Turn Your Laptop Into an ATM

00:00.51
Preston Lee
Hey and welcome back to another episode of freelance to founder. My name is Preston Lee with millo.co and joining me on the air today is my friend Clay Moseley from getdripify.com. hey clay.

00:11.55
Clay Mosley
Hey, man. How’s it going?

00:19.40
Preston Lee
Going well. We are joined also by our new friend Adam who coincidentally just like our last guest last week is from New York but calling from Europe this time from Brussels hey Adam how you doing? Yeah, we’re excited to have you guys listeners you’re in for a treat today because um.

00:25.98
Adam Palmer
Hello Hello Thanks for having me guys.

00:35.74
Preston Lee
Adam reached out connected with the show seemed like a really great fit because Adam wrote has this whole brand wrote this book all around how Upwork saved his life so we’re going to get into that a little bit but a little bit more deeper into this episode but Adam could you give us just like a glimpse into who you are what you’re working on and maybe. Maybe give the listeners an excuse to stick around for the next thirty minutes or so okay.

00:58.69
Adam Palmer
For sure. Yeah, well Thanks again for having me um I’ll keep my intro pretty brief. Basically I turn to freelancing because I needed money desperately as a lot of people probably find themselves in that similar predicament and um. Yeah I was I was using Upwork. Um for a business I was working at at the time for like you know, hiring people here and there small jobs. Um, there was a point where I hired like a pretty big. Ticket freelancer on there which kind of like opened my eyes like wow, you can like actually do some real business on here. Ah again, long story short I that job kind of ended I was in I wasn’t dead and I was just like you know what? if I got on as a freelancer. Um. And it was one of you know the best decisions I ever made my life because I quickly found that like this is such an amazing marketplace to find work and and be a freelancer because it’s just you know it’s pretty abundant on there. So um, yeah I landed. Like my first job on there helping with marketing automation which was basically my forte and um, yeah from there on it was like a $40 job that turned into a $14000 um job with this one client and I just you know as soon as I got this.

02:27.89
Adam Palmer
And I learned that like oh you can just kind of turn your laptop into an ATM machine. Essentially I was I was pretty hooked from that moment on and yeah, yes, well yeah, and I mean i.

02:33.94
Preston Lee
So yeah.

02:35.30
Clay Mosley
There’s there’s the excuse. There’s the excuse why people need to stick around is to turn their laptop into an ATM machine. Hey yeah.

02:39.00
Preston Lee
There’s the there’s the title for the episode. Yeah.

02:46.37
Adam Palmer
It honestly, it felt like that because it was just so cool to know like I could be working for anyone around the world and if I’m working I’m guaranteed to get paid and you know I I did things online for different companies in the past like. Like I say I came from a bit of a marketing background I was doing like some digital marketing for like 1 off places and in the past where it’s like you had to like chase down people for money and it was. It was very difficult to kind of rely on this as like and you know a serious income but it really. and and I perhapsm not getting paid from upwork or anything like that. But it wasn’t really until I discovered. Um the the way you can work on upwork that I was just like oh I can really actually rely on this and I was telling you guys earlier like as soon as I that Genie got out of the pot is like I’m not even gonna.

03:34.55
Preston Lee
Yeah, yeah.

03:42.79
Adam Palmer
You know, I could never send my application to a business ever again because it’s just I couldn’t imagine um, not working like this under these conditions where it’s just very empowering to.

03:51.50
Preston Lee
Yeah I Love you said that before we hit record that like once the genie was out of the bottle. There was no getting it back in and I love that sentiment because it’s so true like once once you get out of the phase of like will this work will this work and you’re in the phase of oh this is working. It’s working.

04:07.91
Clay Mosley
yeah.

04:09.42
Preston Lee
Even if it’s just those beginning phases man. It is so empowering and so exciting to just go like okay this is actually a viable way to live and work and wow it’s so much better than being chained to a desk 9 to 5 every single day.

04:20.95
Clay Mosley
I Miss that feeling I miss that feeling man I’m not even joking like I’m doing all right right now but like and you know this Preston you miss that like beginning stage feet excitement you know, but I also don’t.

04:35.40
Preston Lee
It’s true beginning. Yeah, that’s true. You’re right? it is It is way more exciting.

04:40.20
Clay Mosley
I Also I Also don’t miss the oh shit I’m broke feeling you know? yeah.

04:44.45
Preston Lee
Or like I’m going to be broke next month if I don’t figure this out and I think I think that’s part of why we’ve got Adam on the air today too is like he’s goingnna share with us a few things and clay and I will definitely have things to add. But we’re gonna talk about like how do I go from that that like okay this is this is starting to work I could see this working. But in the back of your mind you’re going like if I don’t find 2 more clients next month I’m in big trouble. Um, how do you go from that to like this is no problem I know I’m gonna have clients I know I’m gonna have revenue. Um this has completely changed my life and I think to Adam it’s fair to say like you said Upwork’s not paying you obviously they’re not paying us as well. Um. I’m a fan of upwork but I’m also we’ve had we’ve had guests on um, who have done this on Fiverr. We’ve had guests on who have done this outside of marketplaces like you know. This is obviously going to be a heavily tailored toward upward conversation. But like there are other ways to do it and other places to do it. We’re not saying Upwork is the only place that works. It’s just the Adam’s experience was through upwork and there are definitely some advantages that he leveraged in order to grow his business. But Adam let’s let’s start off with your story a little bit more then so. So. You you started freelancing on upwork you you got some pretty good clients early on that one. You talked about that turned into a $14000 job. Um, maybe let’s actually do this in reverse tell us now what your current situation is what like what is your business look like now.

06:08.75
Preston Lee
Ah, compared to when it started and how long ago was that.

06:13.30
Adam Palmer
So that I think first job was in like 2016 or so um, it’s been a minute. Yeah and you know I’m I’m serious when I say this like from that first job it. It really hasn’t stopped. Um. You know once once I tasted that I was like wow I could I could get more jobs and really like that attitude. Ah yeah, so I stuck with that kind of digital marketing niche. But um so I guess.

06:32.60
Preston Lee
Yourself? Yeah, and just real quick. What kind of what kind of work. Do you do on Upwork I’m not sure we talked about that. Yeah.

06:47.79
Adam Palmer
Automation Sales funnels that type of thing. Um, you know was was I guess my bread and butter and doing kind of those the Evergreen um product launches and things like that and um, yeah, so I would say that was like my bread and butter. But honestly like.

06:48.98
Preston Lee
Okay, cool.

07:06.77
Adam Palmer
At first and this is this is what I’m always trying to like preach to people. It’s like just don’t be 1 thing I think we’re you know out of this time when you can just be a graphic designer or be a copywriter be this be that. That’s great that you have those passions but I think it’s. If you really want to capture you know a wide variety of different people I think it is sometimes nice to have a lot of different skills and especially when you can ascertain those skills so easily like every single thing I learned was basically. Off of Youtube you know what? I mean so that information’s out there if you want to learn it so you know I I do kind of consider myself like a jackof- all trades master of nothing but you can you know essentially. I don’t know build authority in just by doing something. So yeah, sure Jack of all trades but like you can kind of I hate to say but like pretend you’re the master like at something if you kind of yeah right.

08:06.26
Clay Mosley
Well, you still know more than who’s hiring you right.

08:09.90
Preston Lee
Yeah.

08:11.47
Adam Palmer
Yeah, exactly and that’s and and that’s a great Point. It’s like most of the people on these platforms aren’t professional. Hirers themselves. You know they’re in a situation where they need help and if you know more than that person. You know as a freelancer and can save the client’s time. That’s ultimately you know how you should start to value your own time.. It’s like what is the time that I’m saving these professionals by helping them with stuff that you may have done before which that’s why it’s so important to just kind of like enhance your skill set.

08:35.60
Preston Lee
Ah.

08:47.88
Adam Palmer
Because it’s really just all wisdom. It’s like did you do that particular thing before um, but yeah I’d say you know what? what was the original question though. Princeton oh sure.

08:58.34
Preston Lee
I um, just wondering what your business looks like now. So you know we’ve we’ve talked about sort of going from that that idea of like oh am I going to find a client next month but what what does your business look like now. What are you up to? okay.

09:09.70
Adam Palmer
So still on upwork. Ah, we now you know I’m one of the the top people on the platform now. Um with you know, pretty pretty nice income from from. From upwork and then I started an agency on upwork too. And now we’re like 1 of the biggest agencies on there which basically just kind of morphed into that just due to clients sticking with me over time and just not having you know the bandwidth to support them all on my own. So.

09:34.39
Preston Lee
So yeah.

09:39.35
Adam Palmer
Um, it kind of happened all naturally where we just needed more people on on our side to just support the clients and um it was nice because I was helping a lot of freelancers too and through helping them we gain trust and then you know I. Basically brought them into the agency and things like that. So We just kind of grew and grew and now we have about 50 freelancers on um, the agency. It’s called automate Scale on Upwork and yeah man every day we’re just we’re just grinding on there and um, it’s there’s you know.

10:01.65
Preston Lee
Ah.

10:09.84
Preston Lee
Yeah, yeah.

10:15.69
Adam Palmer
No reason for us to to wet off the gas or or you know, really kind of look for other ways to to get clients like you know, everything’s fed through us, you know, right? right through upwork. So it’s just we’re in a really great place right now. Yeah.

10:28.77
Preston Lee
I Love it. It’s ah it’s a true like freelancer to founder progression right? We have a lot of people on the show who are maybe haven’t completed that process yet. You’ve gone completely from freelancer to now you’re a founder running a business 50 employees or 50 contractors or freelancecers or whatever I mean. That’s that’s really Awesome. So I think we’re going to have some fun digging into some of this stuff today. So tell us. Okay, if I’m a listener and I’m going like I’m just getting started in freelancing or maybe maybe my freelance business is Feast Famine or it’s struggling or I would just like to grow.

10:47.55
Clay Mosley
Yeah, yeah.

10:48.25
Adam Palmer
Sure.

11:05.21
Preston Lee
How do I leverage a marketplace like upwork where do I start and what do I do? okay.

11:10.30
Adam Palmer
Sure. Yeah, so that that all comes down to the profile. Obviously you know that was one of the biggest things I did early on it was I woke up on like a Saturday broke and I was just like I need to get myself out of this place and I went. And I was just like okay I’m going to do this I’m going to make it really awesome. So I spent a lot of time there on the profile making videos making sure the you know the profile picture look nice, presentable. You know, really utilize all of the different. Um. Different space. They allow you leverage. You know what? you’ve learned in marketing like take advantage of all those places because that’s that’s the primary thing I always tell people like what’s the best you know if they ask like oh it was the best way to like send proposals and stuff like that. It’s like start at a good profile because ultimately everything’s going to come back to that. So.

12:03.73
Preston Lee
I okay, so so if I’m not a marketer. Yeah, we’re going to ask the same question. Go clay. Yeah I think the 3 of us are marketers. We could totally like we probably have some ideas but let’s say a graphic designer is listening to this.

12:05.15
Adam Palmer
Um, so.

12:06.70
Clay Mosley
So can you give it a little. Ah yeah, like oh I was gonna say like what does a good profile mean because like that’s totally subjective. Yeah.

12:11.65
Adam Palmer
Sure yeah.

12:19.97
Preston Lee
And they’re like I don’t know what makes a good profile.

12:21.95
Adam Palmer
Sure? Well I think it’s always going to come down to searchability right? So um, the way upwork works is a lot of times clients are posting the jobs that they want and then after they post it upworks. Typically like maybe spoon feeding them some people that maybe they should look at and things like that but upwork only spoon feeds those people using the data that the the freelancer allows and obviously when you’re starting out. You may not have a lot of the quantitative metrics like scores and reviews and things like that that. Um, you know we’ll we’ll help upwork know that you’re good. So you really do need to like kind of stack it with the right words. So if I was like a say a graphic design or something like that I would try what I think is is really good is usually using the like the platforms that um. You know, maybe a client would be looking for it for someone to know like think Adobe photoshop and yeah or illustrator. Um, you know and so many people just yeah, um, trying to think like what’s the thumbnail website I can’t even think of it right now but like.

13:17.27
Preston Lee
Like Photoshop or illustrator or something. Okay.

13:35.49
Adam Palmer
So Many people just um, use that I’ll try to think of it. But yeah, any kind of platform that you think will be possibly put into the proposal from the client I would try to match that up because all of that that different data is going to help. With searchability and seo and stuff like that because you have to kind of look at it as okay, your a business on this googleish kind of marketplace where people are going to be making inquiries and you want to best align with that. Obviously if you.

14:04.26
Preston Lee
So are you? So is this like like you know on Amazon how the titles for products have just gotten like ridiculous. It’s like a whole paragraph I mean do you want to go that far or or do you put them in other places in your profile or.

14:14.48
Adam Palmer
You right? Yeah exactly No I don’t think a whole paragraph. Yeah titles Definitely important. Ah because you you. You want to be aligned with that person. So if I was searching graphic designer like I would you know want to see like professional graphic design or but blah blah something. That’s just going to have that kind of continuity which is you know, pretty simple all right.

14:37.63
Preston Lee
So yeah.

14:38.23
Clay Mosley
So does a does forget my ignorance. It’s been a long time since I’ve been on Upwork but like can you have a video on a profile.

14:45.39
Adam Palmer
Sure, yeah, so that was another big thing that I did that at the time I don’t think a lot of people were really doing like in 2016 I think there was this fear on Upwork.

14:57.60
Clay Mosley
Yeah.

15:05.20
Adam Palmer
You know I don’t know who’s doing the job who I’m hiring like you know unverified people like who is this shady guy and stuff like that because of remember what I was saying earlier like ah we we were hiring people for small jobs so you didn’t really give to like you didn’t really care that much like if we’re just doing data entry does it matter.

15:08.19
Clay Mosley
Oh for sure.

15:09.20
Preston Lee
So.

15:24.95
Adam Palmer
If this is Pete or Pete’s cousin doing it. We just need the data right? But like if we’re we’re talking about bigger projects for sure I want to know like who I’m talking to where is my money going these types of things so to to kind of add to my credibility early on. For sure that was one of those things I woke up that Saturday and was like I’m gonna make a good video and and by good I mean terrible I hate this thing was like thrown in front of like a green screen like you know it was just like it’s honestly still the video that’s live.

15:54.98
Clay Mosley
Ah, yeah, yeah, the green screen. Ah.

16:01.70
Clay Mosley
Oh how funny must work. Well just to be up there.

16:01.83
Adam Palmer
On my profile. So if you guys check that out like you’ll see how cringe this thing actually is but it was yeah I didn’t see any need to change it because I’m just like this brought me some luck I’m not going to I’m not going to like make it overly professional and then not have it work and be like do you know but um. Yeah, so that was like 1 of those delineating things I think that really helped me early on because the thing with video and and so and this is so obvious now. But you know you’re able to make a connection with someone. They’re able to know how you sound what you’re about There’s a lot of you know? ah. Authority and truth that can be kind of spoken in those couple minutes which is reassuring to the people. So if it’s going to be me versus someone that they may not you know, fully believe in like I’m going to win out so that that was happening like a lot early on like and people were almost like. Pre-sold by the time they did get on the phone with me because they’re like you know you obviously know what you’re talking about you. You know they don’t have to ask these preliminary questions where it’s like a first date when you get on the phone with them. It feels like more of like a second or third date by the time you get onto the phone with them because they’ve seen.

17:02.95
Preston Lee
Um, yeah.

17:11.83
Adam Palmer
All these things and that brings me back to the point of like the profile. The profile should really do that for you? Um, So in addition to the video in addition to a good title. A good brief and and describing all the platforms that you work with um. You know one of the biggest things especially for like a graphic designer would be ah your portfolio section and things like that and really just like kind of having that do some of the speaking for you and you can get really crazy Also um, inside of these portfolios on Upwork where you can actually. Do case studies you can do a video within that. Um you can. You can go real heavy on this and um, if you guys do check out my profile. At some point you can see like what I did there and um, how I created some of these case Studies. So people really could spend time and if there ever does come these conversations. You know when I’m having a you know talk with a prospect and stuff like that instead of spending that time going through all this redundant stuff I’m just like you know you obviously didn’t do your homework and check out my my my profile like so maybe go back and do that and then we’ll jump on the phone again and stuff like that. So it kind of gives you a little more power.

18:24.37
Preston Lee
Yeah.

18:29.15
Adam Palmer
Um, in sifting through problematic ah potential clients and things like that because I don’t know it establishes you. It’s just it’s just been a lot better verses you in that employee mindset right? where you’re at an interview table and but blah and I’m like oh trying to answer questions like.

18:40.68
Preston Lee
Ah.

18:45.20
Preston Lee
Yeah.

18:49.70
Adam Palmer
That was not the route that I wanted it to come you know more or less like I’m interviewing them at this point as as they’re interviewing me. It’s more of a conversation and and they should know you know? Yeah yeah.

18:49.55
Preston Lee
Um, yeah.

18:59.81
Preston Lee
Yeah, it’s yeah we we’ve we’ve talked about this like um even with your own online portfolio like not and not inside of upwork or any marketplace just on your own website you you should. You should sell yourself so much on your website that when they pick up the phone or send an email or however, they contact you that becomes a closing situation. Not a selling situation. Um.

19:20.28
Adam Palmer
Um, yeah.

19:23.00
Preston Lee
Maybe maybe a little bit of extra selling but really in in the with the goal of closing them on that phone call and so you you should really have the right copy the right images the right messaging the right pain points identified all of that stuff that makes up sort of a good um marketing message regardless of where you’re at so that when a client contacts you you say. So you’ve seen the Datada you’ve seen that we did this for so-and-so so you’ve seen these results. We’d love to get the same for you when should we start right? and then it becomes like a closing situation instead of like yeah so I’ve done this and I’ve done this and it and it feels more like a job interview.

19:54.78
Adam Palmer
Yeah I can tell you you know with the exception of maybe a few mostly all of my clients like it’s been that right? It’s been getting on the phone and it’s just making sure nothing’s. You know, nothing’s out of whack and it’s a closing situation any any time where I have to force a sale I Just don’t even want to do it. You know if if like you don’t want me, it’s It’s all good. There’s plenty of freelancers out there and there’s plenty of clients like there’s no reason to force anything here. Everybody should feel good about it and if not like that’s.

20:15.70
Preston Lee
So yeah.

20:19.81
Clay Mosley
So yeah, it’s good.

20:29.29
Adam Palmer
Just go on with their lives. But no I never ever try to like oversell myself. It’s It’s just a disaster in the making.

20:34.40
Preston Lee
Yeah, yeah, so I think this has been some really good advice about your profile just to recap we’re talking about like using words and images that will make sure that your client can find you as a good match So when they’re searching or an upward recommends you.

20:36.93
Clay Mosley
Um.

20:51.44
Preston Lee
That’s primarily a keyword copy sort of situation. We’re talking about building credibility by adding videos images experiences results. Um, ah, any sort of ah you said a them like any sort of tools that you use hard skills that you might have. And then also proof and examples like proof that you’re ah you’re worth working with or at least exploring um, having a portfolio depending on what kind of work that you do so like that’s all, really fantastic here’s what I keep hearing Adam from freelancers. When we recommend upwork so we have quite a few resources on upwork throughout our blog and our Youtube channel and all the time we get comments from freelancers that say like this is all well and good. But I’ve started on upwork I’ve filled out my profile and it’s crickets I get no attention I get um. You know I don’t get recommended by upwork I like what do I do? What am I doing wrong? Do you have any I know it can be hard because it sounds like yours you did really well from the beginning right? So but but do you have any advice after all these years of being on upwork of what may be a new. Upworker can do or any marketplace but you even said like there’s so many other freelancers out there right? So that’s one of the biggest issues of upwork is so much competition. What can a person do if they feel like they’ve built a good profile. They’re trying their best but there’s just no traction. Yeah they’re stuck.

22:10.74
Clay Mosley
And they’re stuck.

22:16.55
Adam Palmer
Here’s the thing 85% of freelancers that get on upwork don’t get any money. You know that’s the crazy statistic and it’s yeah, it’s it’s crazy and it’s getting more and more competitive every day you know again in 162

22:21.75
Preston Lee
That’s that’s terrifying. Yeah.

22:33.40
Adam Palmer
There were very few professional, high end people on there charging you know hundreds of dollars per hour right? like that was the big thing back then it was like oh I don’t want to work for five dollars ten dollars an hour like this is this is crazy I’ll never you know sell my soul for that. But that’s definitely not the case and and the myth that like. You know people don’t want to spend money on there is is crazy because there’s a lot of people charging many hundreds per hour these days. Not not just me but all that’s so that’s the so That’s what I was kind of getting into so it’s just like super competitive right? Um, and and and the thing why it’s.

22:59.10
Clay Mosley
So can you go into in more detail. Why 85% of people don’t get money.

23:12.19
Adam Palmer
Such a large number because there’s so many freelancers you know there’s there. There’s a surplus freelancers. There’s never been like a a scarcity on that that side so there’s you know 1 job for um, teen number of freelancers and that’s that’s primarily why that’s high. But. Don’t let that scare you um because I do believe that if you want it, you can get it because here’s the other thing like most of those 85% of people aren’t like going 100 % you know crazy conviction hard in the paint.

23:47.21
Preston Lee
So yeah.

23:50.94
Adam Palmer
Like you know, not letting loose and yeah I made it seem like my first job was easy. But again it was on a weekend and I just kept going into the find work category and and applying um and you know that’s that’s what’s needed and you know they’re the jobs. Are coming through at such a rapid clip because we’re talking about scale here. Yeah 85% people don’t give we’re talking like hundreds of thousands of jobs being posted like you know like weekly basically and like if you just like. Put the pedal to the medal and keep applying and like I said you know the first the first things is I have like a good profile make sure that’s legit but the second thing is like make sure your proposals are good and that doesn’t mean you know, copy pasting dog Bs that like has nothing to do with the job like. If if you can go in there and apply and say okay, you have this part that you have this issue I can definitely help you with that and let’s let’s talk and if you go in with that type of mindset like some clients going to say. Yeah let’s get onto a phone call if you can solve that problem again. It goes back to saving that client time. If you can effectively do that? Um, you’re going to get hired and really, it’s just a numbers game and it’s happened like there’s so many jobs like I could go to my find work section right now and I guarantee. There’s a new job being posted in the last like couple minutes, you know that i.

25:21.33
Preston Lee
So yeah.

25:23.18
Adam Palmer
Could potentially bid on and when you’re dealing with something at that pace. It’s It’s hard for anyone with skills to tell me like oh there’s no work because it’s just not the case like these are not tire kicking um people that are just like oh like you know. Ah I may want to hire for this? No these are like people that like need something right now and time is of the Essence. So.

25:46.10
Preston Lee
Yeah, yeah, we spend a lot of time in in freelance marketplaces and studying sort of the freelance ecosystem just to stay on top of all of that and 1 thing we have definitely noticed is of all the marketplaces upwork seems to have among the highest quality clients like. Um, a lot like you compare to like Freelancer.com which is maybe ah similar in in size and scope and expectation. But you look at the caliber of clients on freelancer.com just based on the job descriptions. Um the the pay rates things like that. It’s it’s night and day compared with upwork.

26:12.27
Clay Mosley
And.

26:22.96
Preston Lee
Upwork just seems to have much like you said just tons and tons of opportunity but also higher quality opportunity and I’ll say so we’re building listeners might know that we run a product called solid gigs and it’s a lead generation service for freelancers and um, we’re we’re building in some Ai functions into. Into the tool for this upcoming year and so part of that is to like is to build search bots that will go out and actually search sites that you specify like upwork and so we’ve built like a demo bot to go out and search upwork and it’s insane. The amount of data. It comes back with just because you’re right, there’s just this. Like river of new leads constantly that match and that’s matching certain criteria. That’s not even all the leads on the site. That’s just saying like I’m a graphic designer and I want to make. Yeah yeah, and it’s it’s insane. How much business is going through upwork and how much opportunity there is for freelancers. So.

27:02.94
Clay Mosley
And.

27:06.93
Adam Palmer
Yeah, it’s just a fragment.

27:18.59
Adam Palmer
And well and the crazy thing is you can set up like an Rss feed that that’s um, kind of taken off of the find search and then we run that into like a Trello environment so like every time something is posted. Yeah, but like you know what our trello boards get filled.

27:26.80
Preston Lee
Yeah.

27:28.60
Clay Mosley
Oh that’s awesome.

27:35.50
Adam Palmer
Like we can’t fill a treo board normally like with like our clients and stuff like that. But every time I’ll get like a zaer like ah um, error you know it’s like board filled like freeer Ace and we have like two different va like sifting through this like archiving different things and we still can’t even stay on top of it without triggering.

27:36.52
Preston Lee
Ah.

27:52.50
Preston Lee
Can’t keep up. Yeah.

27:52.82
Clay Mosley
That’s crazy.

27:53.74
Adam Palmer
Cards and it’s just like you said that we’re just we’re just using I think 8 search inquiries you know and and basically making that off of the like platforms that we work with like ah like say an infusion soft or a hubspot or something like that and the board gets completely filled up and.

27:59.10
Preston Lee
Yeah.

28:09.98
Clay Mosley
Um, wow.

28:12.85
Adam Palmer
That’s it’s just that type of clip. So it’s like you know people people can say that but I’m sure like they may get frustrated on a Monday and not apply again until a Friday or something like that but are they going you know 3 or 4 times per day and hitting up every single job in their wheelhouse. Every day you know until they get something because you know it and especially early on. Ah, if you if you don’t have any of the income. It’s probably hard to like keep that up but still if I’m down.

28:34.43
Clay Mosley
Um.

28:42.37
Adam Palmer
And a week or if I do have some spare time or something like that like I’m applying still like I want to make sure upwork does know that like we’re still hungry in these types of things so any opportunity to bid. You know we’re gonna bid also just just to just to let them know that and.

28:53.93
Preston Lee
Ah.

28:58.84
Preston Lee
Yeah, would you say it? sorry go ahead.

28:59.40
Clay Mosley
In.

29:01.20
Adam Palmer
You know, Obviously it’s not as sorry oh I was just gonna say it’s you know, like bidding on jobs and and and sending proposals isn’t as great as like getting an invite because you know usually those are much warmer leads but still, um, we’ve we’ve we’ve received great clients on on proposals that we’ve sent out.

29:13.43
Preston Lee
Yeah.

29:20.86
Adam Palmer
And I can just yeah I Just in attest to that. Oh very low on a proposal being sent out. Oh ah, good question. Yeah.

29:24.19
Clay Mosley
What’s your conversion rate on that. Yeah, like what? what if you had to put a number to it What what would you say? and ah the reason I’m bringing this up is because I I want people to have realistic expectations on this.

29:35.64
Preston Lee
Yeah I Love that.

29:38.25
Clay Mosley
So that way they don’t have like they don’t get discouraged whenever they don’t get a job right.

29:40.81
Preston Lee
And ballparks fine at them like is it less than 10 percent is it less than.

29:40.85
Adam Palmer
Sure oh yeah, yeah for sure less than 10 percent probably less than 5% probably like close to like maybe like 1 or two percent you know I would say it’s.

29:49.86
Clay Mosley
Wow.

29:50.49
Preston Lee
So for every hundred proposals. You send you get 1 or 2

29:55.90
Adam Palmer
And yeah I know it sounds like a lot when you say like that but there could be maybe like 3 or 4 in a day right? that like just pop off and that’s the that’s the other thing that’s really hard to wrap your head around because yeah, those statistics are great, but here’s the thing. Every single client is unique. It’s like a roulette game right? like just because the last spun spin spun 23 doesn’t mean that it has anything to do with the next spin. So like you could get discouraged by a client and and feel like there’s these patterns.

30:19.55
Preston Lee
Yep.

30:31.28
Adam Palmer
But there’s realistically no patterns. There’s no like cheap you know client pattern there’s no um, angry client pattern there’s no like I’m not getting talked to It’s realistically like every conversion point is new for that particular job because you may align differently. You may say the right things that they’re looking for. You may get in on the right time. Because they could have just posted and you’re 2 minutes on and then you send that thing and they’re like yeah let’s let’s just talk. Um, so there’s all these like dynamic factors that some you know on average sure like one two percent but there could be these hot days and they could be a hot client that’s like.

31:08.64
Preston Lee
Yeah, yeah.

31:08.67
Adam Palmer
You know, paying tenfold of what the other one um, paid as far as like the the whole entire budget goes. So but that’s the thing. Yeah, it can get discouraging and and more often than than not you know, a lot of people are bidding but that’s just you know, realistically you’re you’re kind of competing against yourself.

31:26.10
Preston Lee
Yeah, no I mean I I think that’s perfect I think it’s I think it’s smart to let people know the numbers because I think what has what I’ve heard of freelancers doing some of these freelances I was telling you about leave comments on our Youtube channel or whatever they’ll say.

31:27.68
Adam Palmer
You know, like how do you make your prof. Yeah.

31:40.87
Preston Lee
You know I only have so many connects my my account only came with so many free connects or whatever and and I don’t want to buy more and so it’s like I’ll send 5 proposals or something and I don’t hear back from anyone and it’s like well yeah, you got to send a hundred of them 200 of them before you start to hear back from a significant number of people.

31:40.91
Adam Palmer
Yeah.

31:50.17
Adam Palmer
Um.

31:52.69
Clay Mosley
So yeah, from.

31:57.26
Preston Lee
And that’s how it is in and out of a marketplace I mean if you’re doing any sort of cold outreach I’ve done a ton of cold outreach in my business over the years and that’s just the numbers of cold outreach. You’re going to get 5% or less. It’s sales. It’s it’s cold sales.

32:04.97
Clay Mosley
Um, it’s sales and.

32:13.30
Adam Palmer
It’s cold sales and like I said like the invites are are awesome. Obviously, but yeah I think realistically yeah, it’s it’s tough. You know it’s It’s trying to get a stranger to give you money and.

32:16.79
Preston Lee
Yeah, yeah.

32:26.29
Adam Palmer
Um, especially you know early on when you don’t have that social proof and you just have credits that you know you don’t even know if you’re going to make that money back. It’s it’s it’s tough so you have to kind of get past that that issue you know Fortunately, for me. Um.

32:26.77
Preston Lee
Ah.

32:40.00
Preston Lee
Yeah.

32:45.41
Adam Palmer
Those connects thing it didn’t really exist like especially bidding um in on 2 16 right? because and you could just fire at will um, a lot which you know wasn’t that awesome on the client side because you’d get a lot of um you know rubbish. But um.

32:47.37
Preston Lee
Yeah, it for sure didn’t exist in 2016

32:57.88
Preston Lee
All right.

33:03.73
Adam Palmer
Yeah, now it’s a little more. It’s a little more selective you you know you got to make sure that um you know you are you are making the best of it if you are going to spend those connects and then it it is a little ridiculous too like some of the some of the bidding get up sketch up to like a hundred connects for some of the jobs.

33:16.73
Preston Lee
Yeah, yeah.

33:21.30
Adam Palmer
And you know that’s I don’t know there’s a lot of there’s a lot of freelancecers Now there are yeah.

33:24.54
Preston Lee
I mean I’ve heard a lot of complaints from freelancers about the kexts um I’ve heard it mostly as a negative thing in the freelancer side I I see it obviously it’s not ideal for for freelancers who are getting started who have really tight budget who aren’t. Really confident yet aren’t sure they’re going to be able to convert when they pay for those connects but like at the same time we talk about the massive amount of competition I actually think it can be a positive thing because now instead of thousands and thousands of applications. A client’s getting maybe hundreds or. If you’re lucky maybe dozens right instead of like sorting through 5000 people and hoping they find you they’re sorting through 200 people and hoping they find you so like there’s there’s an upside for the freelancers too for those connects but it just it does cost you.

34:03.73
Clay Mosley
So and yeah.

34:10.42
Adam Palmer
Yeah, there’s there’s a lot of people not too happy, but those are the people probably being vocal. You know what? I mean? Um, so it’s it’s hard to say I mean I don’t have too much of a problem with it because the way I look at it is like.

34:14.67
Preston Lee
Yeah, um.

34:26.63
Adam Palmer
1 good client realistically will pay for all the k connectcts you’ll ever spend period you know so for me I’m kind of playing with house money on the on the knect side I mean I will out. Yeah so I’ll just at this point I just outbid everybody I don’t know if it’s effective or not I just.

34:27.82
Preston Lee
Yeah, exactly.

34:28.67
Clay Mosley
This this is.

34:36.49
Preston Lee
Yep, be up.

34:37.52
Clay Mosley
That’s a good way of looking at it.

34:46.31
Adam Palmer
I just want to just outfit everybody and it’s it’s probably stupid. But yeah I mean yeah I think it is a good good thing as far as the marketplace is involved because even like on ah on an Amazon like you can advertise on Amazon and think about like if you’re if you’re doing a product up against a product that has like. 9000 reviews. You know it’s you’re just going to get a constantly buried by the algorithm. So this is like that one opportunity that is a little empowering for the freelancer to reassert themselves with.

35:11.56
Preston Lee
Ah.

35:17.29
Preston Lee
Yeah.

35:19.40
Adam Palmer
Out the algorithms help. So if you are kind of confident in yourself and that particular job you can circumvent that and sure the fear is like the the client’s going to skip past you and go to the highest score but probably not right like they got I mean that’s that’s what I’ve heard but like they’re obviously seeing. Your face pushed up. You know I think it then comes down to two like did you say the right thing in the proposal is your profile good. Um, because I don’t think it’s just like I you know from from a client you know, speaking from the client I mean I’ve spent hundreds of thousands of hours on upwork as a client.

35:47.34
Preston Lee
Ah, and.

35:57.93
Adam Palmer
Um, you know I would want to see who’s paying to to see be seen I think that would make it seem like ok this person really wants that so you know I’ve seen. Yeah, so you know I’ve seen like people say like oh now it’s hard to like organize people and things like that I.

35:57.98
Preston Lee
Ah.

36:04.14
Preston Lee
And yeah, they’re serious about it.

36:05.69
Clay Mosley
And.

36:16.27
Adam Palmer
Don’t know about all that I don’t I don’t know if this thing is is all bad and you know it’s obviously like a ah way to generate liquidity for the system so they can operate better and so there’s other things you know, um.

36:29.42
Preston Lee
Yeah, yeah, but I think for freelancers. It’s important to I think it’ll be interesting to watch it play out. But I think it’s important to keep in mind that it can be leveraged as as a tool that didn’t exist before like it used to be you either got recommended by Upwork which was nearly impossible when you were just starting out and didn’t have any real credentials.

36:30.67
Clay Mosley
In.

36:46.70
Adam Palmer
Right.

36:49.42
Preston Lee
Or you sent a cold proposal and and you still didn’t have credentials and you were among thousands of cold proposals and it was really it was it was luck a lot of time like I’ve hired a ton on upwork as well and it’s like after the first 10 or twenty that I’m looking at if they all look the same I I don’t I can’t keep looking forever and ever and so.

36:54.50
Clay Mosley
So.

37:05.30
Clay Mosley
This is.

37:05.83
Adam Palmer
Yeah, it’s hard to get past that second page. Yeah yeah, after like the first tenure like okay I get the idea as someone out of this is.

37:07.75
Preston Lee
I Think there’s a lot of upside for freelancers. Yeah yep, yeah yeah, well and and yeah and they’re and they’re They’re very similar right? and so you have to find ways coming back to your earlier advice in your profile to stand out.

37:10.17
Clay Mosley
Um, what.

37:23.14
Preston Lee
And um, and to maybe look more professional or show experience that other people are less likely to have um you know we did I did a year-long podcast with my friend Andy who quit his job to start freelancing on upwork and um, you can listen to that at millo.co/podcasts. It’s called my freelance life and. He ah, he basically differentiated by offering a really unique service and so when upwork was recommending freelancers for these services. There’s not as many clients like that need writing or graphic design but he did um like spreadsheets and data management and stuff like that and there was still plenty of work. But he was different from a lot of people and and he stood out. Um because he offered this unique service. So I think I don’t know there’s there’s lots I think what we’re getting down to is like there’s a lot of opportunity but you have to play your cards right? and you have to be serious about it. So many people sign up like you said Adam and it’s just like.

38:04.20
Clay Mosley
Me.

38:14.33
Clay Mosley
Are.

38:19.33
Preston Lee
I’ll just sign up and see what happens. Well no, that’s not going to work.

38:20.60
Adam Palmer
No, it’s not yeah and and yeah, you’re going to get phased out and I’d say the the the most needed talent on there is like consistency right? if you have that.

38:23.64
Clay Mosley
Um.

38:35.24
Adam Palmer
The talent of consistency and and showing that you’re going to show up and not just be all your weekend Warrior or that type of thing like clients can see that like they want dedicated people. Um, so if you can kind of prove that early on it’s it’s going to be a you know it’s going to be a downhill.

38:43.25
Preston Lee
Yeah, yeah.

38:44.80
Clay Mosley
A.

38:53.60
Adam Palmer
And battle from there.

38:53.67
Clay Mosley
Can you can you touch on price on these marketplaces like you like yeah like so because you go you go on. Um, you go on Upwork right? You see a whole range of fees.

38:58.65
Adam Palmer
So price.

39:06.73
Adam Palmer
So.

39:10.78
Clay Mosley
Some are really really inexpensive. Some are more Expensive. So like there’s there’s you know and considering the like the consumers that would actually go and hire freelancers like a lot of them go with the lowest price with some of Them. Don’t can you kind of give your your experience with how to. Price yourself on a marketplace like this.

39:31.60
Adam Palmer
Yeah, sure. Yeah, and um, my whole thing is like you’re you’re you’ve created your own business right? So you have your own product. You have your own Ceo your your your whole staff like internally right.

39:38.57
Clay Mosley
This is.

39:46.20
Clay Mosley
This is.

39:48.51
Adam Palmer
So you you have to kind of set that up for yourself. So originally when I got on I was about $45 an hour. So like my first gig was was like a $45 small batch job and I really don’t like to do fixed. Projects I do recommend them maybe doing them early on because you can get some reviews right out the door quickly like I said like this this first job was like really small and then he turned it around after I completed that job got the $45 then he’s like okay can I hire you for like 10 to 15 hours a week like. Awesome! Um, here’s my rate $45 and so I was psyched from that like that’s that’s realistically like when I thought my laptop turned into an atm machine because I could just use the tracker and know that like if I’m if if I’m working on this client. Um his name is Brian. Ah.

40:36.00
Clay Mosley
So nice.

40:45.13
Adam Palmer
I would I would be making money and that was the coolest thing about upwork because the time tracker insurance I think you know I talked to you guys before about like having to chase down clients and things like that and it’s just a nightmare and if you’re chasing down money old money spent like you can’t be working on new money and things like that. So. So when I discovered i. Okay, this time tracker make sure like you know I’m never going to have to chase the money. It’s all insured even if Brian’s credit card didn’t work upwork will still step in which I just thought was so cool. So it was 45 hours an hour at first and then. Basically what I did for my business was after every completed job and I got like a good review I would or maybe I acquired a new skill I’d say a good job Adam you’re gonna get and a raise.

41:39.30
Preston Lee
I yeah.

41:39.85
Adam Palmer
Um, and so I basically gamified it for myself. Um, and I wasn’t really thinking about anyone else on upwork. What their prices were what they do but blah blah this was in competition with myself and I was just like okay this is going to incentivize me. Do good work. Get that review and maybe if I don’t know something learn about it and and upskill myself and give myself an atta boy and so that’s just the way I looked at it. So 45 quickly became like 65 and then 75 then 87 I was just like getting more and more psyched I was always. Excited to work and then when it like got past a hundred I was like oh my god like I’m making like what actually I like like I told you about that that 1 kind of um, like not cheap guy that I hired when I was working for that business. He was charging $100 per hour and i. Always thought like oh my god like I couldn’t imagine like sitting at a computer making $100 per hour like what a doctor or a lawyer made doing like some type of stupid platform like infusion soft and that’s what we hired this like original guy chris for so when I hit that hundred dollar mark I was just like I was so stoked you know the fact that like I could be in like spain. Or something on a on my computer and just like okay if I’m working I’m getting paid so that’s that’s the way I looked at it I was always trying to do better and then that kept going to.

43:12.15
Adam Palmer
Two fifty two seventy five 3 50 over 40500 like it I mean it’s it’s just crazy to think about clients paying that amount per hour for for work that you do, but they do it because. What I always say is the most expensive freelancer is the one that fucks your project up, you know and like they have to go back and so like you know if they imagine the the energy spent like trying to onboard a new freelancer and then they like mess it up. So now you’re out of time.

43:35.14
Preston Lee
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

43:39.19
Clay Mosley
That’s so true.

43:50.47
Adam Palmer
You’re out of energy and then you got to rehire for something well imagine just like hiring someone that you knew like dedicated their lives to this knew exactly what you need and can bang it out quicker like the price isn’t. So much going to be the major concern. It’s the time that’s going to be saved. It’s the quality of it. It’s knowing that you know I could just pick up what they’re putting down without a lot of explanation and you know this you know we again I do like automation and and things like. That so it’s like a lot of these times we’re building something that can kind of just like exist after I’m gone and just generate money. Yeah, so there was a lot of like ah Roi speak I can speak to this. So sure it’s like you know, a job could be $20000, but this thing should bring in like 100 k or something like that. So.

44:24.92
Preston Lee
A lot of value there.

44:40.87
Preston Lee
Ah, yeah.

44:41.39
Adam Palmer
You know, as far as that I was always able to kind of justify it in a way but as far as the price el last elasticity and like what people are willing to pay per hour um again I think there’s are really big myths that people are just generally like looking for the cheapest thing. They may say that they may try to like negotiate and blah blah blah. But that’s why you have to have a strong business and say no, this is my rate this is what other people are paying and in fact, it’s just kind of going up. So if you don’t lock in this now like be prepared.

45:05.71
Preston Lee
Um, yeah, ah.

45:17.22
Adam Palmer
To spend more later because if you look at the track record this is what’s been happening you know for for years now and then that gives that like little scarcity kind of play into it and yeah, they’re just like okay, let’s let’s try it out. So um, that’s that’s yeah.

45:19.00
Preston Lee
Um, yeah.

45:28.36
Preston Lee
Um, yeah I think 1 thing I learned from what 1 thing I’m learning from what you’re saying here and that I learned from Andy when we did that podcast I was referencing earlier so Andy had a similar experience. He started really low. Like Twenty five bucks an hour or something um and then he literally doubled it like every time he had a he got a client without much pushback. He doubled it and then he would get another client without much pushback and he doubled it again and he he doubled it like 6 times or something crazy I don’t remember I’ll have to go back and listen to the podcast. But.

45:52.78
Adam Palmer
So.

46:03.27
Preston Lee
He just kept doubling doubling doubling doubling um and before he knew it? Yeah, he was charging like these huge amounts but what he found was the process was perfect for something like upwork because early on it was he was cheap but high quality and so someone would hire him for like twenty five bucks an hour and then he would do $300 an hour quality work. And so they would just like rave about him fivestar reviews really long in-depth reviews about how great he was and that would go on his profile cha-ching right? So then so then he increases his rates but now he’s increased his rates but he has reviews under his belt and so he just it was like this perfect like.

46:36.80
Adam Palmer
5

46:40.51
Preston Lee
Lineupon Line building bit by bit until he then was able to charge the big numbers. But then he had reviews from charging less and it just was like this this sort of perfect flow of getting right to where he wanted to be right in the sweet spot and I’m and I’m hearing the same story from you. Um I think actually. You know this this fear of like well clients are only looking for really low priced freelancers or whatever. There’s There’s a group of clients and they’re the clients that you want that actually don’t look at low priced freelancers because they’re the ones you’re talking about that are going to mess up your project. Um I actually.

47:15.27
Clay Mosley
Yeah, that’s me.

47:16.99
Adam Palmer
And.

47:18.71
Preston Lee
Prefer to hire someone who charges a little bit more because they’re serious about it just like someone who pays more connect credits. They’re serious about the work that they’re doing. Yeah.

47:21.37
Clay Mosley
Yeah.

47:27.00
Adam Palmer
Yeah, they have more to lose they’re in it and and social proof is just so powerful.

47:37.42
Preston Lee
Well Adam this has been really insightful for me. We’re unfortunately out of time today but this has been really helpful. Hopefully the listeners gotten a lot out of it. Um, thank you so much for taking time to chat with us today. Will you let the listeners know where they can connect with you where they can find your book your blog. Whatever you want to promote. Just let them know where they.

47:39.70
Clay Mosley
Yeah, for sure.

47:55.15
Preston Lee
Connect with you and find you so.

47:56.60
Adam Palmer
Sure if you’re on upwork um, you can you can connect with me there and network with me. It’s upwork.com/fl for freelancer slash Adam Palmer um and then if you guys want a copy of the free book. Ah, you can go to freelanceking.com/book. Ah, and then yeah, the channel is upwork saved my life on Youtube and if you just want to go to freelance king.com you can you can find me there email me [email protected] would love to hear from you guys and and again, thank you so much for having me I love talking about this stuff. It’s it’s so empowering. It’s so important in the days that we’re we’re living in and yeah it’ is really nice to connect with you guys.

48:40.37
Clay Mosley
Yeah, it’s good to connect.

48:40.60
Preston Lee
Absolutely yeah, yeah with you as well. Thanks for taking the time today. Be sure to check out Adam stuff. We’ll be sure to link to it in the show description as well. So we’ll have links there for you for quick access. But Adam thank you so much for joining us and Clay Moseley from gitripify.com

48:57.19
Clay Mosley
Yeah, thanks, a lot guys.

48:57.87
Preston Lee
Pleasure as always my friend you guys take care see. Yeah.

48:58.44
Adam Palmer
Thanks Guys Bye bye.