Posted a graphic design job, what happened next was (not) shocking...

[#1]

Thought I'd throw this out there to the freelance community at large...

I recently posted a job to design a website landing page. The job posting included the "am I human" test by asking them to write "xyz" (where xyz was a phrase) at the beginning of their proposal. I also included the high level requirements and a link to the current proof of concept landing page for reference.

Here's what happened...

The Ugly

• 60+% of the submitted proposals failed the "am I human test" and were immediately disqualified from further consideration.
• A vast majority of proposals state things like "I read your job description and it looks like a perfect fit"; or some variant of that. Yet, none of them talked about "why" or presented anything remotely relevant about the job posting.
• Several of the "professional" designers included links to sites that were no longer online. Read that again...

The Good

Upwork's client tools allow you to "shortlist" and "archive" proposals. The shortlist is very helpful to track those you want to follow up with. The archive removes all the noise from the list of candidates.

Initially I was concerned the job posting would show 50+ proposals and deter better freelancers from submitting proposals. However, I have to give props to Upwork for only showing the active number of proposals in the job posting.

In other words, none of the archived proposals are counted towards the total number of proposals shown on the job listing. Instead of showing 50+ proposals, the listing shows 5-10 proposals.

The Mediocre

There is an alarming number of freelancers submitting proposals with zero contracts/no earnings. And to be honest, I totally understand why they have zero contracts; most all of them have underwhelming profiles, to say the least.

Of 50ish candidates after a day or so, only 3-4 specifically addressed the project requirements. The rest either made vague references or none at all.

Summary

As a part-time freelancer, posting a job for the first time provided great insight into the challenges our clients face when rummaging through a heap of proposals. After going through this process, I've concluded a few things:

• Every proposal must specifically address the client's job.
• When in doubt, ask questions specifically related to the job you do not understand.
• Grammar, formatting, and cogent proposals make a much bigger impression than I realized.
• If you have canned text, make sure it's no more than 2-3 sentences.
• Profiles matter!
• Portfolios matter!

These are all points I've followed in the past; this experience reinforced why they should be followed. Hope this helps other freelancers out there...

Cheers!

[#2]

Hello Farag!

Do yourself a favor. Think like a Business Owner.

Get the contract activated first, and then send your "Mock-Up" of what the client wants. Not before.

Regardless of the steps you took, that client now has a free mockup to pass along to their graphics person. 

Please, please protect your assets. Not doing so, that's money out of your pocket.

[#3]

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Farag S wrote:

Thank you, Woodrow, but the client can’t use it in this colour format for the purpose, and also doesn’t have access to the design assets for editing.

The client profile is also created last year like mine and it has a good rate. This just shows how it’s difficult to connect for new users now.

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It may be that, having received a free sample, if they have not been more, (it does not matter RGB and watermark), the client has chosen the one he likes the most and has ordered it from someone for $10.

[#4]

I hate to tell you this, Farag,

I've been working with marketing and ad agencies for many years. I've seen it time and time again.

If a freelancer willingly sends over a mock-up with the steps you took, all the marketing manager does is pass your sample to their graphics person and says, "I want the piece to look like this one." 

The graphics person opens Photoshop and creates a new version based on the sample you just sent over. 

So, moving forward, send nothing the client wants until you have a contract activated. 

[#5]

I would be interested to hear how many of the freelancers that past the test did not have stolen items in their portfolio.

I have been looking for translators in the past so I asked to reply in either the source or target language. That can sometimes also be quite revealing.

[#6]

Hello Kindler!

I found your post interesting and insightful. Thank you!

I've had my share of hiring freelancers and employees over the past 30 years. And it is a juggling act. 

However, when you begin the conversation with the "am I human" test, you've just told the pros to leave the conversation. And they do.

Who loses? Not the pros because they have no skin in the game, dog in the hunt, or money on the table.

It is the client. That's you!

Silly "write this phrase" gimmicks expose the client as ill-prepared. And lets the pros know immediately; this job poster has little to no experience hiring professional freelancers.

It sends up red flags to stay away, and they will walk away and never look back every time.

So don't shortchange yourself with gimmicks because you may have just lost the opportunity to hire an Elon Musk but settle for a Barney Fife instead.

Instead of a "Litmus" test, try rapport. 

Clients that start the conversation with that frame of mind build long-term solid relations. 

Congratulations on posting your first job!

[#7]

An instruction to mention this or write that in my response to a job post is usually an automatic deal breaker for me, too. It indicates the client lacks experience and confidence hiring and working with freelancers, which means they are going to be high maintenance in any of a number of ways. 

[#8]

I am not sure what all this talk of "guarantees" is about.

As a client, I know there are no "guarantees" when it comes to hiring freelancers.

[#9]

Hi, Kindler.

Thanks for the perspective in your post.

Upwork has changed its connect policy and pricing to try to limit clients being overwhelmed with irrelevant proposals and the freelancers who submit them. I expect clients to do what they can to achieve the same end.

If your "are you a human test" works for you, it sounds like a useful tool. It isn't something I see often and never prevents me from responding to a new Upwork job I think I am ideal for. But anything that reduces my competition from large numbers of irrelevant posters and competition from other **Edited for Community Guidelines** qualified freelancers likely improves my chances of submitting a successful proposal.

[#10]

Will - I think we share the same philosophy with our clients. They are the one's hiring and paying us, so why not take an extra 3 seconds and pass their human test.

I suppose on the plus side, all of the hard-core /**Edited for Community Guidelines** freelancers who refuse to even acknowledge a job post b/c it has a "are you a human test" is just one less freelancer in the pool of proposals.

p.s. great word!

[#11]

I am apparently very much in the minority but I have no problem with clients asking us to prove we're humans or that we can read. I think it's more fun if it's something like "Tell me your favorite dish to cook" if it's a cookbook job or "What's your favorite sports team" if it has to do with sports. It can give a client some clue about a sea of anonymous freelancers. It's nice to work with like-minded people.

I will not, however, under any circumstances, answer any of the ridiculous questions like "what part of this project do you think will be the most challenging," mostly because my answer would be "working with clueless clients who think a question like this is in any relevant to finding a qualified freelancer."

[#12]

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Kelly B wrote:

I am apparently very much in the minority but I have no problem with clients asking us to prove we're humans or that we can read. I think it's more fun if it's something like "Tell me your favorite dish to cook" if it's a cookbook job or "What's your favorite sports team" if it has to do with sports. It can give a client some clue about a sea of anonymous freelancers. It's nice to work with like-minded people.

I will not, however, under any circumstances, answer any of the ridiculous questions like "what part of this project do you think will be the most challenging," mostly because my answer would be "working with clueless clients who think a question like this is in any relevant to finding a qualified freelancer."

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Hi Kelly, mostly I dislike this practice, but there is a difference between a client asking me a relevant question to the work and asking me to answer that (and use that as the human test) versus asking me to jump through some random hoops to show I can follow orders. A random special word or weird phrase that has nothing to do with the job does nothing to vet out bad applicants. There are still scammers out there that can fake who they are but still easy enough to include the special word/phrase to pass the test. Since proposal development is my bread and butter and bacon, I will repeat what I tell my students all the time: it's not being detail oriented that matters, but knowing WHICH details are important that matters. Clients who want this are not able to discern the important details, and my work would be wasted on them anyhow. Now, if I was a little more needy of finding clients, I might acquiese to this. But only if I were strapped to find good clients. 

[#13]

Also, I don't know about for other projects, but for graphic design I would highly recommend sending invitations as opposed to hoping someone good shows up out of the blue. In 2021 I applied to exactly 2 jobs. The rest were previous clients or jobs I was invited to.

[#14]

The union of "write X" plus a batch of canned questions makes me think hard about submitting a proposal. Work has to be very striking to go through all the hoops.
One proposal I submitted had a "write X" requirement. I did, followed by "it's not a fun thing to do." The client got in touch and with laughter, he asked me why I said that.
I told him several of the things that have been said here. His response was that he had read that it was something that was good to do to discern those who had read the ad or not, but that, in reality, it had not been of any use to him. Many proposals that were not even related to work, but with X written at the beginning.
Too bad I couldn't do the job, he seemed like a fun guy.