Recent Difficulty Landing Work / 100% JSS and Top Rated Plus

[dustin_slack]

Hello Upwork Community, please tell me if you are experiencing similar issues. Or if I'm crazy or doing something wrong, please tell me straight up. Also let me preface this by saying that I realize I'm not the best designer in the world. Always room to grow, I get that. But I do stand by my work and the vast majority of my clients are pleased with my work as well. 

I've been top rated plus 100% jss (graphic designer) since way before Upwork implemented these ridiculous changes. Connect boosts, 10 free connects a month (oh how generous - let's push the freelancers to boost their proposal so they'll run out of connects sooner and have to buy more), consultations, project catalogs... my work is in my profile! CLIENTS CAN VIEW MY WORK IN MY PROFILE. Not only that, if they search my name in Google, they will find my actual portfolio website. This leads my to my first concern listed below. 

Project Catalogs: If a client wants a fixed price pitch deck, they can find me and invite me to interview and discuss it with them in detail. Not all graphic design projects are alike. Some require more effort, some require minimal effort. Three tiers for a project just doesn't cover it. It is a nuanced discipline. It's more work for us trying to comply with Upwork's new standards and less money coming our way. Looking at it from a client perspective, it seems like they would think of us freelancers as unflexible, rigid, unwilling to budge, too complicated, and then just give up on the platform. I had to wait about 15-20 days and multiple fixes to get my first Project Catalog to go through. You know what Upwork said when I asked them what was taking so long? They are having trouble getting through the influx of similar concerns. I mean, that's a red flag right there. 

Consultations: Clients aren't dumb, they might need direction or need advice and might not know exactly what they are looking for, but they aren't dumb. Why are clients going to pay for a consultation when they can just message me through Upwork by inviting me to a job - even if they are unsure they'll even want to hire for the job? If the project looks good, my type of client, or design style, I'll respond, for free - because I potentailly want that specific work. What does Upwork think they are getting out of this? I'm not a lawfirm, consultations... I just don't get it. 

I haven't been receiveing invitations or landing jobs like I used to. I started noticing it about 3-4 months ago. It used to be like I'd snap my fingers and there was a good job at hand (even when I wasn't top rated plus!). Now it's nothing. I've been complaining to Upwork support about this for about a month, but I'm to be assured, these changes are working and are great for freelancers! I'm just not seeing it and I can't be the only freelancer not getting the same amount of work they used to get, not even close. I can't be alone in this, maybe I am, but intuition and years of experience tells me I'm not. 

Let me know if any of you fellow freelancers, especially graphic designers, if you're experiencing similar things or feel the same way or if you have a different opinion. I'm just trying to understand what is going on. I used to be able to make a living straight through Upwork. I've always respected Upwork so much that I'd route clients who reached out to me through my website back to Upwork, those who found me through Behance, or Dribbble, etc. Currently, it's almost impossible though. I've been using Upwork since about 2015-2016 or back when it was Freelancer. I've never had such a hard time getting work while being top rated plus at 100% jss. Something is amiss and it has to be these recent (within the last 9 months) changes to the platform. 

At this point I'm just frustrated. I put in so much work and so much effort to increase my jss to 100% and become top rated plus in my field. Now it feels like I did all that work for nothing. Great for discipline in general, not seeing the benefits monetarily anymore. 

Also, the less us freelancers get work, the less Upwork gets their cut of our pay. I think Upwork isn't looking at the fact that we (freelancers, clients, and Upwork) rely on each other. Which is why none of these changes make any sense to me. If I'm not making money on Upwork then Upwork isn't making money from me. When things start messing with your income, you notice. If I'm not the only one, then Upwork has to be experiencing less income (their cut), unless they are relying on us freelancers buying more connects to fund their platform - which just doesn't add up in my mind. 

The thing is, I'll keep using Upwork because aside from a few other sites, they've cornered this market - and like I stated before, I've been on here working since it was Freelancer. I just hope things change for the better and soon. During a time of inflation in the States, I'm not so sure about other places, having my income interrupted because of platform changes is quite frustrating. Maybe it's the platform changes, my feeling is that it is, but then I again I could be wrong. This is just my experience as of the last couple months. 

Anyway, let me know your thoughts. Whether we agree or not, much love and respect to my peers for responses.

Dusty

[getcheeky]

Hey Dusty,

I've totally noticed a change--- EXACTLY the timeline you stated--- about May'ish. Very odd bc, like you, I consider myself to be topshelf at what I do--- Brand Designer + Copywriter.

I never had to look for jobs either--- I always got invites. Things are waaaaay different now--- suuuuuper silent. And it seems like Clients are holding onto their money for dear life. 

This is definitely NOT cool. I was hoping things would pick up by September, but......... 

I don't know what's going on.

[dustin_slack]

Thanks for responding Michelle! Glad to hear I'm not alone. Unfortunately I'm not happy to hear it's happened to you too. Very peculiar isn't it? 

I sort of feel like we are Guinea Pigs in Upwork's platform changes. 

This is cool if your getting paid by Upwork to do this product change work, I mean it's good work (pay I'm sure) on a reputable platform for a known brand. Not cool to those who are affected by the changes!

I hope things turn out better soon Michelle, hang in there. 

I've also had ups and downs with JSS for absolutely no reason, but this is different. 

Much thanks for real though, and feel free to reach out... I don't know about direct messaging. But if you need feedback or anything, just to talk careers even if we're in different disciplines, Google my name. I'm not hard to find haha. I also check the forums now and again and if it's something I can relate to I'll be sure to give you my input. 

Also I checked out your work, very nice looking. Keep at it! 

Best of luck, truly mean it!
Dusty

[d7e9f370]

Hi, Dusty

Now I have the same problem. 

I've sent several well prepared proposals to what match my career and skill set but there have been not any response.

I want whoever has got success on upwork help us to overcome it.

Thanks

[zoomconcepts]

Yep, there's a marked change in engagement, it started around the end of first quarter of the year (give or take a few weeks). I've gone years without needing to spend a single connect and still get invited to jobs and land some pretty decent gigs. Now it's dry as a desert. Invites are extremely rare and about 80% of what I've received in the last 6 months has been spam or scams, and for the first time in years I have had to actually buy connects and apply - with pretty bad engagement there too (and I know itt's not my proposals). 

I'm not sure it's the feature changes; their appeal to clients is limited imo, and wouldn't leave a mark this noticeable. My best guess is they changed the way the talent search algorithm works... but of course we'll never know if they did.

ETA: graphic designer here too 

[dustin_slack]

Thanks for the response Bojana! I'm sorry to hear it's happened to you too. Also, great looking work BTW, very nice. 

Yeah I remember having like over 100 connects all the time. Now I have 8 after posting and *boosting*, which hasn't worked for me at all - thats for I think about 5 proposals I submitted today. I used to get so many invites I literally had choices to make, it was awesome. I would get offers before I even talked to the client... obviously I wouldn't just accept until I made sure everything was transparent with the client and we were a good fit - but the point is, it was working just fine until whatever change happened. 

This is just wild. Same experience with spam or scams. Except, I've contacted Upwork support about that because until the time both you and Michelle mentioned, I never had so many proposals closed because they didn't adhere to Upwork's standards. "They are looking out for our best interests". While I appreciate that Upwork wants to protect us from scams, I'm wondering if these jobs were legit, but since they had a simple mistake when they were posted by the client, they were then written off. If I was a client I would be annoyed and not come back... I would think Upwork is too much work and annoying to deal with. However, I do believe that at least some of those jobs that I submitted proposals to that Upwork closed were scams, just some I don't believe were. 

Something has changed though somewhere, platform updates, algorithm, I'll never know, Upwork will never say. Regardless, it's a problem for us freelancers, graphic designers, copywriters, product developers, etc. Some of us do this on the side, some of this do this full-time, in the end we like how Upwork handles the communication and transaction for the most part. Getting our money messed with is the problem. Ugh. 

Something has to give somewhere because this just isn't working. 

Best of luck Bojana, and like I told Michelle, if you ever want to communicate about work I'm easy to find on the internet. Feel free to message me here or feel free to find me elsewhere. 

Thanks so much for responding!

Dusty

[getcheeky]

Hey Dusty,

Thanks for the accolades! 🙂 I freelance full time, so now I've gotta amp-up my Marketing strategies for self promo--- yay! 

And yes, soooooo many scams and fake jobs being posted!! WTF??? It's like Upwork has been overtaken by aliens. 
That would explain a lot. 😉

For real though--- this shiznit cannot keep going downhill for us anymore. SOMETHING has to change--- Upwork needs to fix it, man, like NOW NOW. 

[alibajwa256]

yes

[c778de80]

perhaps we should team up and combine our forces. 

As a senior android developer with 7+ years of experience, I see a great designer here and a marketing expert. Nothing could stop us if we combined our forces, it might be better than moving forward as lone wolves like we used to.. lol

[dustin_slack]

Hi Kaan, thanks for the response. I received your direct message and will respond to you in a bit. But I like the idea. Thanks for taking the time to read my post and your suggestion!

Dusty

[331162f0]

Hey Dustin!
same case with me. I'm also a top-rated Wordpress developer with 100 job success but for a month. I'm not getting any single order and I don't know what's the problem with upwork. 

[dustin_slack]

Hi Fatima, yeah this is a huge problem. I'm doing everything I can to get Upwork upper management to take action on this. So far I've heard from you, Michelle, Chiara, Bojana, Benedick in another thread and other freelancers, we aren't alone. This is a massive problem. Upwork needs to do some self reflection and fix this nonsense and soon. 

Complaining to Upwork support, I just get the same bare promises over and over. "The changes are great and freelancers and clients love it". Yeah, I don't think so. 

Someone suggested banding together to get Upwork to listen. It may have been Michelle... I'm considering ways of doing that or starting a way to do that. 

Thanks for your time and your feedback, it's much appreciated! 

Dusty

[getcheeky]

Hey Dusty,

Yeah, that was me that said we should start a petition--- I mentioned it on Chiara's post. We gotta figure something out--- SOON! 
Let's chat more via LinkedIn. 🙂

[dustin_slack]

Will do and thank you for that suggestion and being involved in these threads. I made another post asking if anyone wanted to band together but it's not rolling like this thread is. 

I'll chat with you on LinkedIn soon. 

thanks Michelle!

[tjmisny]

Dustin, I'd love to join this communication mission.  I have tried to reach out to Upper Management so far to no avail.  It should be a Win Win for Upwork to listen to us -- we make the money that keeps them solvent.  

[331162f0]

Hi Dustin!

We have to find other freelancers that are facing the same issue and we have to form large groups to take this issue to higher authorities of upwork.  Let's do something for our rights and raise a voice against useless boost connects features and many more. Let's find a way to gather all people together. 

[belenc2018]

Hi Fatima,

Count me in if you go ahead with that.

However, I messaged Upwork last week and got the same empty response as usual: they don't admit any problem.

[331162f0]

Hi Maria!

Thanks for the support!  we definitely need people like you and I have reviewed your profile and I'm amazed that you are also not getting work It's so strange. What is happening with upwork? Please send me the network request on upwork.

[8c43a735]

Hi Dustin, Can we get Upwork on a twitter space?

[faranshahbazkhan]

Hey Dustin, 

 You're definitely not alone, I have had a similar problem now, barely any invites!

This has been an ongoing issue for the past 7 months or so now, I have never had to purchase connects before to bid out (not saying it's a bad thing) but that's not how Upwork was working for top-shelf freelancers. 

There has to be something rewarding for good-performing freelancers, and the only thing that kept us going (invites) has been stripped off from us now. That's an unfortunate situation. 

[lysis10]

I thought 100% was the main goal of all goals? Silly me just struggling over here with always under 100% never achieving the high ranks of 100% 😞  It's really hard and it's all that matters.

[getcheeky]

Hey Jennifer, 

I think you're perfection! Girl! You have such an impressive portfolio--- amazing! I'm super impressed. 🙂

[lysis10]

---

Michelle W wrote:

Hey Jennifer, 

I think you're perfection! Girl! You have such an impressive portfolio--- amazing! I'm super impressed. 🙂

---

Don't be impressed. I have no idea what I'm doing but I still manage to be a raging female dog.

[getcheeky]

Hahaha! Such modesty 😉 Carry on!

[belenc2018]

Don't worry. I've been 100% for some time and nothing changed. I thought I'd reach paradise, but it was all the same

[bilal1983]

Hey Dustin, there's definitely some changes in how things work which has affected a LOT of freelancers on the platform, and recent economic conditions have made things worse.

I too am very interested in hearing from upper management about what they're doing (going to do)  to reassure their top freelancers that their future is safe here. Like you said, they keep experimenting and introduce new systems, and they've been doing this from the beginning, but it had not affected the earnings of established freelancers as it has recently.

About your other post, where you said less freelcaner earnings means less Upwork earnings (their cut), yes that is true, but I commented on this recently that, for sure UW is aware of this, and they've most probably taken this into consieration. They might have taken a business decision to let more newbies join the platform. This group of people are the ones expected to purchase the most connects, so UW continues to earn, maybe more this way?

I also suggested to come up with ways to ensure UW maximizes their revenue, and keep experienced, qualified freelancers happy too. Increased service fee maybe, and entrance test for freelancer so that unskilled and unqualified freelancers do not join?

Also, I hope they fix the other reasons people have pointed out for reduced job invites and opportunities, like search algorithm changes, boosted proposals etc.

You could create a petition-type post, and ask for a certain comment on it from freelancers to be counted as a signature of their approval, and on the post request a response from management.

I rely completely on UW as a freelancer and hope things get better for all of us. Good luck!

[81f2681a]

---

Bilal M wrote:

They might have taken a business decision to let more newbies join the platform. This group of people are the ones expected to purchase the most connects, so UW continues to earn, maybe more this way?

I also suggested to come up with ways to ensure UW maximizes their revenue, and keep experienced, qualified freelancers happy too. Increased service fee maybe, and entrance test for freelancer so that unskilled and unqualified freelancers do not join?

---

I don´t think the problem is the newbies. I´m a newbie in Upwork, but if you see my portfolio, I´m not unskilled and unqualified. Of course I´m not the best illustrator or animator in the platform, but I´m pretty sure I´m good enough to work professionaly.

To join Upwork I needed to do a lot of interviews and do verify my ID. If things changed and anyone can be a freelancer without interviews or ID verification, so, maybe this is the problem. Well I don´t know. What I knows is that clients don´t needs to verify ID, so anyone can post a job, and there is a lot of scamm and fake jobs now.

Other things, like bosting proposals and project catalogs, I don´t knows if this realy works! Why project catalogs is needed if we can just place our portfolios in our profile? And, the only thing usefull about boosting proposals is when a job that you want has 20+ proposals yet, so you can boost to makes your proposal on top. But, a lot of freelancers just boosted it too, and just 3 will be on top, if your boosting is outbided, you go to the end of list anyway. So, boosting proposals is useless for most of the freelancers in anyway.

[bilal1983]

What I meant is unskilled and unqualified new freelancers joining.

[tlsanders]

Your future is not safe here, or in any specific place. As an independent business owner it is your responsibility to develop multiple channels for securing work to ensure that the loss of one platform or referral source cannot undermine your business. 

[bilal1983]

I agree, it is not totally safe here or any other place. But I'm happy and content with how things are. If for some reason, it doesn't work out on this platform, God will open another door for me.

[martina_plaschka]

What specific changes has upwork implemented to cause this effect?

[81f2681a]

I thinks boosting proposals is the worst thing they did. But lets list someother things:

- Project catalogs: In my opinion this is useless since we just can place our portfolios in our profiles. I thinks, maybe clients is searching for project catalogues instead of inviting freelancers, I don´t knows if this is happening for sure, but thats what I´m suposing. Maybe we just needs to adapt to this new system. Project catalogs makes Upwork similar to Fiverr. Well, I don´t think this is a good idea. Upwork just had an identity, and now the platform wants to be like Fiver!? In my opinion Upwork was more professional marketplace than Fiverr, why the platform would like to be like another platform, that in my opinon, is inferior? I could understand if Fiverr would like to be like Upwork; but Upwork looking for to be like Fiverr?! That doesn´t makes senses to me!

- Letting anyone to be a "client": If Upwork lets anyone to post a job, a lot of fake jobs and scamm jobs will increase. Yesterday I saw a job post with the description "I want an illustrator - hue hua ha ha ha ha hahdkfjakdfjalkjf"! Please, this sounds like a kid posting in a MMO game chat to join a clan!

- Problem in searchs: I don´t knows what is happening, but when I search for jobs, the first jobs in my list is jobs posted days ago. Some other jobs doesn´t matchs my skills, even I seted up the searchs to shows jobs in my categories.

- Undetailed sub-categories: Realy, a lot of categories is mixed all together! In Design and Creatives, the sub categories "NFT, AR/VR & Game Art" is all toghether! Its all in the same sub-categorie, and all of these is completely diferent from each other! I do game art, can do NFTs with more efforts definetely I can´t do AR/VR that requires completely diferent skills! Mixing these 3 sub-categories together is a big mistake! NFTs may have a wide range of variety, not just crypto games; AR/VR is more related to social medias and coding than art! And game art is... game art! It can match any game like pc game, mobile game, console games... not just NFTs crypto games. But when "game art" is together NFTs and AR/VR it seens just NFTs crypto games that matter. This is a complete mess! I don´t knows if other categories is like that, but as an artist, I think this is a big mess.

- Boosting Proposals: Everybody complains about this! So please Upwork, destroy boosting proposals!

[getcheeky]

Hey Andre,

Nah, man....I don't want to "adjust" to their new, awesome platform--- it's not in our best interest. 

I think the Project Catalog thing was a huge mistake, and it definitely hasn't helped me in the "bidding process". My prices are not the most expensive, but they are not cheap.

I'm excellent at sales--- I want to be able to persuade in conversation vs flash a Project Catalog of "said prices" and say, "Here ya go! This is what you get!"

=====

On another note....

Like you said, Upwork completely needs to have clients verify their identity to open a job--- that should be a NO BRAINER!! 
Dude, Upwork needs to protect us! 
It feels like an effin' circus right now on this platform--- so many clowns fogging up our feed. 

[c4e453ac]

"- Letting anyone to be a "client": If Upwork lets anyone to post a job, a lot of fake jobs and scamm jobs will increase. Yesterday I saw a job post with the description "I want an illustrator - hue hua ha ha ha ha hahdkfjakdfjalkjf"! Please, this sounds like a kid posting in a MMO game chat to join a clan!"

The problem when you allow a low barrier to entry for people to post jobs is that if you then raise that barrier, the jobs posting stats are going to tank.  UPWK share price is at least partly influenced by the stats on the site.  If jobs postings drop by 20% because Upwork introduce a simple censorship filter that detects scams (utterly trivial to do), this will gain ugly publicity.  While it's an open secret that Upwork does have fake jobs postings that try to scam new registrants, the jobs posting stats tanking because UW implement a filter to eradicate scams will shine too bright a light on the situation (just my opinion, because there's so many easy technical remedies to this).

[tjmisny]

Problem in Search is a massive problem.  When you search for freelancers in a given category, the results are often irrelevant to your search terms.  Certain freelancers names show up 4x before others show up once.  It's obviously broken and Upwork knows it is broken.

A fun test: Try searching your own profession and see how long it takes for your own name to show up.  I did this earlier in the year and it took around 300 pages for my name to show up.  

[dustin_slack]

Martina, I mean no offense. But have you not read anything regarding the various issues we are discussing here? 

Whatever Upwork changed within the last 6-9 months has depleted our income. This could be algorithm changes, platform changes, we don't know. But it was fine before all these changes. 

Is this helping you understand why we are upset? 

Like I said I really mean no offense but it's quite clear from a bit of reading what our concerns are and how the recent Upwork changes could very well be the reason we are affected. 

All the best, Dusty 

[moonraker]

---

Dustin S wrote:

Whatever Upwork changed within the last 6-9 months has depleted our income.

---

Prove it.

This is a problem that quite a few people on this forum seem to have at the moment - making assumptions and expecting others to back them on those assumptions without evidence that they're correct.

Correlation does not necessarilly mean causation. Yes, things started getting tough at around the same time as the boosted connects were introduced but that DOES NOT mean boosted connects were the cause. And to clarify, I AM NOT saying boosted connects or whatever else are not the cause. I am saying we don't know what the cause is. (And just incase somebody wants to make another asssumption - I detest boosted connects).

You know what else was happening at around the same time? The invasion of Ukraine and now we have the cost of living crisis, both of which could EASILLY be a cause. And they probably do contribute, at least in part. Yet so many people seem to want to overlook that VERY plausible explanation and throw ALL blame at Upwork instead. I suppose it's just easier that way.

If you or anybody else can present some evidence that shows your claims are correct then you'll likely get more support. And to be clear - I don't mean claims that people are finding it harder. I know already that this is true. I mean claims about THE CAUSE of the issue. Claims like "boosted connects diddit". Because until you pinpoint the cause then you are just **edited for Community Guidelines** against the wind and tilting at windmills.

Until somebody provides some evidence of the cause it's nothing but guesswork, wild speculation and conspiracy theories. I want nothing to do with it because all I see is a bunch of people getting angry about something they just made up. What they have just made up might be true, but they struggle to acknowledge that it might also be wrong. 

And if you genuinely want to fix this 'problem', then surely it would make sense to address the cause of the problem rather than something that is utterly irrelevant to the cause. Otherwise you will get nowhere.

But I'm sure that I have just wasted a few minutes of my time writing this. I'm sure that some will misunderstand my point, deliberately or otherwise. I'm also sure that many will reject it because it doesn't enforce their own opinon, but that won't change the truth, whatever it is.

From now on, I'm just going to amuse myself with people's behaviour in this group and the wild conspiracies they're coming up with.

[paywell]

You are making some valid points there. I too can’t see a direct link between new features and profile views.

I saw a drop in my statistics, especially in the beginning of August.

In my mind, I have made a connection between and the frequent Upwork Service problems (which you can see on the Upwork Status website).

Below I will write my version whether it has to do with the new features or not.

Back to your post:

I was waiting for someone to mention the Ukrainian Invasion. 

Upwork stock prices have been plummeting since the start on February 28th, reaching their first low the day after banning Russian users (03.08.).

Therefore, I would like to throw in another probable cause into the cauldron of “why’s”:

For some reason, Russian freelancers as well as clients have been left out of the equation and only the new features seem to be at fault.

This makes me think – how much business had Russians generated?

Reluctantly, I must assume, that the answer may be: the same amount which has been missing for the last 6 months.

Though I wouldn’t hold my breath for some hard evidence on that. 

One may only try to find a real life analogy to the situation, which can be found in the US sanctions on Russian oil: 

Officially, it merely made 3% of the US oil imports, but has influenced the market prices drastically, so that those sanctions had to be lifted. The same happened with fertilizers - a rise and then sanctions were lifted.

Being a Ukrainian myself, I cannot afford the luxury of suggesting to stop the Upwork “sanctions” on Russian clients.

But all politics and emotions put aside – I firmly believe, that those clients, views and invites, which disappeared, will come back as soon as the current geopolitical situation will be resolved.

I almost forgot:

The only way the new implementations could affect users, could be through the rising amount of incidents (seen on the Upwork Status website). 

This also could be through Russian programmers being banned from Upwork.

Whether this is true or not – I cannot tell, but this sure would make a lot of sense, why implementing new functions could affect Upworks health as a website.

But this is yet another wild assumption with no evidence to back it up. 

[spectralua]

Don’t worry about russian users. Most of them switched to VPN or re-registered. They didn't go anywhere. I still see them with fake-location accounts.

[paywell]

Pryvit, Mykola! 

I believe there were hundreds of billions $ USD got frozen due to sanctions (300 or 400) Although not all of it was in Upwork, the part which was - can't be unblocked with a VPN.

Some of the abovementioned $ may have influenced the worldwide markets. Taking money out of a system in such amounts can't be good for the system. Especially when we are talking $, not roubles.

As if to confirm this: Upwork stock went down 2 times, after implementing sanctions against Russian users.

I would really like to have the stats on what part they were contributing to the system.

Getting booted from Upwork and signing back on right away through a VPN may work for freelancers, but not in all cases and not with all scenarios. Especially not for clients.

If a worker from Russia was on Upwork's programming team and got booted, he can't reinstate himself on the same position, right away, with a VPN.

Hence, my assumption about the frequent downtimes and the possible negative influence of new function implementations on Upwork's website:
If one team worked on the new functions and now another has to implement it, there may be trouble.