Introducing Upwork Plus for Clients

[Jessica S]

3 invites is not enough to give a new client a decent enough experience to want to pay for this service - especially if their hiring needs are sporadic. Why pay monthly? They will be swamped with unqualifed applicants to sift through because their mere 3 invites only resulted in one response and that freelancer's fees are too high. And so.. retaining new repeat business will be a challenge at best.  They should get at LEAST 5 invites.

$50/month...  that's a ridiculous price for what you guys are offering for that money.

And your best freelancers who rely solely on invites, and get so much less now, will focus their efforts elsewhere, leaving the less qualifed ones to apply for jobs.

This is not how to save the platform. I fear this is the beginning of the end. Most clients won't want to pay for this and you reduced the basic plan to something that will produce a less than desirable experience and won't bring on new clients. Sounds like a lose-lose to me. 

[Wendy C]

We've all said the same thing in various ways.  It truly is sad that the mods do not have substantial input into management decisions as I sincerely believe the mods have a better sense of reality from both buyer and FL perspectives than do number crunchers,  designers, and ill-informed execs with corner windows.

The mods are the ones with hands-on user experiences and, as such, should be consulted at least nominally.

[Kim F]

I used to make money here because of Upwork.

I now (since US only and other shenanigans) make some money in spite of Upwork.

Hardly anyone I work with is a business, growing or otherwise. You now seem to be bored with making it difficult from my end and have moved to making it difficult from the client end.  A limit of 3 invites is just going to see the same projects posted again and again and...

[Jessica S]

What kills me about this, is that they are giving alll these perks that used to be FREE (outside of one featured job per month and a worthless badge) charging $50/month for it and are spinning it as a "feature" - a benefit of some sort - hoping new clients won't notice. They would have to grandfather in existing clients since it's such a damanging change. I guess Upwork doesn't want new clients... squeezing as much money as they can from both ends instead of just trying to improve the platform and deliver strong client experiences. It won't work... 

[Pat M]

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Wendy C wrote:

We've all said the same thing in various ways.  It truly is sad that the mods do not have substantial input into management decisions as I sincerely believe the mods have a better sense of reality from both buyer and FL perspectives than do number crunchers,  designers, and ill-informed execs with corner windows.

The mods are the ones with hands-on user experiences and, as such, should be consulted at least nominally.

_________________________________________________________________________

I totally agree Wendy!  As we all know, it appears that some Mods drink more of the kool aid than others.  Hopefully those that don't drink so much of it would be consulted.  

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[Haider R]

Absolutely nailed it. 

[Isabelle Anne A]

LOL Upwork, congratulations -- you've outdone yourself. Just when I thought things couldn't get any worse 

[Maria T]

I ..., this ..., without words!

[Scott B]

I just noticed that you have to be a plus client in order to filter freelancers by Top Rated (or Rising Talent). So, freelancers won't see any impact, eh? Now clients have to go through more hoops to find my profile.  Awful. 

[Wassim T]

Scott, I gave up on Upwork's invitations a long time ago. I don't personally care much about invitations as much as I care about how my proposal is being delivered to the client. The algorithm that deals with the display order of proposals is pretty much messed up. In many instances, I had to walk clients through hiring me (after we initially chat because they have less experience in hiring on the platform for the first time) and when they share screen I mostly see my name close to the edge. I also know this is perfectly true when I use the platform as a client. Most of those that Upwork recommend are generally not the ones that I pick for the gig.

I don't know if someone from Upwork will see my comment, but Upwork, please, if you see this, you must know that most of your algorithms suck.