My Freelance Expertise as a Geo Information Scientist on UpWork after 10 Months | by Aleksei Rozanov | Oct, 2024

I. To start with, please slim down as a lot as you possibly can.

Don’t name your self only a Machine Studying Engineer, however Monetary Information Scientist/Information Annotator/Medical Pc Imaginative and prescient Skilled/LLM Architect, or Geo Information Scientist like in my case. You’ll be capable of get a basic knowledge science undertaking, however you’ll additionally a have a set area of interest.

Virtually all of the initiatives I had had been within the geospatial discipline, however one among them was centered on the synthesis of the NLP datasets from scientific literature. I undoubtedly had the competence to gather, construction, and describe this type of knowledge, regardless of formally being a geo individual. By the best way, the consumer gave 5/5 stars! So the area of interest is not going to restrict you, don’t fear.

II. The decrease the competitors the higher.

Sounds controversial, however please imagine me. I noticed a whole lot of initiatives with greater than 50 proposals from different freelancers. You don’t need this competitors not since you’re not price it, however as a result of the consumer simply gained’t be capable of adequately estimate the talents of all of the professionals. They simply need the work to be finished.

So apply solely when there are not more than 10 purposes submitted, or apply, however keep away from any false expectations about you engaged on this contract.

An instance of a undertaking with greater than 50+ proposals submitted. Picture by writer.
An instance of a extra area of interest undertaking with lower than 5 proposals submitted. Picture by writer.

III. Don’t neglect what you write contained in the proposals you submit.

Usually UpWork hides the identify of the consumer, however for those who verify their testimonials, you would possibly discover that different freelancers talked about the identify of this individual of their critiques, so please handle shoppers by their names!

Add an exterior portfolio like GitHub/private web site or another platform which may turn out to be an indicator of your abilities. UpWork means that you can connect as much as 3 initiatives out of your UpWork portfolio, which frequently isn’t sufficient. So undoubtedly share some hyperlinks with the consumer to get aware of different initiatives of yours extra deeply. In my case, many purchasers referred to my weblog on Medium as one of many key causes to rent me. It’s a simple option to see my technical and communications abilities.

Lastly, don’t middle the proposal round your character. I do know you need to show you’re the very best for this undertaking. However nobody cares, sorry. The one factor the consumer cares about is the issue being solved. So deal with it. Present your care and fervour to assist. Deal with the consumer like a physician prepared to heal a wound, not a businessman chasing one other payday.

IV. Keep away from “re-sellers”.

That is the form of shoppers who act like brokers or brokers. They hunt for candy initiatives on many alternative platforms, get the contract, after which go to UpWork to rent another person for the lower cost.

Why is it dangerous? As a result of they barely talk with you and the consumer on the opposite aspect. They aren’t within the context of the undertaking in any respect.
I used to be unlucky sufficient to get this type of a consumer for my first undertaking. He ended up creating a bunch chat with me and the preliminary consumer asking me to not inform this person who I’m the one doing the job.

The answer is straightforward: verify their earlier initiatives. Usually, the brokers have tons of critiques (not essentially dangerous). However the titles of the initiatives will not be related in any respect. If this individual is hiring individuals to do knowledge evaluation, satellite tv for pc imagery processing, enhancing a video, fixing math olympiad, and 3D design, it does look suspicious!

V. Use GPT to make your pet undertaking shine. Something you set in your portfolio on UpWork ought to have some story behind it. Within the very starting the one factor you may have is a pet undertaking or some task from a category. Leverage ChatGPT to create a compelling description of your work. Make it appear to be an actual job with some influence and business software.
Along with your first shoppers you’ll be capable of add increasingly, however from my expertise, 4–5 examples of your work is sufficient.

Part of my very own UpWork portfolio. Picture by writer.