How many connects are you ready to pay without any income?

[yurynmuz]

How many connects are you ready to pay without any income for small jobs under $50?

Question to low level freelancers - not to moderators.

[lysis10]

Since $50 is a low value job, I'm assuming it'll be like $.30. If it's a good fit, I'll bid.

[hardorff]

If you never bid, you won't get hired, so if I like the job I'll make a proposal.

[tlsanders]

Yury, I'm not the type of freelancer you're looking for, but your question is confusing. What do you mean by "without income"? Are you asking what freelancers would be willing to win before getting their first freelance job, or what they would pay to bid if they were continually earning no income through Upwork? (in the latter case, I would hope the answer is "zero")

[tlbp]

I believe one of the reasons behind adding a small fee to each proposal (via the cost of connects) is so that freelancers have what we call "skin in the game." So, yes, the question everyone should ask themselves is how much of their own money they are willing to risk in support of their own career? 
Are you confident in your own skills? Are you ready and able to invest in your business? 

If you are not willing or able to invest in your business's growth, then perhaps the message Upwork is sending is to go and get some experience elsewhere (free platforms). Then, when you are earning enough to be able to take things to the next level, give Upwork a try. Although, as I understand it, everyone starts with 60 free connects. So, you need not make any investment until you have given the platform a try. 

[yurynmuz]

Thanks for your replies.

I meant: For example I want to earn $10 here, I apply $.3, $.3, $.3 etc.

After some time I will spend $9, then $19++  trying to earn $10 - looks like casino.

91% earn nothing according to statistic

[tlbp]

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Yury M wrote:

Thanks for your replies.

I meant: For example I want to earn $10 here, I apply $.3, $.3, $.3 etc.

After some time I will spend $9, then $19++  trying to earn $10 - looks like casino.

91% earn nothing according to statistic

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I am very sure that many among those 91% are expected to leave Upwork once the new fee system is active. 

But, what is the point of those 91% being on the platform if they do not earn money? 

Spending money in the short-term is a feasible strategy for a business that is trying to gain traction in a new market (loss-leader sales, grand opening costs, etc.) but the eventual goal should be to begin turning a profit. 

Each freelancer will have to decide for themselves how much they are willing to invest before seeing returns--whether on Upwork or anywhere else they go to market their services. 

[petra_r]

When 2 years of wasting free connects failed to lead to a single contract, any  money spent on connects may well be a waste.

[yurynmuz]

Clients don't see the applications from zero level accounts.

91% are simply invisible and always will be.

But the situation is really interesting now, many small jobs/clents (under $50) will have to use another places

[petra_r]

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Yury M wrote:

Clients don't see the applications from zero level accounts.

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Absolute nonsense. Of course they see them. I have hired zero level freelancers with great profiles and great proposals. My clients have hired countless such freelancers. Of course when the profile and the proposals suck, the freelancers won't get hired, but it is a lie that clients don't see the proposals.

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Yury M wrote:

91% are simply invisible and always will be.

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More absolute nonsense.

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Yury M wrote:

But the situation is really interesting now, many small jobs/clents (under $50) will have to use another places

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And even more absolute nonsense.

I don't understand why you waste your time lying and making a fool of yourself on a public forum with you complete misinformation.

Is it because you spent 2 years trying (and failing) to win a single contract here and need to find an excuse, so pretending that you weren't hired because nobody saw your proposal makes you feel better than accepting that those clients indeed saw your proposals, but didn't want to hire you because they preferred other freelancers every time?

[yurynmuz]

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Petra R wrote:

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I don't understand why you waste your time lying and making a fool of yourself on a public forum with you complete misinformation.

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Really, I don't want to speak with gurus & moderators

I'm interested to hear from 91% like myself

[petra_r]

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Yury M wrote:

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Petra R wrote:

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I don't understand why you waste your time lying and making a fool of yourself on a public forum with you complete misinformation.

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Really, I don't want to speak with gurus & moderators

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Of course not, because they can debunk your lies. Because they know you are lying.

You want to speak with newbies and failures, because they don't know any better and might just believe your lies.

[yurynmuz]

I don't need your opinion about my personal mistakes.

I'm interested: For example, how much a person is ready to pay to earn $10?

Will it look like some kind of casino?

[petra_r]

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wrote:

I don't need your opinion about my personal mistakes.

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I am not interested in your personal mistakes. Nobody cares.

I am referring to your lies. And that is not "opinion" - that is fact.

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I'm interested: For example, how much a person is ready to pay to earn $10?

Will it look like some kind of casino?

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Why would you care? Everyone needs to decide for themselves.

You can decide for yourself if you are willing to invest any money. It would probably be stupid considering that you have spent 2 years trying to win a contract here and have failed spectacularly to get hired even once.

It would probably be a waste of your money but then again, your money, your time.

Clearly if you really believed your own lies and really believed that clients do not see the proposals of people without a history (which is, of course, untrue) then it would be insane to pay. So the fact that you are even considering it shows that you actually know that your lies are just that: Lies.

[yurynmuz]

I don't trust gurus & moderators.

As I remember I'm at Upwork since 2016 - but applying not often, a few connects a year.

As I see 91% don't have any chance - the filters will kill all their tries.

[petra_r]

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Yury M wrote:

I don't trust gurus & moderators.

As I remember I'm at Upwork since 2016 - but applying not often, a few connects a year.

As I see 91% don't have any chance - the filters will kill all their tries.

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That's just (more) nonsense.

There are no filters on proposals.

People fail because clients don't want to buy what they are selling over what someone else is selling. Simple as that.

[lysis10]

I embrace freelancercide and welcome the day they fall on their own swords over 15 cents.  Build a wall and make them pay for it.

Jamie Lannister dies first. Mark my words.

[versailles]

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Yury M wrote:

I don't trust gurus & moderators.

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Lol that answer 😀

[tlsanders]

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Yury M wrote:

I don't trust gurus & moderators.

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Which means you don't trust anyone who knows how Upwork works or how to succeed here. That's sort of a self-defeating business strategy, isn't it?

[tlbp]

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Yury M wrote:

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Petra R wrote:

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I don't understand why you waste your time lying and making a fool of yourself on a public forum with you complete misinformation.

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Really, I don't want to speak with gurus & moderators

I'm interested to hear from 91% like myself

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Perhaps you should host your own web forum. Then you could decide who was permitted to participate. 

[gilbert-phyllis]

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Tonya P wrote:

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Yury M wrote:

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Petra R wrote:

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I don't understand why you waste your time lying and making a fool of yourself on a public forum with you complete misinformation.

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Really, I don't want to speak with gurus & moderators

I'm interested to hear from 91% like myself

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Perhaps you should host your own web forum. Then you could decide who was permitted to participate. 

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He could call it potstirrer.bs

[tlsanders]

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Yury M wrote:

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Petra R wrote:

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I don't understand why you waste your time lying and making a fool of yourself on a public forum with you complete misinformation.

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Really, I don't want to speak with gurus & moderators

I'm interested to hear from 91% like myself

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Yuri,you're not hearing from those freelancers because they're not here in the Upwork forums--at least, not in any significant numbers. 

Today's numbers (they're in constant flux) show that 8.47% of registered freelancers have ever made any money through Upwork. But, they also show that only 10.1% of registered freelancers have been active on the site at all in the past 30 days, and only 13.4% in the past 60 days.

For the most part, the freelancers who haven't made any money either signed up and never really used the site or saw that they weren't making any money and moved on. 

[jaycrutcher]

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Yury M wrote:

Clients don't see the applications from zero level accounts.

91% are simply invisible and always will be.

But the situation is really interesting now, many small jobs/clents (under $50) will have to use another places

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Most of those small jobs aren't really small, they just come from cheap clients, or clients that don't know what the work they need is really worth. I see postings for experts with low budgets, which means the client wants great work for low pay, and I see entry level postings with a lot of work needed, which means the client wants great work for low pay. The common theme is great work for low pay, and if this change makes those people go away then great!

[tlbp]

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Jarrad C wrote:

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Yury M wrote:

Clients don't see the applications from zero level accounts.

91% are simply invisible and always will be.

But the situation is really interesting now, many small jobs/clents (under $50) will have to use another places

---

Most of those small jobs aren't really small, they just come from cheap clients, or clients that don't know what the work they need is really worth. I see postings for experts with low budgets, which means the client wants great work for low pay, and I see entry level postings with a lot of work needed, which means the client wants great work for low pay. The common theme is great work for low pay, and if this change makes those people go away then great!

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There are no small jobs, only small budgets. 😂