- In this video you're gonna discover exactly how I made
over $100,000 on upwork.com,
by building my own SEO link building agency.
So maybe you wanna make that sweet moola,
you wanna start your own business, maybe travel the world,
and stop being an office drone,
then keep watching this video,
because it will teach you exactly how to do this
with upwork.com, and it doesn't cost you a single penny,
plus I'll reveal some exclusive tips
for making money on Upwork that I've never revealed before.
So keep watching if you wanna learn more.
So how did this all happen?
Well, essentially a few years ago I started living
the Upwork dream when I quit my office job, left England,
left all my friends and family, as you do,
and then moved over to Chiang Mai, Thailand,
and that's when I started working online with Upwork.
Now, the thing is, when I first started working with Upwork
I was really cheap and very bad at monetizing myself.
In fact I was so cheap the Indians used to outsource to me.
So, I was that cheap,
and along the way I started learning different things about
how to use the platform, how to make money,
how to start scaling up a business.
And that's when I discovered
that actually Upwork can be incredibly profitable.
Now, this isn't my main source of income.
To be honest I have loads of different sources of income.
It's just something I've built up over the years.
But, Upwork is extremely profitable,
if you know the secrets to using it.
And that's exactly what I'm gonna show you in this video.
So we're gonna split it into three sections, all right?
First of all,
picking a niche, then marketing yourself,
and finally how to sell.
And then also after that I'm gonna show you
loads of bonus tips on how to use Upwork
and how to make lots of money off it.
So let's just jump straight in and I'll show you how.
So if you don't know what Upwork is,
this is basically a platform for freelancers to find jobs
and for clients to find freelancers.
Kinda like eBay for jobs, right?
And basically all you need to do is sign up to Upwork.
Takes about two minutes.
Even your grandma can do it, it's that easy,
and then after that, you need to pick a niche,
and this is really important.
It can make or break your business.
If you don't spend time picking a niche,
you're wasting your time and you might as well not do it.
So, what you need to do is pick a really solid foundation
for your Upwork business.
So for me, for example, I picked link building,
and that's because it's very scalable, it's high ticket.
I only work with clients who are ready to spent
at least $1,000 or more per month.
Something with high retention rate,
so are clients gonna hire you every single month,
and also something that you're confident
of doing a good job.
If you can't do a good job, you're wasting your time
and you're wasting your clients money, as well.
So you've really gotta focus on something that
you can sell for a lot of money,
but also ethically you can perform a very good job
that's gonna make your client lots
of money in the long run too.
So, that's something to think about.
Now, a lot of people, when it comes to Upwork,
are worried about competition.
And that's true.
There's tons of freelancers on there.
Everyone's scrambling for money on there.
Everyone's scrambling for jobs,
but the truth is that if you market yourself properly,
and you truly understand the value of your business,
then you don't need to worry about competition.
Competition is irrelevant,
because most of the people you're competing against
are really low value freelancers who have no idea
what they're doing, and without being disrespectful,
usually they're not gonna do a very good job.
So if you can offer a great service that your clients love,
then you're gonna win every time,
and your clients are gonna win every time too.
So that's why I don't worry about competition on Upwork.
In fact, if you look there's probably hundreds,
if not thousands of link builders on Upwork,
but I don't worry about any of them.
They don't have the same system as me.
They don't have the same amount of reviews,
same amount of case studies,
they can't deliver as good a service as me,
and therefore they're just not gonna win
when we're head on against a client.
But to be honest,
they're probably a bit more humble than me,
but you know, you go big or you go home, right?
So anyway, next up you've gotta start marketing your profile
and selling who you are as a person,
because when there's thousands
of freelancers competing against you,
you wanna be the one that stands out.
You wanna be the cream of the crop,
and then you have all these other freelancers below you
that can't match your personality, your marketing,
and everything else that's on your profile.
So, for me, when you look at my profile,
it's got a very direct headline.
It's got a sales page that shows a lot of personality
and draws the customer in,
but then also explains the benefits
and the reasons why they should pick me as their freelancer,
compared to every single other person on Upwork.
And then next up, there's a clear call to action.
So, when customers read through the page,
they can see at the end that there's a clear call to action
and what they need to do next if they wanna work to me.
Now, the other thing I'd say also,
is that I've included a couple of qualification answers
in my Upwork profile.
Personally, I don't wanna work with broke clients
who don't have a lot of money, and can't afford me,
and make loads of excuses about why they don't pay me
in the end.
I have to be very careful about who I work with.
I'm very selective about that,
and I clearly show that in my Upwork profile.
Now this is really powerful
because it demonstrates your value as an agency
or as a freelancer, because it shows you've got options.
And it's kinda like when you're on holiday, you're starving,
you're looking for a restaurant.
You walk down the street and you see two different options.
One restaurant has tons of customers,
it has a really good energy about it.
You can see they're busy,
but they're also enjoying their job,
and then you see this other old, dusty restaurant.
The lights are kinda dim.
The staff are looking really bored
and there's nothing going on.
And you think right, okay.
I'm always gonna go for the busier restaurant.
Just like you're always gonna go for the busier freelancer,
simply because if they're busy they must be good.
They're in demand.
And it's the same with Upwork.
So you can use this on your profile to optimize it
and land more customers.
And the final, most important thing
about making money on Upwork is to sell, sell, sell.
I hear some people say on Upwork,
"I've sent 10 proposals today and I've got nothing back."
That doesn't matter.
For me, I'll send 100 proposals if it takes one sale.
It doesn't matter.
The way I think about it is, you're a dinosaur.
You're going out there to hunt, and if you don't eat,
you're gonna die.
And it's the same with sales.
If you don't sell, and you're not working,
you're trying to make money online,
then you need to sell as much as possible.
Sales is so important.
It's something you have to learn to love to do.
At first I was very shy when I did it.
In fact, the first time I got onto a client call,
I was actually shaking a little bit, like, "Hello."
But eventually you get very good at sales.
You enjoy it, you love the process,
and it becomes extremely rewarding.
The other thing is, as well,
that if you can learn to sell,
you're gonna make money not just on Upwork,
but pretty much everywhere.
Every single business requires some sales.
Even if you wanted to work for someone else,
they need salesmen and sales is one of the most important
and powerful skills that you can ever learn
to grow a business.
So, that's something I recommend,
is spending 90% of your time, when you go on Upwork,
spending your time on sales.
Every single day, first thing in the morning,
I send 10 proposals,
I look at every single link building job
that I possibly can, find the ones that are right for me,
and then reply to them.
And this is so important
because with sales it's just a numbers game.
You just have to get your name out there
and if you're in front of enough clients,
you will land the sale.
So this is why it's so important for your business.
Next up, you gotta price yourself properly.
So you gotta know your own worth when it comes to Upwork,
because otherwise you will get screwed
and you have to be very careful about negotiating rates
with clients on Upwork.
Because, at the end of the day, they just want to save
as much money as possible,
and you wanna provide the best service you possibly can,
and you can't do that if you're not getting paid enough.
The biggest mistake I ever made was being so cheap
that I thought everyone would wanna buy from me,
but at the same time, if you're extremely cheap,
it doesn't represent your value,
and it makes you look like a very low value freelancer.
So that's why I recommend pricing yourself properly,
making sure your worth is there in the pricing,
and that you price yourself in a way
that makes you stand out from your competition.
This is so damn important.
And the other thing is, as well,
if you want a scalable business,
then you have to price yourself at a higher price point.
The only thing I will say is
that you have to make sure you can deliver
an amazing service that comes along with the price tag.
Don't just price yourself at $1,000
and then deliver something that's absolutely terrible,
because that's only gonna frustrate your clients
and it's gonna look terrible on you.
And it's gonna hurt your reputation in the long run.
So that's why I recommend pricing yourself,
but also delivering an amazing service along the way.
Now, another thing
that I'd recommend is using proposal templates.
On Upwork you're gonna be sending hundreds of proposals,
if you're applying for jobs,
so you might as well make this as quick as possible,
and that's why I recommend using proposal templates.
You can quickly copy, paste and personalize them
to the job that you're applying for,
and it will save you hours and hours of time
because instead of rewriting
a whole new proposal from scratch,
you can quickly copy and paste it into Upwork.
It will save you time
and it will make the whole process a lot more efficient.
Now something to keep rolled up your sleeve is case studies
because case studies are like social proof
to show that your service actually gets results,
because there's no point trying to make money on Upwork
if your service doesn't benefit anyone.
For me, yes I'm focused on money,
but also I'm focused on delivering an amazing service
for the clients that I work with.
For example, for me, with link building and my agency,
I've got loads of case studies
where I can show I've got proven results
of how my link building benefits my clients.
I've also got loads of example websites
that I've created myself, and I can show my clients.
They personally benefit me,
but they also show the client that, hey,
the link building, he doesn't just do it for clients,
he does it for himself too,
and therefore it must be an extremely valuable service.
The other thing that I use is YouTube videos.
I create loads of case studies on YouTube
with results of how my link building can grow a website,
of 10x traffic overnight,
and how I've used my own link building strategies
to benefit my websites and other websites too.
The thing is, if you're gonna be selling a lot on Upwork
you really need something that can make you stand out,
and case studies are so powerful for that
because they add social proof.
They do most of the selling for you,
and if you can prove that your service benefits people
in a tangible way, then you're gonna stand out
as a freelancer on Upwork.
Most freelancers on Upwork,
they can't prove that they've got the results.
They don't have very good case studies or portfolios.
So, if you can create an amazing one
then you're gonna stand out by a mile,
and it's gonna separate you from 99% of freelancers
on upwork.com.
Now something that's extremely important to clients
and something that I recommend you do,
is making sure that you're available for calls
with potential clients that wanna sign up with you.
Because most of the time they're not gonna grill you
on some crazy topic about the service that you deliver,
but they do wanna know that there's someone genuine
and authentic at the end of the line.
So that's why I recommend being able to jump on calls
with clients when you're on Upwork.
This will separate you from freelancers as well,
because most freelancers, they're either scared
of jumping on the call or they don't wanna waste their time.
Maybe they don't know what to say on the sales call.
And therefore, if you jump on a call with a client,
it's gonna separate you from most of the freelancers
on the platform.
Plus it's a great way to sell your services too.
If you're on the phone to someone,
you can easily explain the benefits of what you do,
some case studies, and there are all these different ways
of selling on the phone
that will make you stand out and help you land more sales
and make more money with Upwork.
And like I say, the first time I jumped on a sales call,
it was actually really difficult.
I was quite shy.
I was worried about what the client was gonna say.
I thought that it was just gonna be
an extremely hard sales call,
but at the end of the day it was easy,
and all they wanted was a conversation.
And nowadays, I love jumping on calls with clients,
because it's a great way to understand their problems,
speak to them and understand their situation
so that I can deliver a better service.
This is something I recommend
if you're freelancing on Upwork,
or if you run an agency too.
So thanks for watching this video
on how I made over $100,000 on upwork.com.
I really hope these tips helped you
and if you have any questions
about setting up your Upwork profile, or SEO in general,
please let me know in the comments section below,
and I'll be really happy to help.
And we've got 51 subscribers now,
so if you're watching this
and you haven't liked the video already, please do.
I know you wanna keep the information to yourself,
but it makes a huge difference to me,
and to you if you (mumbles),
if you smash a like on the video
so that I can help more people with my videos.
Thanks for watching.