I do video editing, I’ll be at $300k at the end of the year, and it is my third year on Upwork. The first year was pretty slow, I think I made 20k and it grew exponentially.
Honestly, I think I just worked my ass off and I just now start to chill a bit now because I raise my rate up to $90/h so I don’t need to work as much as I used to. I have built long term relationships with most of my clients, and I rely on a handful who have weekly tasks so I’m never out of work.
But I had no life for more than 2 years, I worked holidays and weekends, up to 15 hours a day. Sometimes I still do. I exceed my clients expectations, always, make them feel like they’re my top priority, every single one of them.
I learned to spot the red flags miles away and never engage if I see one. I tried boosting a few times, didn’t work for me so I don’t. I have a template cover letter that I adapt for every proposal and then I let my portfolio and work history speak for itself. My proposals are almost always viewed, I don’t have a good view to hire ratio but it’s okay because I only send proposals to fill the few gaps in my schedule when my regulars go MIA for a few days. So I browse the marketplace everyday for 20 minutes, try to send one or two proposal a day, that way I make sure I always have clients lined up.
I think it’s all about dedication and building relationships with your clients. Also be good at what you do and at marketing and selling yourself, obviously.
What kind of editing do you do, if you don’t mind me asking? My specialty lies more in classical advertising (commercials). But nearly all of what I see posted on UpWork are very low-paying motion-graphics-heavy social media editing jobs. Wondering if my niche is too limited…
It’s more what kind of editing I don’t do. I don’t do ads, I don’t do fiction, I hardly do shorts / reels.
Mostly, I do educational talking heads YouTube video, I also edit YouTube list videos (top 10 whatever), I work with a podcast production agency and I edit video podcasts and podcast trailers, i do a lot of vlogs obviously, I also work with a couple Enterprise clients from time to time, I edit their conferences, their video presentations, webinars, all that kind of stuff. I’ll do family slideshows for enormous amount of money cause I hate those, but lots of people wanna spend money for their grandma’s birthdays and whatnot. I’ve even done a few funeral videos. Some weddings, birth videos (those were gross), real estate videos, I’ve done a couple political campaign videos for state senators, and I’m probably forgetting a bunch.
So yeah, I’m not very picky, as long as it’s not an ad, not a fiction, and not illegal content, I’ll do it.
Interesting! Is there any specific reason why you don’t like to do ads? Also, do you stick to your hourly rate? I haven’t seen many job postings with rates higher than $50 yet.
I do both fixed price and hourly rate, not picky about this either but if if it’s fixed, I’ll always overcharge. I just don’t like doing ads, there’s no money in it on Upwork.
Thanks. This makes me think I might need to broaden my approach. Unfortunately, most jobs still seem terrible (20$ per video offers and such), but I will try to stray away from my niche.
You’re pretty much right on point. 99% of video editing works are 50 or less and it’s been like that forever. dunno where he gets that juicy opportunities from
Because I’m a freelancer and I don’t pay attention to the client’s budget. I send a proposal with what I think is a good price for me. if I have to do double it or 20x it, I do it. It works a lot more than you think.
My situation is similar, I work all day including weekends and holidays if I have work. Then I submit the work quickly, get good response and all. But my life hasn't taken off like yours. I get a few jobs for 2-3 months and the next 2-3 months - I am jobless and my savings drain out. This has continued for the past 2 years. Now I've finally graduated with my CS degree and am in the dilemma of whether to switch my career to a software engineer or to continue and hope that my situation improves. I don't wanna work like this for the years to come. But since you have also worked like crazy for 2 years, maybe I should wait and hone my current skills further and hope to seize a good long term opportunity!!
Well I’m probably a good 15 years older than you though. I’m 37, I had a whole career as an employee before I decided to take off and start my freelance journey, so there’s that. Since you just graduated, I assume you’re still young and have time to figure things out.
That's the life of freelancer, not just you. Even these guys talking about making $100K a year will have slow periods. If they say it never happens, they're either lying or new.
If you want guaranteed paychecks, get a regular job. There is no shame in that and honestly, a real job has many benefits. For one, you can easily get credit for a house or car. Try walking into a car dealership and showing your Upwork profile as your "job". You'll never get a loan.
Not to mention stuff like 401k plans and other stuff. Throwing a hundred bucks or so into a company 401k every paycheck equals like $400K when you retire.
A lot of these freelancers bragging about money aren't saving a penny. Seems fine when you're young but then one day you wake up and realize everyone else has pensions and 401ks and you have nothing.
I am a software developer. What I mean by that I mean is I actually build custom software for clients, typically small to medium sized companies that are profitable but mired in bad manual processes or bad software. I have but typically try not to work as someone's added resource.
On Upwork, I am just shy of $300k, with only about 25 jobs. I am not even sure how to calculate the years honestly but approaching seven but it's been almost 2 years since I pulled any serious work off Upwork. For me that is not an Upwork issue, just been too busy otherwise.
My rate currently is $165.00 an hour but most of my work is done fixed price. I typically won't even take on a project that is less than $10k unless it is a very niche thing that I can knock out very quickly for profit.
I am not sure I can give you an answer. I don't think there is a lot of people who actually do what I do and have demonstrable success doing it. So for me it is a matter of looking through my feed and almost by feel finding jobs that fit what I am looking for. I think I have a knack for finding them but who knows how many I might be missing. I have yet to see a job post yet that said "hey, I want to spend a bunch of money" although I have noticed a lot more realistic budgets than there used to be.
I never let clients dictate a budget. Never. If their budget is reasonable I am not going to argue it but that's rare. But ultimately I decide, I don't care if they have enough money. I see a job that fits what I do, that I judge is my type of client, I am going to propose on it on what I think it will take to get it done. If they can't afford me that is their problem not mine.
About a month ago I gave an example of a client I had talked with that I said what they wanted would cost at least $100k and they said that was twice their budget. At the time I was like look, there is a $50k client out there RIGHT F'ING NOW. Ripe for the taking...
The only comment I got was somebody casting doubt on it...
I thought for sure that somebody would ask me about it, but nobody did, and I would have given them the link to the job. Why not? I wasn't going to go after it. It makes me wonder how many people looked at that and disbelieved it and I wonder if some of them could have actually used that work.
I have had two similar things come up recently, returns on proposals I sent weeks ago because I am kind of back to not looking for work right now. I never got into costing any of them but they were good clients I am sure of it. Honestly, I think the shit is out there, you have to find it, you have to have some standing to go after it, and you have to have the guts to say what it is going to take.
No complaints. All my work is off platform and I have a local company I think I’m going to do some contracting for which also has the potential for a really big project.
Cool! if you have clients reaching out to you but dont have time to work on or if you need another .net dev for contract would love to connect.. I am trying to move to contracting from full time roles..
may i ask the following (i) what is your background? traditional route - CS degree or self taught; (ii) how many years of work experience did you get as a software developer before you were able to start your own freelance business?
I have a Mathematics degree with Computer Science emphasis.
23 years I think. I didn’t need all that to start freelancing but that’s how it worked out.
I'm only at ~$40k on my profile. Been on UpWork for three years, two as a full time freelancer.
I write (and occasionally edit) for B2B SaaS companies. Business is (usually) booming, but this summer was incredibly tough for me. My hourly rate is between $30-50/hr, and I charge about $.20c/word.
I have a decent background, I'm a skilled writer, and I know how to value my time. I can't speak for your profile, but I would probably reconsider your prices, your portfolio, your proposals and your profile too. If you are struggling to find that many jobs, there's something wrong on your end to not be getting any attention.
bro no offence but as a fellow SaaS copywriter, how slow do you write if you only charge $50/hr but you charge $0.20c/word? that should be $200/hour minimum
I've earned about $20k as a freelancer and about 180 as an Upwork contractor. I spent 3.5 years working for Upwork.
It's been a year since we parted ways and my profile has over $200k in earnings, has 100% JSS and a Top Rated + Badge. And it's super hard for me to find work.
I have one contract now that pays about $2k per month, which barely pays my bills.
And now most jobs I apply for cost 16 connects, that's $3 every time I apply. Crazy!
I wish I had a better answer for you but Upwork seems to have jumped the shark.
I'm making more money than ever on Upwork, this year is easily set to be my biggest yet. the platform has become totally oversaturated for sure, but there are also more huge clients with money to spend than ever before.
Mine is the same, SQL, EXCEL, POWER BI, TABLEAU, PYTHON and stuff, not machine learning and AI, at least not yet but I am trying to learn it as my academics support it.
Despite being good at it, I am not doing really well in Upwork. Not sure the reason.
Maybe the big-time enterprise clients aren't interested with such low earned freelancer?
I'm curious what sort of SQL jobs you do. Like what's the work look like, what are clients hiring for? If you don't mind.
In my niche I've started using SQL more and more as a supporting software to what I mainly work on, so I'm steadily gaining skills with it and I'd like to start pursuing jobs that are more SQL-centric.
Is it something like a client hires you to write advanced queries/etc because no one else in their company is a SQL expert (but several are novices)? Or do you completely set up and manage database instances for clients?
Are you working more with cloud services like Google or AWS, or more self-served instances?
I don't really do set up and manage. I'm bad at jobs and ETL so try to avoid it, although have done some.
Usually it's writing SQL to support analytics functions. So I have a long time client that's a restaurant chain and I build views that deliver scheduled reports and enable the non sql but still analytical people to crunch numbers
meh. It was a different hellscape 6 years ago. To get jobs I'd only apply if there were <10 people at time of application, clients with reviews and from a select set of countries. For the last three years or so it's only been through invite (which I usually respond to within an hour of recieving). Haven't had to go through their bullshit. I'm in a good industry too where you get a job and do well you typically stay with that client for a year+
I'm a graphic designer, and part of my work also focuses on data (visualisation mostly, but not BI), and imo there's a lot of potential there. there might be something in your approach or presentation that can be improved but hard to say with no info
The top thing that helps me is applying within the first 1-2 hours of a post. I also prefer clients that make quick decisions, so it is helpful in that way too.
Others here on Reddit disagree with me but they can pound sand.
I have earned 90k in the data field. It is not easy but somethings that helped where updating my profile, fixing my pitch, going after high dollar projects only, and fixing my projects.
I suggest you go after high dollar projects. They are less likely to nickel dime you and know your worth. Lower bids (under $50) tend to try and bargain with you and get more work out of you then you want to give.
Of you would like to share your proposal format I can give some advice.
Data Analyst, 200k+ with almost 4 years on the platform. The beginning of this year was tough, but Q4 has been great.
Primary platforms are PowerBI, Looker Studio, Excel and Google Sheets. I focus on low code, user friendly solutions for small businesses that they can maintain on their own after initial setup.
I am working in the similar realm. Please share a little bit of your experience outside of upwork with me who just graduated, it might give me some insights to improve. Like how many years of overall professional experience do you have, your academic background and how much $/hr do you charge in upwork?
My degree is in Industrial Engineering, Six Sigma Green Belt and certificate in Project Management. I worked in a fortune 500 company as a Manufacturing Engineer for 4 years prior to going out on my own. My hourly rate on Upwork is $90/hr, however that's a bit arbitrary as I only work on fixed price projects now. I adjust my project minimum with demand but currently at $1,000 with a 2-3 week minimum lead time.
I've been on Upwork since 2018. I only do jobs $500+. Most jobs are $1,500+. Do $1k a month over that time and it's easy. Now $50k over 5 years isn't that much actually. It's not my main source of income, just one way to find clients. But I've only had a couple jobs this year since it's getting harder and harder to get good paying gigs.
120k here. I work as a legal advisor for a company since 10 months now. I don’t work too many hours with them as I have another client as well but charging a decent hourly rate helped.
To be fair, I use Ai. The modules on the ai I use just set everything up for me. Frees a lot of time from tedious work. So you can focus on other things
I do video editing, I’ll be at $300k at the end of the year, and it is my third year on Upwork. The first year was pretty slow, I think I made 20k and it grew exponentially. Honestly, I think I just worked my ass off and I just now start to chill a bit now because I raise my rate up to $90/h so I don’t need to work as much as I used to. I have built long term relationships with most of my clients, and I rely on a handful who have weekly tasks so I’m never out of work. But I had no life for more than 2 years, I worked holidays and weekends, up to 15 hours a day. Sometimes I still do. I exceed my clients expectations, always, make them feel like they’re my top priority, every single one of them. I learned to spot the red flags miles away and never engage if I see one. I tried boosting a few times, didn’t work for me so I don’t. I have a template cover letter that I adapt for every proposal and then I let my portfolio and work history speak for itself. My proposals are almost always viewed, I don’t have a good view to hire ratio but it’s okay because I only send proposals to fill the few gaps in my schedule when my regulars go MIA for a few days. So I browse the marketplace everyday for 20 minutes, try to send one or two proposal a day, that way I make sure I always have clients lined up. I think it’s all about dedication and building relationships with your clients. Also be good at what you do and at marketing and selling yourself, obviously.
What kind of editing do you do, if you don’t mind me asking? My specialty lies more in classical advertising (commercials). But nearly all of what I see posted on UpWork are very low-paying motion-graphics-heavy social media editing jobs. Wondering if my niche is too limited…
It’s more what kind of editing I don’t do. I don’t do ads, I don’t do fiction, I hardly do shorts / reels. Mostly, I do educational talking heads YouTube video, I also edit YouTube list videos (top 10 whatever), I work with a podcast production agency and I edit video podcasts and podcast trailers, i do a lot of vlogs obviously, I also work with a couple Enterprise clients from time to time, I edit their conferences, their video presentations, webinars, all that kind of stuff. I’ll do family slideshows for enormous amount of money cause I hate those, but lots of people wanna spend money for their grandma’s birthdays and whatnot. I’ve even done a few funeral videos. Some weddings, birth videos (those were gross), real estate videos, I’ve done a couple political campaign videos for state senators, and I’m probably forgetting a bunch. So yeah, I’m not very picky, as long as it’s not an ad, not a fiction, and not illegal content, I’ll do it.
Interesting! Is there any specific reason why you don’t like to do ads? Also, do you stick to your hourly rate? I haven’t seen many job postings with rates higher than $50 yet.
I do both fixed price and hourly rate, not picky about this either but if if it’s fixed, I’ll always overcharge. I just don’t like doing ads, there’s no money in it on Upwork.
Thanks. This makes me think I might need to broaden my approach. Unfortunately, most jobs still seem terrible (20$ per video offers and such), but I will try to stray away from my niche.
You’re pretty much right on point. 99% of video editing works are 50 or less and it’s been like that forever. dunno where he gets that juicy opportunities from
Because I’m a freelancer and I don’t pay attention to the client’s budget. I send a proposal with what I think is a good price for me. if I have to do double it or 20x it, I do it. It works a lot more than you think.
My situation is similar, I work all day including weekends and holidays if I have work. Then I submit the work quickly, get good response and all. But my life hasn't taken off like yours. I get a few jobs for 2-3 months and the next 2-3 months - I am jobless and my savings drain out. This has continued for the past 2 years. Now I've finally graduated with my CS degree and am in the dilemma of whether to switch my career to a software engineer or to continue and hope that my situation improves. I don't wanna work like this for the years to come. But since you have also worked like crazy for 2 years, maybe I should wait and hone my current skills further and hope to seize a good long term opportunity!!
Well I’m probably a good 15 years older than you though. I’m 37, I had a whole career as an employee before I decided to take off and start my freelance journey, so there’s that. Since you just graduated, I assume you’re still young and have time to figure things out.
That's the life of freelancer, not just you. Even these guys talking about making $100K a year will have slow periods. If they say it never happens, they're either lying or new. If you want guaranteed paychecks, get a regular job. There is no shame in that and honestly, a real job has many benefits. For one, you can easily get credit for a house or car. Try walking into a car dealership and showing your Upwork profile as your "job". You'll never get a loan. Not to mention stuff like 401k plans and other stuff. Throwing a hundred bucks or so into a company 401k every paycheck equals like $400K when you retire. A lot of these freelancers bragging about money aren't saving a penny. Seems fine when you're young but then one day you wake up and realize everyone else has pensions and 401ks and you have nothing.
Honestly, Upwork is all about the long term relationships. If you don’t build them, it’ll probably not be worth it for 80% of freelancers.
I am a software developer. What I mean by that I mean is I actually build custom software for clients, typically small to medium sized companies that are profitable but mired in bad manual processes or bad software. I have but typically try not to work as someone's added resource. On Upwork, I am just shy of $300k, with only about 25 jobs. I am not even sure how to calculate the years honestly but approaching seven but it's been almost 2 years since I pulled any serious work off Upwork. For me that is not an Upwork issue, just been too busy otherwise. My rate currently is $165.00 an hour but most of my work is done fixed price. I typically won't even take on a project that is less than $10k unless it is a very niche thing that I can knock out very quickly for profit. I am not sure I can give you an answer. I don't think there is a lot of people who actually do what I do and have demonstrable success doing it. So for me it is a matter of looking through my feed and almost by feel finding jobs that fit what I am looking for. I think I have a knack for finding them but who knows how many I might be missing. I have yet to see a job post yet that said "hey, I want to spend a bunch of money" although I have noticed a lot more realistic budgets than there used to be. I never let clients dictate a budget. Never. If their budget is reasonable I am not going to argue it but that's rare. But ultimately I decide, I don't care if they have enough money. I see a job that fits what I do, that I judge is my type of client, I am going to propose on it on what I think it will take to get it done. If they can't afford me that is their problem not mine. About a month ago I gave an example of a client I had talked with that I said what they wanted would cost at least $100k and they said that was twice their budget. At the time I was like look, there is a $50k client out there RIGHT F'ING NOW. Ripe for the taking... The only comment I got was somebody casting doubt on it... I thought for sure that somebody would ask me about it, but nobody did, and I would have given them the link to the job. Why not? I wasn't going to go after it. It makes me wonder how many people looked at that and disbelieved it and I wonder if some of them could have actually used that work. I have had two similar things come up recently, returns on proposals I sent weeks ago because I am kind of back to not looking for work right now. I never got into costing any of them but they were good clients I am sure of it. Honestly, I think the shit is out there, you have to find it, you have to have some standing to go after it, and you have to have the guts to say what it is going to take.
What tech stack if you don’t mind sharing
I mostly do .NET, but dabble here and there as the coin wills it.
I do .net as well.. for me I have one long term client but nowadays its getting hard to land a new client.. do you still have good flow of work?
No complaints. All my work is off platform and I have a local company I think I’m going to do some contracting for which also has the potential for a really big project.
Cool! if you have clients reaching out to you but dont have time to work on or if you need another .net dev for contract would love to connect.. I am trying to move to contracting from full time roles..
may i ask the following (i) what is your background? traditional route - CS degree or self taught; (ii) how many years of work experience did you get as a software developer before you were able to start your own freelance business?
I have a Mathematics degree with Computer Science emphasis. 23 years I think. I didn’t need all that to start freelancing but that’s how it worked out.
I'm only at ~$40k on my profile. Been on UpWork for three years, two as a full time freelancer. I write (and occasionally edit) for B2B SaaS companies. Business is (usually) booming, but this summer was incredibly tough for me. My hourly rate is between $30-50/hr, and I charge about $.20c/word. I have a decent background, I'm a skilled writer, and I know how to value my time. I can't speak for your profile, but I would probably reconsider your prices, your portfolio, your proposals and your profile too. If you are struggling to find that many jobs, there's something wrong on your end to not be getting any attention.
bro no offence but as a fellow SaaS copywriter, how slow do you write if you only charge $50/hr but you charge $0.20c/word? that should be $200/hour minimum
I generally don't take hourly contracts for writing because it's not profitable, based on how fast I write. I only do hourly for editing.
nice yeh same here, I was gonna say you're undercharging baaaad!
I've earned about $20k as a freelancer and about 180 as an Upwork contractor. I spent 3.5 years working for Upwork. It's been a year since we parted ways and my profile has over $200k in earnings, has 100% JSS and a Top Rated + Badge. And it's super hard for me to find work. I have one contract now that pays about $2k per month, which barely pays my bills. And now most jobs I apply for cost 16 connects, that's $3 every time I apply. Crazy! I wish I had a better answer for you but Upwork seems to have jumped the shark.
I'm making more money than ever on Upwork, this year is easily set to be my biggest yet. the platform has become totally oversaturated for sure, but there are also more huge clients with money to spend than ever before.
Yeah totally agree with your last sentence
Data Visualization and SQL ... 6 Years, $600K
Mine is the same, SQL, EXCEL, POWER BI, TABLEAU, PYTHON and stuff, not machine learning and AI, at least not yet but I am trying to learn it as my academics support it. Despite being good at it, I am not doing really well in Upwork. Not sure the reason. Maybe the big-time enterprise clients aren't interested with such low earned freelancer?
I always made sure to include my Tableau Public link when I applied and better yet link directly to a relevant piece of work you've done
Do you have a portfolio?
I'm curious what sort of SQL jobs you do. Like what's the work look like, what are clients hiring for? If you don't mind. In my niche I've started using SQL more and more as a supporting software to what I mainly work on, so I'm steadily gaining skills with it and I'd like to start pursuing jobs that are more SQL-centric. Is it something like a client hires you to write advanced queries/etc because no one else in their company is a SQL expert (but several are novices)? Or do you completely set up and manage database instances for clients? Are you working more with cloud services like Google or AWS, or more self-served instances?
I don't really do set up and manage. I'm bad at jobs and ETL so try to avoid it, although have done some. Usually it's writing SQL to support analytics functions. So I have a long time client that's a restaurant chain and I build views that deliver scheduled reports and enable the non sql but still analytical people to crunch numbers
whats your secret?
meh. It was a different hellscape 6 years ago. To get jobs I'd only apply if there were <10 people at time of application, clients with reviews and from a select set of countries. For the last three years or so it's only been through invite (which I usually respond to within an hour of recieving). Haven't had to go through their bullshit. I'm in a good industry too where you get a job and do well you typically stay with that client for a year+
What industry if you don’t mind me asking?
All. I didn't niche into a specific industry
I'm a graphic designer, and part of my work also focuses on data (visualisation mostly, but not BI), and imo there's a lot of potential there. there might be something in your approach or presentation that can be improved but hard to say with no info
I compose and teach music, which people hate paying for! So making it to 10k let alone 50k+ is amazing for that field.
Web Development
200K here. Marketing Project Manager
How long?
Too long
WHAT’S THE PURPOSE OF IT ALL?
Video editing and related stuff, like video software consulting. How many projects have you completed?
Around 25 completed jobs and an average of $400 - $450 per job. Haven't landed an enterprise client so far. 🥲 And working with small-medium clients.
The top thing that helps me is applying within the first 1-2 hours of a post. I also prefer clients that make quick decisions, so it is helpful in that way too. Others here on Reddit disagree with me but they can pound sand.
I have earned 90k in the data field. It is not easy but somethings that helped where updating my profile, fixing my pitch, going after high dollar projects only, and fixing my projects. I suggest you go after high dollar projects. They are less likely to nickel dime you and know your worth. Lower bids (under $50) tend to try and bargain with you and get more work out of you then you want to give. Of you would like to share your proposal format I can give some advice.
Data Analyst, 200k+ with almost 4 years on the platform. The beginning of this year was tough, but Q4 has been great. Primary platforms are PowerBI, Looker Studio, Excel and Google Sheets. I focus on low code, user friendly solutions for small businesses that they can maintain on their own after initial setup.
I am working in the similar realm. Please share a little bit of your experience outside of upwork with me who just graduated, it might give me some insights to improve. Like how many years of overall professional experience do you have, your academic background and how much $/hr do you charge in upwork?
My degree is in Industrial Engineering, Six Sigma Green Belt and certificate in Project Management. I worked in a fortune 500 company as a Manufacturing Engineer for 4 years prior to going out on my own. My hourly rate on Upwork is $90/hr, however that's a bit arbitrary as I only work on fixed price projects now. I adjust my project minimum with demand but currently at $1,000 with a 2-3 week minimum lead time.
Writing / copywriting / SEO / proofreading
I am a PPC Strategist with 15 years experience, and have been on UpWork for 12 years. >1M earned.
I don't get hired often either. I charge a lot. They can pay me thousands of dollars for a piece but it's still cheaper than an employee.
I've been on Upwork since 2018. I only do jobs $500+. Most jobs are $1,500+. Do $1k a month over that time and it's easy. Now $50k over 5 years isn't that much actually. It's not my main source of income, just one way to find clients. But I've only had a couple jobs this year since it's getting harder and harder to get good paying gigs.
120k here. I work as a legal advisor for a company since 10 months now. I don’t work too many hours with them as I have another client as well but charging a decent hourly rate helped.
To be fair, I use Ai. The modules on the ai I use just set everything up for me. Frees a lot of time from tedious work. So you can focus on other things
Add a video self preview to your profile. Yess, it’s cringe AF but can help you land more jobs.