How to make a profile on a freelance exchange as effective and attractive as possible?

Question

Freelance

What would you advise to make the profile as attractive as possible and people responded to it. Registered on upwork, worked as a freelancer for about 6-7 months and commercial experience for about a year. And in the portfolio, there is nothing to add at all.
What would you advise to do? Is it worth doing a couple of projects specifically to add to the profile? Is it worth it to pass some kind of tests for confirmation of skills?

Answer 1

You need to describe the tasks that you can solve for the client in this style .
After I switched to communication in the key of solving problems and began to offer an expert assessment for free, the conversion from contact to purchase of the project changed a lot (from 10% to 35%).

Answer 2

About 80% of freelancers cannot fill out a portfolio to effectively attract clients.
The best way, in my opinion, is to put yourself in the place of the client and give answers to the questions that interest him.
For example, what text do I use (I am creating turnkey landing pages)
Hello!
Don't you think that all applications of candidates are similar to each other? Let me try to interest you in another way.
1. Result 100%. You will receive a ready-made landing page, start accepting customer requests and selling your products/services.
2. Always in touch. I am in touch most of the time of the day, so I quickly answer your messages in the process of work.
3. Visual result. For your convenience, I will upload the process of working on the project to the test server - you will see not a layout or a picture, but your future full-fledged website with working buttons and forms.
4. Your adjustments.I will try to do everything perfectly the first time, but if you don’t like something, I will make changes until you say “I’m fine with everything.”
5. Marketing recommendations. Five years of work in marketing taught me how to find mistakes that affect conversion. You will receive recommendations for attracting customers and effectively selling your products/services.
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1. The work is carried out in full. I like to work “perfectly well” the first time, so I write everything down and don’t forget anything.
2. If I don't make it on time, you get a 20% discount. Time is a valuable resource for an entrepreneur. If I fail to complete the agreed deadline, the price for the project is reduced by 20%.
3.Your data will not be passed on to third parties. All provided for work remains in strict confidence and is not disclosed.
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If you have read to the end, then you are already interested in my proposal.
Right now, while you're thinking, your potential customers are going to your competitors.
Contact me in any way convenient for you and we will start cooperation.
With respect and hope for cooperation, Yuri Galmakov.
And of course, clients want to see at least some work in the portfolio. If he opens several portfolios of different artists, he will choose the one who is more experienced (who has more work published).
Even if the portfolio does not contain perfect work, it will still work better than an empty portfolio.

Answer 3

On upwork, first of all, they value feedback and then everything else

Answer 4

Remember, you have only one significant resource, in almost unlimited quantities (a little exaggerated, but still), which you will turn into money - this is your time! Everything else, such as knowledge, skills, practical experience, etc. affect only the quality of the resource you have. You just need to learn how to exchange the available resource of time for the money of customers. Well, and accordingly, in order for the fees to be higher, improve the quality. In addition, in order to sell your resource, you must at least tell those who are ready to buy about your exchange offer. Freelancing. as in life, there are simple rules of a market economy that must be used and applied.
I hope I didn't confuse too much with my phrases, but the following comes from this:
1. Convey to a potential customer the information that you are ready to do some work. Advertise yourself, tell about your skills. Form your portfolio on the portal, include your best works in it, even if it is from some projects from your previous works. The main thing is not to exaggerate and do not deceive, often customers are looking for less experienced, but cheaper specialists for some kind of work, or one of the freelancers is looking for assistants. And this will give you the opportunity to gain experience and, most importantly, earn a reputation. Each freelance exchange has a description of what affects your rating, do not neglect it, do everything to make your rating as high as possible, this is your reputation. Oh, and also, add an avatar to your account, few people want to work with a faceless person. People are used to associating images of someone and something in their minds, and associating someone who does not have an image is an additional cost of energy that people do not want to do, and therefore they avoid all sorts of anonymous and no-names. When working as a freelancer, you will rarely meet your clients and since the latter will not be able to associate your name with your face (meaning real in life), they should be able to associate it with some image, let it be your photo or logo or whatever, but it should not cause disgust and not be empty!
2. Tell the potential customer how long you are ready and able to work. Ie tell us how many time resources you are willing to sell.
Tell us about your conditions and preferences for work. After all, if you want to do your job with high quality, you must completely surrender to it and do it with pleasure, and not think about the fact that you were put in terrible, uncomfortable or generally unacceptable working conditions. Many customers want more, faster and cheaper, or for nothing at all, and they are not at all interested in your inner world, difficulties, etc. Remember, any work must be paid and motivated (c)!
3. Diversify your markets. Create your accounts on several freelance exchanges. Not necessarily all that you can find, but don't get hung up on one.
Do not consider it as advertising, but buy PRO accounts, they provide a number of benefits and privileges that will give you the opportunity to get more orders.

Answer 5

The nuances here are dark. I will tell you about one of the most important - the photo should be of good quality with a pleasant smile. Upwork recommends looking at the camera, but to me it doesn't matter where you look. A beard is always a plus, there was a study where a person painted on his beard and thereby increased the number of responses.
Also, the effectiveness of a photo depends on the price niche, that is, how you present yourself. The client is more comfortable, if you work for just $20, to see that you look worse and poorer than him (but still neat). From 30+ - you can let yourself look good and well-fed.
Regarding the first message - the tests are worth passing, even though they are damn stupid.
A couple of projects, or at least one, is very worth doing on purpose, especially if you have no former projects at all. That's how you gain experience.

Answer 6

One good project in the portfolio is enough. Test pieces 5 passed. And what is the goal, do you want to be invited to interviews or take bets on the project?

Answer 7

A well-filled portfolio (of course, good work) in the vast majority of cases is the final option in making a decision. ;)

Answer 8

Do not shy away from projects that pay little, but after which there will be a favorable review in the profile. When your account will shine with 2-3 dozen successfully completed works, you will inspire confidence in almost any customer.

Answer 9

The attractiveness and rating of an account or a freelancer depends mainly on the following factors:
- portfolio
- reviews
- period of work on the stock exchange (experience)
By actually publishing high-quality, fashionable information on all these things, you can, with a certain degree of probability, guarantee a good account status.
The "feedback" of a freelancer and the ability to communicate with customers and, on occasion, with fellow freelancers are also important.
And of course: a positive, kind, decent photo of a real account user, with a slightly smiling face, an interested person .... inspiring confidence in anyone!
The ability to value your work, time, respect colleagues, competitors and, most importantly, customers - these are the main theses for development and attractiveness.
But all this is pumped with experience, through trial and error, not only one's own, but also those of others, communicating, the ability to analyze and, so to speak, "feel" the market.

Answer 10

My freelancer profiling tips - two articles on the Payoneer blog:
(Part 1) Freelance programmer: what and how to write...
(part 2) Freelance programmer: what and how to write...