Can You Actually Make Money On Upwork

5 Ways To Make Money With UpWork

Grow your earnings one freelance job at a time

UpWork is one of the best side hustles because of the endless job opportunities available. You can get multiple freelance gigs from the site rather than have all of your income tied to one central source. You also get full control over your schedule as many freelance gigs allow you to work at home and set your own hours.

Getting started on UpWork can be a bit of a learning curve. However, there are a few strategies you can apply to start generating additional income from UpWork.

Use A Filtered Search

When you look for jobs on UpWork, you can use filters to find jobs that fit specific criteria. Knowing how to use these filters is vital for landing jobs on UpWork and making the most of your connects (their name for "credits").

UpWork has a few criteria you can use to optimize your job search, but here are the key ones:

Proposals — Look for jobs that currently have fewer than 10 proposals. When you submit to a job with a small number of applicants, you increase your chances of getting noticed and hired.

Client History — Look for clients with 1–9 hires. Some people post jobs on UpWork and end up not hiring people for that role. Clients with a hiring history have already paid freelancers through UpWork, so these clients are more likely to actually hire someone for their job.

You can use other criteria such as your experience level or hours per week to further refine your search. However, proposals and client history are the two most important parts of the filtered search to find jobs more likely to hire you.

Submit Applications Every Day

You don't get UpWork gigs without consistently submitting applications. If you submit 3 applications each day, you'll get better at writing applications and are bound to get hired eventually.

This gets more difficult as you burn through your credits. I recommend using the free version for as long as you can, but getting 80 connects for $15/mo will allow you to submit applications to at least a dozen additional jobs each month. It's only worth the investment after you've gained some experience on the platform.

You won't have to submit applications every day forever…just every day until you start landing freelance work. Then you'll have to spend more time serving your existing clients than submitting more applications.

Focus On How You Can Help The Company

Most cover letters and resumes are self centered. It's easy to tell who's just looking for a job and extra cash and who actually cares about the company and doing good work.

Before writing a cover letter, think about what the client truly wants. They don't just want another person on their team. They want results. They want their customers to feel a certain way or attract more of them. When you write a cover letter that focuses on what your clients want, they feel like you're both on the same page.

Identify the results your clients want to achieve from the job position and demonstrate how you can achieve those results. Clients don't often state results they're looking for. They just want you to know the work involved and the spot they need filled. When your cover letter is customized to what the client wants, you have a much better chance of landing additional freelance work.

Build Up Your Body Of Work

No one will hire a person who lacks experience and can't demonstrate their ability to fulfill the role. You're competing with other applicants for a single position (or a few positions in some cases).

In between submitting applications and responding to messages, you have to build up your body of work. Start writing on platforms like Medium and publishing YouTube videos to demonstrate your expertise. Not only is this a great way to build a brand, but clients will get a better understanding of your abilities and how you can help them.

If you want graphic design work, start creating graphic designs and post them to your Instagram (or a separate business Instagram account to keep it personal on your current account). You can then include the graphic design Instagram account as part of your resume.

Polish Your Profile

If you haven't updated your UpWork Profile in a while, it's worth reviewing. Your profile is one of the first places potential clients will go to determine if you're the right person for the job.

When highlighting your expertise, demonstrate how that expertise lines up with your ability to perform work for your clients. For instance, I talk about my podcast in my profile and how my experience as a podcaster has turned me into an excellent listener.

I also mention in my profile that I ran qualifying times for the Boston and NYC Marathons not to brag but to demonstrate the level of commitment I can provide to an organization (those are not easy races to get into). If the client happens to be a runner or someone curious about those races, we've already got a talking point.

If your profile is nothing more than bragging, you are missing out on a great opportunity to stand out and highlight how you can help the client.

Getting freelance work on UpWork involves many application submissions. As you optimize your application and filtering processes, you'll get better at landing freelance work. The only two things you can control in the beginning are how you optimize your presence and the number of applications you submit each day. The rest will eventually fall into place.

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