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3611afd8
Community Member

Getting frustrated and discouraged

I have been on upwork for a little over a month now, and probably submitted 50+ proposals. Spent money to buy connects quite a few times, and have YET to even get so much as a peep from any of them. Not a word. I am a seasoned developer with 24 years experience and the least I would expect after so many proposals is at least SOME contact. Anything. Is this site a scam? I feel like I am just plugging money and time into this site for nothing. Anyone else had this issue?

10 REPLIES 10
jarankowsky
Community Member

A succesful upwork profile entails not only the inherent skill and expertise on an area, but also personal branding, marketing, copywriting, market research, keywords and other elements of any online service offering. Always adapt, research and update your proposition of value.

 

Also, if your services are offered by thousands of freenlancers too, then it will take 6 months or more to get a decent rating within upwork's algorithm.

yitwail
Community Member


Jason R wrote:

I have been on upwork for a little over a month now, and probably submitted 50+ proposals. Spent money to buy connects quite a few times, and have YET to even get so much as a peep from any of them. Not a word. I am a seasoned developer with 24 years experience and the least I would expect after so many proposals is at least SOME contact. Anything. Is this site a scam? I feel like I am just plugging money and time into this site for nothing. Anyone else had this issue?


Assuming each proposal required 6 connects, then you spent roughly $45 on connects. I haven't spent a single dollar on them, since being Top Rated, I get 10 free connects a month, and everytime I get an interview after applying, I get another 10 free connects, plus some connects may have carried over from when they were free. I've never raked in as much as some many seasoned developers do at Upwork, in part because my rate's lower than theirs, and less than half your rate for that matter, but I get some income from it, so it's not a scam for me. It all comes down to whether you believe the site is a scam, or a highly competitive marketplace where the failures outnumber the successes.

 

Besides your rate, which is on the high side considering the current lack of Upwork work history, I'll mention that the first website you've listed in your overview, and where you're currently the Senior Developer/Architect according to your work history, is not responsive in mobile (for non-developers, that means it's very tiny in mobile), has a large empty space where coupons are supposed to appear as a slider (slideshow for non-developers), and a 2015 copyright in the footer (which suggests it hasn't been refreshed for some time). Clients who click that link in your profile are not likely to be impressed, so you and your team should fix that, or you should omit that link.

__________________________________________________
"No good deed goes unpunished." -- Clare Boothe Luce
a_lipsey
Community Member

Echoing what others have said, your profile does not distinguishing you from the rest of the planet doing what you do on Upwork. The whole first paragraph of your profile is useless to me as a client. The rest of your profile you talk mostly about yourself and not what you will do for me, as a client, to make sure my project is successful. A profile isn't a bio; it's an advertisement of your services and why a client should pick you. Nothing in your profile makes you stand out at all as the freelancer I should hire.

I'm guessing your proposals are about how qualified you are and not about how you're going to fix my problem or address my project. It's a fundamental error a lot of freelancers make.
gilbert-phyllis
Community Member

Agree with Jorge, John and Amanda. In addition, it's worthwhile to search for FLs who are doing what you want to do and earning what you want to earn, and study their profiles. 

All good advice, but I really have no idea how to word my profile right without examples. How do you find the profiles of other similar devs on here? Is there a search page on here somewhere that I am not seeing? Every freelance job up to this point I have ever done has been word of mouth, so upwork is a completely new experience for me. 

yitwail
Community Member


Jason R wrote:

. How do you find the profiles of other similar devs on here? Is there a search page on here somewhere that I am not seeing? 


When you're logged in, just go to upwork.com, then click the down arrow next to the magnifying lens icon in the Search box at the top to change it to Search talent, then type in something like full stack developer and press return, and you'll see more results than you can look at, so you can filter it on the left, by rate, job success, earnings, etc. 

__________________________________________________
"No good deed goes unpunished." -- Clare Boothe Luce
3611afd8
Community Member

Would you be willing to take a look now and see if its improved?

yitwail
Community Member


Jason R wrote:

Would you be willing to take a look now and see if its improved?


I took a quick look and it looks better to me, which isn't to say it couldn't be improved. Rising talent badge -- not sure that was there before -- is good, and so is having a portfolio, though it would be better if you had an item more recent than 2015, so if you can omit the date, I would. But $80/hr is still a lot, so odds are to start with you might be better off looking for fixed price jobs, unless the client indicates they can pay that much in their job post. And just because a client specified "Expert I am willing to pay higher rates for the most experienced freelancers" does not mean they'll pay top dollar.

__________________________________________________
"No good deed goes unpunished." -- Clare Boothe Luce
84601750
Community Member

And he's gone... 

yitwail
Community Member


John D wrote:

And he's gone... 


No, he isnt, but you are.

__________________________________________________
"No good deed goes unpunished." -- Clare Boothe Luce
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