New talent badges are now available!

ilianamontauk · ‎07-06-2020

Earlier this year, we shared some of our upcoming plans to highlight top talent on Upwork. We understood that you are looking for more ways to stand out and want better access to high-value opportunities with quality clients. As we continue to attract more businesses seeking flexible talent solutions, we have also heard their need to more quickly find talent they can trust for complex, strategic, and long-term work. To further our continued efforts towards this vision, we're excited to announce two new talent badges: Top Rated Plus and Expert-Vetted.

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TOP RATED PLUS

What is Top Rated Plus?

Top Rated Plus is a new status for talent that has a proven track record of excelling on large or long-term contracts on Upwork. On average their contracts last 7 months. These professionals and agencies are highlighted because they have delighted clients on large contracts. Businesses frequently seek talent for large projects or longer-term relationships, and trust talent with this proven experience on Upwork. Right now Top Rated Plus talent has earned more than $100K on average through Upwork, four times as much as Top Rated talent.

What are the benefits?

Priority access to work with Upwork Enterprise and Business clients: they will be able to find you more easily in search, and our Talent Services teams will prioritize inviting you to their invite-only jobs.
A Top Rated Plus badge displayed on your profile visible to clients on Upwork’s Enterprise, Business, and Plus plans (to all other clients you will continue to appear as Top Rated)

What are the requirements to become a Top Rated Plus freelancer?

Earned $10,000+ in total earnings (all contracts included) the past 12 months
Worked on one of more large projects in the past 12 months without negative feedback. What is considered a large project can vary depending on the skill category:

$5,000: Design & Creative, Engineering & Architecture, Legal, Translation, Writing
$10,000: Accounting & Consulting, Admin, Data Science & Analytics, IT & Networking, Sales & Marketing
$15,000: Web, Mobile & Software Dev
$20,000: Customer Support

Are not an exclusive agency contractor
Maintained Top Rated status

What are the requirements to be Top Rated Plus as an agency?

Earned $20,000+ in total earnings (all contracts included)
Worked on one or more large projects in the past 12 months and no more than 10 percent of the contracts had negative outcomes. What is considered a large project can vary depending on the skill category:

$10,000: Design & Creative, Engineering & Architecture, Legal, Translation, Writing
$20,000: Accounting & Consulting, Admin, Customer Service, Data Science & Analytics, IT & Networking, Sales & Marketing
$30,000: Web, Mobile & Software Dev

Maintained Top Rated status

Timing

The Top Rated Plus badge was released today to some clients. If you qualify for this badge, clients on Upwork’s Enterprise and Business plans will now see it on your profile, as will some clients on Upwork’s Plus plan. You will start seeing the badge on your own profile and MyStats later this summer - we’ll notify you by email once you can see it there.

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EXPERT-VETTED

What is Expert-Vetted Talent?

Expert-Vetted Talent is a new status for talent that has deep experience in their field, on or off Upwork. Upwork invites this talent to participate in a rigorous pre-screening process. We chose to highlight these professionals because businesses frequently seek talent with a strong combination of expertise and soft skills, and they trust talent that has been pre-screened by professionals in the relevant field. This talent will get prioritized for clients on Upwork’s Enterprise and Business plans, whose average project value is over $8,000.

What are the benefits?

An Expert-Vetted badge on your profile to help you more easily stand out and find quality work with top clients on Upwork’s Enterprise and Business plans. All other clients will see your Rising Talent, Top Rated, or Top Rated Plus badge if you have one.
Priority access to work with clients on Upwork’s Enterprise and Business plans
A personal relationship with an Upwork Talent Manager who helps match you to opportunities aligned with your goals

Our team is hard at work to further enhance the Expert-Vetted experience, so expect more exciting updates on the horizon including opportunities to engage with this exclusive community of professionals like you and other ways to more easily access high-value work.

What are the requirements to become an Expert-Vetted freelancer or agency?

This opportunity is available by invitation only. Keep your eyes peeled for an invitation in your email inbox or when you log into Upwork. Once we are able to offer this opportunity to more people, we will provide an update here.

If you are invited to participate, you will need to pass a rigorous pre-screening process which may include a portfolio review, coding tests, interviews, or other steps relevant to your area of expertise. Agencies participate in a similar process to assess the agency’s expertise.

Our initial focus is Design & Creative; Web, Mobile, and Software Development; and Sales & Marketing.

How is this different from previous programs, like Upwork Premium?

Expert-Vetted replaces previous programs for expert-level talent. We’ve done extensive research with businesses seeking expert-level talent on Upwork for large projects and created new criteria in line with current client expectations. If you’ve previously taken an assessment for Upwork Premium or Upwork Pro, thank you! We have your results on file and will take them into consideration as we grow the program and extend additional invitations. Your results also continue to be available to our Talent Services teams which take them into consideration when sending invitations to jobs.

Timing

The Expert-Vetted badge was released today to some clients. If you qualify for this badge, clients on Upwork’s Enterprise and Business plans will now see it. You will start seeing the badge on your own profile and MyStats later this summer - we’ll notify you by email once you can see it there

RISING TALENT & TOP RATED

Freelancers who are currently Rising Talent or Top Rated will continue to keep those badges and benefits. Expert-Vetted and Top Rated Plus are not replacing Rising Talent or Top Rated.

When you earn Expert-Vetted or Top Rated Plus status, your new badge is only visible to Upwork's Enterprise and Business clients—as well as select Plus clients for Top Rated Plus.* All other clients will see your Rising Talent or Top Rated badge if you have one.

See the chart below to learn which badge clients see when they look at your profile, depending on the client type.

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We care deeply about helping you succeed on Upwork. There is plenty more to come! We will continue to invest in our talent badges and other solutions. We'd love to hear your thoughts on how these new statuses impact your work and other ways we can help you achieve your goals.

Thanks!

Iliana Montauk

Product Manager

*Beta test update July 2021: We are always working to improve features on our platform, from time to time some users may see options while we test changes for this reason. Over the next few weeks we'll be testing a way for badges be visible to all clients when searching Project Catalog. If there are any changes that will permanently take effect we will update you here!

ilianamontauk · ‎07-08-2020

I believe that was a typo in his message, Mark.

k_nadel · ‎07-08-2020

For what it's worth, I think UpWork is doing a good thing here. It's been a while since being a Top Rated FL actually meant anything; nowadays, it seems pretty much everyone is TR, we go by the thousands so it's not really something special. True that maybe the requirements will have to be adapted for this to make sense in some fields of work, and also (in my humble opinion) it doesn't seem to make that much of a difference if it's only Enterprise and Business clients that can see the new badges: I for one don't think I've ever had a single Enterprise/Business client... But, all in all, I think it's more positive than it is negative!

Having said this, I read it's just 3% of freelancers that will get this badge, but judging by the amount of people confirming their status in this thread it seems it must be all of us TR+ in here... or surely it's a little more than that? Or maybe it's just that this whole community forum is formed of extremely successful people, awesome!

Finally, is it just me or does "Top Rated Plus" make it sound like we're paying some sort of membership plan? After all clients do pay for "Upwork Plus"... It just sounds a bit misleading to me, but that might just be me!

ilianamontauk · ‎07-08-2020

I love this suggestion, Scott, thank you! I am on the team actively working on perks. We have had similar ideas. I will pass your feedback on to the team.

ilianamontauk · ‎07-08-2020

Hi Aaron,

Thanks for the suggestion. I'm one of the product managers working on solutions to support great talent like you on Upwork.

We selected the thresholds for each category based on the project values we see in the marketplace today. We believe that $5000 is a reasonable threshold for the Writing category.

Future improvements we are considering include:

1) Expand the threshold to include relationship value, not just contract value (ex: if the same client hires you multiple times)

2) Create the thresholds based on subcategories instead of categories (ex: UX/UI design projects tend to be larger than logo design projects so the thresholds would be different, instead of $5,000 for the whole Design & Creative category).

What do you think of those ideas? Which do you think would apply best for someone like you?

Note that we do not currently have a time frame for these improvements. The earliest I would expect us to launch improvements of this type to Top Rated Plus would be in 2021. Our focus right now is making the new badges visible to talent (scheduled for later this summer), increasing the perks & benefits associated with the badges, and getting more people access to the pre-screening required to become Expert-Vetted.

We do not believe a badge for high earners would be valuable at this time. The reasons are:

- Too many badges create confusion for clients; we have to have the right balance between distinguishing high performers and creating noise

- Clients already have easy ways to find high earners by looking at the total earnings on the profile and using filters, and they actively use these

- Businesses seeking high performers value other signals more, like the size of the projects or the types of clients you worked for

Let me know if you have any other questions!

Iliana

florydev · ‎07-08-2020

Iliana M wrote:
I believe that was a typo in his message, Mark.

I stand by my silliness!

researchediting · ‎07-08-2020

David M wrote:
Nishant S wrote:
Superb initiative. Just curiousthat roughly how many freelancers or what percentage would be part of the top rated plus plan.
They announced that roughly 3% of FLs would attain Top Rated Plus.

Mods could you tell the community roughly what that number is (I can't find how many registered freelancers there are now especially as a result of COVID-19) - I'm guessing it's in the hundreds of thousands, which is why it's taking so long to send out all the email notifications!

As of late Septermber 2019, Upwork claimed 375,000 "earning" freelancers and agencies.

researchediting · ‎07-08-2020

Aditi J wrote:

Can Upwork please give a one month warning/notice to freelancers before making such major changes?

Since they can neither give us reasonable notice nor provide the necessary infrastructure before requiring us to change our entire client onboarding process, my guess is "no."

researchediting · ‎07-08-2020

Iliana M wrote:

We selected the thresholds for each category based on the project values we see in the marketplace today. We believe that $5000 is a reasonable threshold for the Writing category.
Which is yet another example of why Upwork's categories don't fit the services we offer. $5000 or up to much more for writing a book? Sure! More that $5000 for editing a book? Tantalizingly close, but so far: no.
Future improvements we are considering include:
1) Expand the threshold to include relationship value, not just contract value (ex: if the same client hires you multiple times)
:thumbsup:
2) Create the thresholds based on subcategories instead of categories (ex: UX/UI design projects tend to be larger than logo design projects so the thresholds would be different, instead of $5,000 for the whole Design & Creative category).
Bingo! See above.
Let me know if you have any other questions!
Iliana

Thanks!

faranshahbazkhan · ‎07-08-2020

Hi Paul,

I saw the same pop-up today.

Even though I don't qualify for the new 'Top Rated Plus' badge as per the criteria, I am on my way to reach 10k+ earnings in a matter of 3 weeks and currently working on a contract with earnings 4k+ as of today. I also happen to see the pop-up saying "Congratulations you're Top Rated", but I already am "Top Rated" from a few months now, does that mean I have been awarded the "Plus" badge too?

feed_my_eyes · ‎07-08-2020

I'm still waiting for a response to the question of whether you can achieve the "large project" payment threshold by working on more than one contract for the same client. I'm wondering why some freelancers seem to qualify even though they don't have a single contract worth $5,000. I sent Vladimir a private message about this, and other people have also asked about it in this thread.

Also, I was told over a month ago that I qualified for the "Expert Vetted" badge, but I haven't received any updates since. I am wondering how this differs from the "Plus" badge in terms of exposure to Enterprise and Business clients?