The secret to finding work on Upwork

Here's the thing. You can make money on Upwork but it takes work and patience.

Check Upwork Several Times a Day

You have to look for jobs EVERY day. Not just once a day, but several times a day. Jobs fill up fast. If you only check the jobs once a day, you will miss out on a ton of opportunities. Even though I am a web designer, I never look for web design work on Upwork. I am an SEO consultant so I exclusively look for SEO and content writing. There are a ton of writing and SEO jobs posted every day.

Be Picky About the Jobs You Pitch TO

The bad thing about Upwork is there are a lot of people looking for cheap freelancers to work with. This is why I don't use Freelancer. Freelancer seems to be the go-to for out of country work. When you look through jobs read the job description and the pay. The pay isn't the only thing you should consider. Do they sound demanding? Do they need fast turn-around time? Can you keep up with the project? If a job seems like more trouble than it's worth I skip it.

Have a Great Profile

I think one of the reasons I get work when other people don't is because I have a great resume and experience. If you don't, work on improving your resume and profile. This is your opportunity to sell yourself so sell yourself up.

Get Reviews

When you first start out, you might have to take some crappy low paying jobs just to get some reviews on your profile. I did that in the beginning and now I have a ton of 5 star reviews. Make sure you ask all your clients to leave you a review and let them know how much it helps you with your freelancing at Upwork.

Can you make money on Upwork?

When I first started using Upwork I was thrilled. I started getting jobs right away but I quickly found I was spending hours of time writing content for nitpicky people and not making very much for my time so I abandoned it.

But then I came back to it almost a year later and I have loved my experience there. I do have a few tips. If you see a job posting that's overly demanding skip right past it. I don't enjoy working with demanding and cheap clients.

Look for the jobs that are well suited for you. Don't pitch every job. You will end up hating and not do as well.

Also, work on your speed if you are a writer. Writing content fast takes practice. When I first started writing on Upwork a blog post would take me the entire day and sometimes only pay $25. Definitely not worth it. But, the more I practiced the faster I got. I can now write a blog post in a couple of hours typically. Some topics I can write about in an hour. Make sure you are making enough for it to be worth your time or you will burn out.

When you get started you have to make a lot of pitches but once you have some good reviews it gets easier. Practice your pitching. If your pitch is boring and you don't sell yourself you won't get the job. Fortunately for me, I have great work experience when it comes to writing. I also own my own SEO consulting business in Albuquerque so that helps me with credibility.

At my business, Badass Web Goddess I do web design, but I never pitch web design jobs on Upwork. That's a really competitive space. I can almost always get SEO writing jobs there because I am good at it. I keep clients because I am responsive and handle criticism well. Sometimes when you first start writing for someone they will nitpick everything, but once you write for them a w

hile you learn what they want and they keep coming back to you.

This week I have written 5 blog posts for clients I have found on Upwork and I am working on an SEO project this weekend for another Upwork client.

If you do SEO or write, it's a good way to make money.

Demanding Clients with Unrealistic Expectations

Yesterday I got up at 5 am with every intention of being done with one of my client's writing assignments by 1 pm at the latest. I worked as fast and as hard as I could. But, by the time I was closed to finished with it, it was nearly 6 pm and I had to stop.

I started really evaluating my time and is this even worth it. The thing about freelancing is that you don't always know how to price things. You might assume you can complete one client's project in the same amount of time as another client. Most of my clients on Upwork are SEO or SEO writing clients. On top of freelancing on Upwork, I am an Albuquerque and Santa Fe SEO consultant. So, I have my own clients too.

Plus, I do web design. I go back and forth about which I like more my Albuquerque web design business or my SEO business. I have sort of an addiction to SEO. I like it because it takes strategy. I write a lot and I get so excited when clients email me and tell me they got a lead from Google. Plus, I am competitive. I am determined to take the other Albuquerque SEO companies by surprise. I work harder than most people and I am really good at content strategy.

Web design is different. I have a little more fun with it. I am really trying to get more feminine web design clients. I like making websites for ladies because I get to be creative and have fun. But, I think there is more potential with SEO. And I really do like it.

What frustrates me the most is my low-paying SEO clients and some of the work I get on Upwork. Clients I find through my own website tend to pay better, although they are not necessarily less demanding. Upwork clients usually find Upwork because they know a little about SEO. Upwork is like the main freelancer site for SEO work. So, I sometimes like it better because at least the clients I get there know what SEO is and expect content that's written for Google. But, because they are more educated on SEO, they can also be more demanding and nitpicky. And what drives me the craziest is they all think they are the expert. A lot of them haven't actually done SEO as a business, they've just taken a course or watched some YouTube videos.

Those of us who do it for a living have done experiments, have tested different theories, and understand the work involved. Some of my clients expect me to write high-quality content (that takes several hours to write) but only want to pay you $25 for it. You sorta get what you pay for. You can have cheap or you can have quality, but expecting someone to write top-notch, well-researched content, well you're not going to get Pulitzer prize-worthy content for $25.

Anyway, I decided to blog today. This is pretty cathartic even if this blog doesn't get much traffic.