
Pioneer. You register. With Pioneer, verify your
account that your real person, and Pioneer will send
you a physical card, actually physical card to
your verifiable address. You can receive this card. When you register it when
you register Pioneer, you can connect pioneer
account to your up, and you can withdraw your money, not to your bank account, you can withdraw money
to Pioneer account. Basically, anywhere
in the world, you can just take
your pioneer card and insert it inside ATM
and withdraw your money, and you will he cash. Or you can pay with pioneer
card like like a normal card. Before it was impossible to
connect this card to EPOPay. Right now with the newer cards, it's possible to connect
pioneer card to ApplePay. Basically, it's just a card, but not from your country, not from your bank account, from a paying platform from financial platform
with a brand name P. That's all super easy. Very straightforward.
Usually Again, depends on the country, but it takes seven to
ten to 14 maybe days for your physical card to come to your verified address
mail address. If you're okay
receiving money to your bank accounts
and zero problems. Also, if your country
liable for a paypal and you can connect your
paypal. Hope it makes sense.
18. Ranking on Upwork: Connects blood of p. Basically, when you are submitting
your proposal to a job, it will cost you some
a number of connects. It can be five, six, ten, 15, or maybe even more and
connects cost money. If it depends on when you
are watching this video, but for a moment when I'm like, film this video, 150
connects cost around $10. Connect is a bland of upwork work will give you
depends on your membership, some number of
connects, and for free. No actually for free, you need to pay for a
membership fee and you get, and you will get a specific
number of connects per month. But there is another
way to receiving jobs. You are not actually applying
for a job, a client, we find your profile and will invite you to a job and
it will be free for you. This is the best way to to
get the jobs, of course. You want your profile to be as high in the upwork
search as possible. How you can achieve that. First of all, you need to Niche. We can create three
internal profiles on work and they should
be very specific, I suggest one profile will
be very general if you have web developer and doing
only WordPress websites. For example, I suggest one profile will be I'm
like Work Press developer. Another profile will be I I will use element like
elementary developer basically for a Work press. The third profile will
be, I don't know. Gutenberg developer
for a Wordpress. If someone will search for
a WordPress developer, one of the profile one way or another will
appeal because like elementary the most popular visual page builder
for a Wordpress, and Gutenberg is a default
builder for Wordpress basic. Yeah. You want to be as
specific as possible. Basically niche down, and also, you want to be active, you need to bid on the jobs. Basically, From my
experience, how it's working, if I'm not bidding on the jobs, clients are not inviting
me and they are not inviting me because I'm
not high in the search. Basically, my dit, I'm
spending contacts. I'm bidding on the jobs, and I'm climbing
high in the search and clients start to invite me. When you are actually bidding and spending
your contracts, you're not bidding only
on the specific job, you're climbing higher. Your profile will be higher in the search for this
leg specific skill. I hope it makes sense. A work, of course, want you to spend as much as
possible on the contracts. But it's also supplying with your very good jobs at
the same time. Do that.
Misha Manko, Digital marketing strategist
