Hi cool guys/girls of freecodecamp!
I will tell you little about my background: Im not a newbie (i mean:i worked like 7 years as developer at various places in Israel, mostly as FED).
my github: https://github.com/shootermv
my tech blog: https://gs500coder.blogspot.com
Recently i have lost my job (the reason i guess - is organisation changes) and currently i`m trying to find something to start work on (in my field - Frontend/React/Redux).
It seems to me that become a freelancer is something i want to try now.
What i had tried so far is - to open account at upwork site and start to send proposals.
Im sending like 3-4 proposals every day but no luck - nobody comes back to me.
I guess im doing something wrong here.
But what?
Seems strange to me im so not attractive, despite i have pretty lot of experience and ready to work (at least at the beginning) for low wages…
Will be glad for some tips
I think a lot of those jobs are based on “reputation” on the site. You may have to bid lower than you think on some small projects to build that reputation. Other than that, I think it’s just patience.
Part of the problem is that a lot of those low lying jobs are often ill defined. How do I bid on “I need someone to build me a web site.” And people actually bid on it. There are people that bid low on everything, even jobs they don’t know how to do. It’s hard for the askers to know what is what - many of them are not coders.
I ended up landing my first job there by bidding lower than I should have. I probably bid half what it was really worth and probably took twice as long as I should have because I was still building skills. But I did a good job so the guy hired me for a second job at a better rate. And that led to me having some experience that led to a “real” job. ymmv
I hate encouraging people bidding low on these things. Don’t be ridiculous, but you may have to pay your dues for a bit. And be patient. I think that’s just how the game is played.
Thank you for your advice!
Interesting, but few hours after your answer i got some proposal from the upwork…
Doing now their skill test , lets see how it will go
Thanks again
Hi @shootermv, congratulations on getting a response to your proposal! I just read this good article yesterday with some tips on getting started on Upwork that might be helpful:
It’s been a fair while since I last tried to get some work on Upwork, and I’ve got quite a low opinion of the business (it’s a meat market – be aware that isn’t really there to allow freelancers to make a living), but you just have to keep plugging away until you get a bite.
When you get some interest, don’t pause writing proposals, you still need to keep churning them out otherwise you’ll be back to square one.
Adjust the way you structure your proposal each time until you can get a template that gets you responses fairly regularly and that you can fill out quickly – try being more/less assertive, more/less technical, more/less concise etc. Once you get a response, try to figure out why they responded, what you think worked, use that when making more proposals.
Your profile is very important, keep adjusting that as well.
