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cchew947
Community Member

Specialties, Industries, and Outcomes

I recommend Upwork consider changing the “Category -> Specialty” construct to three independent job announcement/profile sections: Specialties, Industries, and Outcomes.  Even though specialties exist already, the “Category -> Specialty” construct makes it challenging to make good selections (and may make it tough for clients and freelancers to connect). 

 

When I read good job details, the client includes the specialty they want, the industry experience they desire, and the outcome they want from the job.  I place my industry experience and project experience (outcomes) in my profile overview to help clients make better selections. 

 

Upwork Categories (in the “Category -> Specialty” construct) almost act as a barrier between client and freelancer.  First, Upwork categories prevent me from finding my specialties because the hierarchy is different than what I have experienced (perhaps clients may feel the same).  Second, I have worked on several of my specialties across many (not just one) of the categories listed including:  Accounting and Consulting, Engineering and Architecture, IT & Networking, Legal, plus Sales & Marketing.  Third, if I don’t match a clients “Category -> Specialty” selection, my proposal may get racked very low in the list, even though I have the right industry experience and project experience.  If my proposal is 17 of 22, my industry and project experience will never get read.

 

I truly appreciate Upwork’s efforts to make the client/freelancer search much more effective.  A better plan may be to disconnect Category from Specialty and make them independent.  That way, Category becomes the Industries that a person has worked and Specialty is a skill the person has for one or more Industries.  Further, adding a project type or Outcome as a profile section may help as well (Form, Report, Article, Instruction Manual, Presentation, CAD Model and Drawings, etc). 

 

If Clients and Freelancers populated job announcement tags and profile tags in these three terms (Specialties, Industries, and Outcomes), the matching algorithm may be much stronger.  As an example, I have done data analysis (Specialty) for Accounting and Consulting, Engineering and Architecture, and IT & Networking (Industries) to produce reports, dashboards, articles, and presentations (Outcome). 

ACCEPTED SOLUTION
AveryO
Community Manager
Community Manager

Hi Christopther, 

Thank you for sending your suggestion here. I'll make sure to share it with the team so that they may consider it for future releases.


~ Avery
Upwork

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4 REPLIES 4
AveryO
Community Manager
Community Manager

Hi Christopther, 

Thank you for sending your suggestion here. I'll make sure to share it with the team so that they may consider it for future releases.


~ Avery
Upwork
cchew947
Community Member

HI Avery,

 

Thank you for considering the input.

 

Regards, Chris

datasciencewonk
Community Member

Slightly off-topic: How are the "Popular projects" working for you? Sincere question. Notice any changes in invites or other shifts?

Hi Kat,

 

I haven't noticed any change with the "Popular Projects" and the summer has been much slower than I anticipated.  The "Popular Projects" is one of the reasons I wrote the above article. 

 

Again, I appreciate what Upwork is trying to do.  However, the "Category -> Specialty" construct underlies "Popular Projects" and several other aspects of the client and freelancer search.  This construct limits the chances of finding solid connections rather than improves it. 

 

Shifting to independent tags of Specialities, Industries, and Outcomes may improve the searching.

 

Regards, Chris

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