Hey Prompt Entrepreneur,
Now that we’ve got our basic profile in place we need to start filling it with what actually matters: past work history and reviews.
This is what Upwork clients are looking for. And when you first start there’s an awkward phase where your profile is empty. In this Part we’ll be getting over that hump
Let’s get started:
Securing your first freelance clients
1. Low cost first gigs
For your very first gigs I recommend finding and completing low cost (<$100) jobs.
We want volume here. Doing a gig for $5 is the same as doing a gig for $5000 as far as the number of jobs and number of reviews is concerned. Your “total billed” will obviously be low but at least we’ll get off the ground with a handful of lower-cost gigs.
Consider this lower price work as a marketing cost for you. Instead of running adverts to build your profile and marketing you are taking a lower rate on your work. It’s not a outgoing cost but a reduction in revenue.
Still don’t fancy doing lower priced work? One recommendation here is doing this sort of work for charities or non-profits. Then it’s a two for one – you’re doing low cost work for reviews but you are also providing a valuable service to a worthwhile cause.
Head to Find Work, enter your category and skills and optionally set the fixed price to a lower bracket (ie. <$100). It’ll be simpler to pick up more gigs here. And more gigs means more reviews.
Here’s an example gig that would work:
This is a very simple with a low ($50!) price.
To apply for the gig you need to send a proposal. You do this by hitting Apply. In that next screen you’ll see more details about the gig as well as the questions you’ll need to answer.
The most important is the Cover Letter.
The cover letter is where you get to tell the potential client about yourself and convince them you are the right person for the job.
Most people on Upwork just use a copy/paste template. Don’t do that. We’re going to do better.
We’re going to combine your profile and the job description and have ChatGPT create a cover letter for us.
Here’s the prompt:
Act as a Upwork freelance expert
Generate a cover letter to apply to the job, combining both the details of the job and details from my freelancer profile. Use the provided guidelines.
Guidelines
-Personalize it - Address the client by name and make it specific to the job posting.
-Keywords - if the job description says to mention a certain keyword or phrase make sure to do so.
-Highlight relevant skills and experience - Quickly summarize your background, key skills, and past experience that makes you a great fit for this particular job. Provide specific examples if possible.
-Explain why you're interested - Briefly share what interests you about the role and company and why you'd like to work on this project.
-Keep it brief - Cover letters should be short and to the point. Aim for 3-4 paragraphs at most.
-Use a professional tone - Avoid overly casual language. This is a business letter, so adopt a polite, formal tone. Use everyday language, not metaphors.
-Ask for the job - Wrap up by reiterating your interest in the role. Proactively ask for the opportunity to interview or move forward.
-Thank the client - Express appreciation for their time and consideration. End on a gracious note.
Job details:
+ [copy/paste job details]
My freelancer profile:
+ [copy/paste freelancer profile]For your profile copy/paste the whole of your profile – capture all the details you can. As you start to get work make sure to start copy pasting that all in too.
For the job details also copy in everything from the main job description page including the skills required. Use select all then copy. Don’t worry about copying parts of Upwork’s interface- ChatGPT will know to ignore that.
💬 Prompt Output:
ChatGPT will output a cover letter focused on both the job description and your profile, merging the two together.
The more detail in the job description and your freelancer profile the better ChatGPT will be able to generate something unique.
Make sure to read through and make adjustments. For instance for this cover letter specifically I’d mention I have 12,000 LinkedIn followers – a highly pertinent piece of information for the gig.
Also adjust the language as required – feel free to change the prompt itself to best fit your particular tone of voice.
2. Brand new to Upwork
This ought to be sufficient to get your first gigs, especially lower priced work like this one.
If you are still having difficulty though let’s tweak the cover letter to add additional context about being new on Upwork.
Here’s the adapted prompt:
Act as a Upwork freelance expert
Generate a cover letter to apply to the job, combining both the details of the job and details from my freelancer profile. Use the provided guidelines.
Guidelines
-Personalize it - Address the client by name and make it specific to the job posting.
- New to Upwork. Be open with the client and mention having just started on Upwork and as such have limited history here. Because of this I’m doing early gigs for a discount to build a base of work history and reviews.
-Keywords - if the job description says to mention a certain keyword or phrase make sure to do so.
-Highlight relevant skills and experience - Quickly summarize your background, key skills, and past experience that makes you a great fit for this particular job. Provide specific examples if possible.
-Explain why you're interested - Briefly share what interests you about the role and company and why you'd like to work on this project.
-Keep it brief - Cover letters should be short and to the point. Aim for 3-4 paragraphs at most.
-Use a professional tone - Avoid overly casual language. This is a business letter, so adopt a polite, formal tone. Use everyday language, not metaphors.
-Ask for the job - Wrap up by reiterating your interest in the role. Proactively ask for the opportunity to interview or move forward.
-Thank the client - Express appreciation for their time and consideration. End on a gracious note.
Job details:
+ [copy/paste job details]
My freelancer profile:
+ [copy/paste freelancer profile]💬 Prompt Output:
This prompt will explicitly mention you are new to Upwork. People are going to notice your lack of reviews anyway so this is a way of immediately dealing with that objection head on.
3. Reviews
With your first gigs the main objective is getting 5 star reviews.
Performing the service isn’t enough.
You need to:
-
overdeliver
-
ask for a review
People will forget to review. They are busy. It’s natural.
So we need to blow their socks off and then ask, making them feel compelled to give us a review.
First up make sure you overdeliver – go the extra mile. How you do this will depend on the service obviously but here’s a nice simple prompt to give us some ideas.
Based on this job description generate a scope of work and over-delivery suggestions. Using the job description from above we get:
The prompt gives both the in-scope and out of scope work to help us distinguish them. Make sure you do the in-scope work as a default and then sprinkle in a few of the over delivery suggestions to gain brownie points.
Next up we need to DM them a review request as soon as the gig is completed.
Here’s a quick prompt:
The work is complete. Write a short (2 line) review request and offer to do future work. This generates a very short and to the point review request.
Don’t overcomplicate this as it’ll bury the core message of needing a review. Feel free to follow up as required – once a week is fine. Just make sure you get that review!
5. Premium Prompt – Guaranteed First Gigs
Pulling it together
What we’ve covered in this Part will get you your first few gigs and reviews. Our profile will start to flesh out and not look as new.
In the next Part we’re going to leverage this and secure proper work for proper payment.
A reminder of what we’re covering this week :
Part 1: Your freelance offer
Part 2: Building your freelance profile
Part 3: Securing your first freelance clients
Part 4: Marketing your freelance work
Part 5: Growing Your freelance business
See you tomorrow Prompt Entrepreneur!
Until then, keep PROMPTING!
Kyle