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0:00It's no secret that the AI space is
0:02absolutely booming right now and
0:04everybody's trying to get a slice of the
0:06pie. But one of the hardest things is
0:08how do you actually find clients to do
0:10work for? And that's what I'm going to
0:12be talking about in this video. So in
0:13this video, I'm going to give you
0:15absolutely everything that you're going
0:17to need to start out in the AI space and
0:20to start winning work on a platform
0:22called Upwork and how to scale all the
0:24way from $0 to over $100,000 earned. I
0:28did this exact podcast on Lelay Molley's
0:30channel and that went viral. But what
0:32I'm going to do in this video is take
0:33you through it in more detail to give
0:35you extra information on exactly how to
0:37do this. If you're not familiar with who
0:39I am, my name is Adam. I started as a
0:41freelancer on Upwork in 2021. And since
0:44then, I'm in their expert vetted top 1%
0:46program. I've done over 60 projects and
0:48I've made over $100,000 as a freelancer
0:51on this platform alone. And these skills
0:53that I learned doing all of this in the
0:55AI space allowed me to go ahead and
0:57create three separate other channels of
1:00business. I built a YouTube channel. I
1:02built an agency that is focused around
1:04building custom AI powered internal
1:06tools for businesses. And I built a
1:08community helping people to learn AI
1:10skills and also how to sell them. Now,
1:12what I'm going to do in this video is
1:14talk you through the entire process, but
1:16I'm going to pay specific attention to
1:18that first $500 to $1,000 earned. And
1:21the reason for that is because there's a
1:23massive mental barrier or abyss between
1:26most people that never find a way to
1:29make money online and the gap which is
1:31honestly just $500 which actually
1:34validates that this is possible and it
1:36proves to people that you can actually
1:37do this if you put the work in. And that
1:39is the hardest part of this entire
1:41journey. So I'm going to pay extra
1:43attention to that and give you tried and
1:45tested methods to break through that
1:47barrier so that you can earn your first
1:49bit of money online. prove to yourself
1:51it's possible and then just scale and
1:53get better from there. All right, so
1:55breaking this down before I jump into
1:56it, I want to quickly talk on the types
1:59of people that are typically drawn to
2:01this kind of way of work and lifestyle.
2:03And typically they have one or all three
2:06of these qualities. So they're
2:07unsatisfied with the current working
2:09arrangement, whether that's because of
2:11pay, whether that's because of hours,
2:13whether that's because of the people
2:14that they're working with. They have a
2:15curiosity or a passion to work on
2:17something outside of work hours. and
2:20typically unpaid. And they've got the
2:22ability and the mindset to be able to
2:24persevere through setbacks and keep
2:26working on something even if they've
2:27been rejected and failed multiple times.
2:30Honestly, for the first $500 to $1,000,
2:33it's literally that last point there
2:35where that's the hardest part and you
2:37really need to just keep working on it
2:39and not giving up. And that's that's
2:41that's pretty much the the secret source
2:44to making it through something like
2:45this. But how do we actually do it? So,
2:48I've got these two bubbles here. We've
2:49got create freelancing profiles and
2:51learn AI. Now, the reason that I have
2:53create freelancing profiles in front of
2:55learn AI is because a lot of people get
2:58stuck in this learn AI phase. So, they
3:00spend all this time watching YouTube
3:01videos, joining communities, making
3:03practice projects, but they never feel
3:06ready to actually jump in and start
3:08doing it for clients. And what I'm going
3:09to tell you now is this is a general
3:11philosophy around everything, but you're
3:13never going to feel 100% ready. And what
3:16you're doing by creating the freelancing
3:17profiles before learning AI is you're
3:19taking a look at what kind of job posts
3:21are out there in the market. You're
3:22opening yourself up to opportunities and
3:24you're keeping your eye on what jobs are
3:26being posted. So when one does pop up
3:28that you think, "Oh, there's a chance
3:30that I could be able to solve that
3:31problem or do something with it, you're
3:33ready to go and you've taken some
3:34proactive steps into winning your first
3:36job." Which freelancing profile should
3:38you choose? Well, there's many options
3:40out there. I personally recommend
3:42Upwork. I think there's heaps of work on
3:44there, especially if you're getting into
3:45the AI space. But to be honest, all of
3:47them probably work. I would recommend
3:50picking one and narrowing down on that
3:51though because then you're going to
3:52build up your social proof, build up
3:54your reviews, uh, and build up a solid
3:56profile, and you can do that in one
3:57space rather rather than having to build
4:00it over four separate tools, which is
4:01going to take you longer. Now, I'm going
4:03to give you the three steps on how to
4:04build a winning profile, but I quickly
4:06just want to talk on the learn AI skills
4:08and then narrow in on that. So with
4:10learning AI, it's a massive space and
4:12it's also an industry that's really in a
4:14premature stage right now. So you've got
4:16all these other typical digital
4:18industries like social media,
4:20advertising, uh people that are doing
4:22design work, all these different jobs
4:24that have been around for a while. AI is
4:26very much a new technology and the
4:28market is still figuring out how to use
4:29it properly. So there's all these stats
4:31coming out and as someone that's
4:33implementing AI for businesses every
4:34single day, I can tell you that the vast
4:37majority of AI use cases and jobs being
4:40completed in the market right now are
4:42actually not achieving much ROI at all
4:45and are really underwhelming in
4:47comparison to what the headlines are
4:49telling us that AI can do. And the
4:50reason for that is because the
4:52implementation is honestly lagging
4:54behind the technological advancement. So
4:57there's a lot of things that are
4:58technically possible with AI, but the
5:01actual method or the actual process of
5:04implementing those into businesses takes
5:07months of technical development and
5:09understanding and scoping and that is
5:10lagging behind significantly. So we are
5:12very much very early on the AI wave. It
5:16is by no means too late. So how can you
5:18learn this? Well, there is 1 million
5:20opportunities. I started learning this
5:22stuff pre-I. Uh, and so I can tell you
5:25right now that just the fact that AI
5:27exists means that you have access to
5:29knowledge that the people before you
5:31would have taken weeks. You'd have to go
5:33search through blogs on the internet,
5:36take [clears throat] all these extra
5:37steps to learn the knowledge. There has
5:38never been more knowledge available to
5:40you. There has never been more knowledge
5:42available to you to learn than there is
5:44today. So, there's all sorts of spots
5:45you can go to. Some of my favorites are
5:47YouTube. So much good quality tutorial
5:49content on YouTube. There's all these
5:51communities around. There is blogs and
5:54forums. There's AI, huge resource.
5:57There's literally everything. There's
5:58courses. Um, and you can just jump in
6:00and start building your own personal
6:02projects and learn through action. But
6:04when do you stop? When is enough
6:06learning for you to jump out in there
6:07and start trying to catch some fish? And
6:09I would say it's long before you feel
6:11like you're ready. You need enough
6:13knowledge to talk about AI and be able
6:16to answer some of the typical questions
6:18and know the buzzwords. You do not need
6:20to be a master by any means. So jump in
6:23one or two possible personal projects,
6:26learn some of the basics, get familiar.
6:28That might take two to three weeks
6:30maximum. Then jump in and start applying
6:32for work because you're going to learn a
6:34hell of a lot quicker when you throw
6:35yourself in the deep end and start
6:37actually doing work for clients. In
6:38terms of niches that you can pick, two
6:40of the really low hanging fruit options
6:42that I recommend, start with AI coding
6:44in a basic sense. Tools like Lovable and
6:47V0. You can get started without needing
6:49to know how to code and it's a really
6:51good entry point to start to get
6:53familiar with how tech works and you can
6:56learn some of the nuances of how those
6:58tools work when you jump in and actually
6:59start using them. NAD Make.com and
7:02Zappia are also a really good spot to
7:03work in automation if you're interested
7:05in that space. Two really they're
7:08massive industries. There's so much
7:09opportunity in both of those. They
7:10honestly connect with each other really
7:13really well. So if you want to learn
7:14both of those, I would highly recommend
7:15it. But there's a million opportunities
7:17just in those two areas alone. Now, with
7:20the freelancing profile, so once you've
7:22got the absolute basics of these two set
7:24up, I'd say you can do this in a week.
7:26Honestly, create your freelancing
7:28profile, start learning some basic AI
7:30skills, you want to jump into trying to
7:32win work as soon as possible. I cannot
7:35stress enough how much you cannot get
7:37stuck here cuz this is what most people
7:38do. they get stuck here and then they
7:41send one or two proposals out a day or
7:43they kind of get lazy with this and they
7:45never get any projects because they
7:47didn't put enough effort into actually
7:48going out there and trying to win work.
7:50And what a lot of people are scared of
7:52is they're like, "Well, I don't know how
7:53to do this and if I win a project for a
7:55client, I'm not going to know how to do
7:56it." So, they start freaking out about
7:58that. What I'm going to talk to you
8:00about in here is an easy way that you
8:01can pitch to clients to avoid that harsh
8:04reality. Honestly, it's a lot more of a
8:06fear. It's actually I don't think it's
8:08ever happened over the 60 projects that
8:09I've done on Upwork and over the 250
8:12that I've done in total. There's usually
8:13always a way to make something work,
8:15even if it's an edge case. But I'll
8:17teach you exactly how you can word your
8:19proposals and how you can set this up so
8:20that doesn't happen to you. At the
8:22start, you're going to be in what I call
8:24the crawl phase. So, this will teach you
8:26how to crawl, walk, and then run. The
8:29crawl phase is very much about learning
8:31rather than money. So what I see a lot
8:33of people do, especially people that are
8:35coming from existing careers where
8:36they're getting already getting paid,
8:38you know, somewhat significant
8:39substantial amounts of money, they come
8:42to something like freelancing and
8:43they're not willing to drop their rate
8:45because it's a bit of a hit on their
8:46ego. They're like, well, I'm already
8:48earning $40 or $50 an hour here or
8:50whatever the case is. I'm not going to
8:51go and then work for $10 an hour on
8:53Upwork. And I think that's a real
8:55barrier because at the start, unless
8:57you're already an AI pro in your
8:58existing work, there's a lot of learning
9:00that you're going to need to do. You're
9:02going to need to learn all of the
9:03technical skills, which is what you're
9:04going to be learning in this crawl
9:05phase. You'll be learning all the
9:07technical skills. You'll be learning so
9:09many valuable soft skills. Client
9:11management, how to work on Upwork, how
9:13to invoice, how to handle variations
9:15properly, how to manage client uh
9:18expectations. All of these things that
9:20you seem you don't really think of when
9:22you actually jump into here. You're
9:24going to learn often the hard way by
9:26possibly doing a lot of unpaid work or,
9:29you know, doing projects for a very
9:31discounted rate. And it might seem like,
9:33oh, damn, I'm working for free or
9:35whatever the case is. You're really not
9:38because you're building invaluable
9:39skills that will be so much more
9:41important when you start working on 10,
9:4450, $100,000 deals, mistakes, because
9:46you're going to make a hell of a lot of
9:48mistakes in here. Every mistake that you
9:50make here repays itself 10 times in
9:54later stages when you learn and you
9:56don't make the same mistakes on project
9:58sizes and budgets that actually matter
10:00and are actually significant. The other
10:02thing you're going to do in here is
10:02build your confidence. This is the
10:04hardest phase. So I call this the
10:05inflection point because the vast
10:07majority of people never make it past
10:09this phase uh for a number of reasons.
10:11But as soon as you make it past here,
10:13it's it's honestly much easier to then
10:16go through the the the next stages
10:18because it's really just about refining
10:20and getting better at the processes that
10:22you learned here. So whilst a lot of
10:23people don't like this phase because you
10:25might not make too much money and
10:27there's a lot of learning that could be
10:29embarrassing, you might make a fair few
10:31mistakes. Trust me, you're in the
10:33playground here. You're dealing with
10:34small project sizes. Worst case
10:36scenarios, you can't do something. It's
10:38not the end of the world on a $500
10:40project. and I'll teach you how to word
10:41that correctly. But long story short,
10:44the the most valuable skills that I
10:46learned, I learned here and they've
10:47aided me amazingly the rest of the way
10:50through this journey. Now, if you want a
10:51video on how to set up your Upwork
10:53profile completely, I've got that in my
10:55channel. You can check that video out
10:56right here. But what I'm going to do now
10:58is talk you through the three things
11:00that you need to get right to succeed
11:02and get to that $1,000 mark on Upwork
11:04and beyond. Step one, create a winning
11:06profile. This might sound like it's
11:09common sense, but believe me, 80% of the
11:13people on Upwork are not doing this as
11:15well as they could be, and it's costing
11:16them. The most important thing you can
11:18do for your profile, in my opinion, is
11:20to build a clear video. And the aim of
11:22that video is not to tell everybody
11:24about how great you are, although you
11:26might subtly put that in there
11:28somewhere, but the aim is to show how
11:30well you communicate and be able to
11:32connect with the client in the easiest
11:35way possible. You're showing how well
11:36you can communicate and you're basically
11:38giving them confidence that they can
11:40trust you to deliver the solution to
11:41their product. This video can be around
11:44about 60 seconds long. Does not need to
11:46be extensive at all. You're basically
11:49introducing yourself. Then you're
11:51quickly going into what you do to help
11:53people. What kind of people do you help
11:55on Upwork? Do you help automate
11:58businesses with AI? Do you help develop
12:00nice landing pages? What do you do? If
12:03you want to quickly mention some success
12:05stories that you've had now at the
12:07start, you can use your personal
12:09portfolio projects that you did in the
12:11learning phase. Um you you don't need to
12:13have massive project knowledge. Uh it
12:16does help but you can use you can very
12:19much use this at the start. Uh and you
12:21basically want to quickly introduce
12:23yourself, what you do, who you help, and
12:26how they can get in touch with you and
12:27what the next steps are. That can all be
12:28done in 60 seconds. I'm going to take
12:30you through some example profiles and
12:32you can visit my profile, but you can
12:33visit some of these other people's
12:34profiles as well to see exactly how to
12:36do that. But other basic things are
12:38clear profile photo, optimized title,
12:40description. Try and fill that portfolio
12:42section out as much as possible. Now, if
12:44you've got any relevant work experience,
12:45throw it in there, but also personal
12:47projects can go in there as well. It
12:48really just needs to look nice. I'll be
12:50honest, most clients don't really look
12:52at most of this. They skim over it at
12:53the max most of the times. And then
12:56reviews. Now, if you're just starting
12:58out, you're not going to have any
12:59reviews. There's two options you can do
13:01here. You can go through the rest of
13:03this process. Uh, having no reviews does
13:05make it a little bit more difficult to
13:08win jobs. And I'll teach you how to send
13:10proposals to to get around that. But the
13:13other option you can do is you can do
13:14what's called seeding your account. Now,
13:16you have to be very careful here because
13:18it does need to look natural or Upwork
13:20can flag the transaction. But what you
13:23can do is you can create a client
13:24account. And basically what you do is
13:26you do a test project for a certain
13:29amount of money to get a couple of
13:32seated reviews onto your profile. Now I
13:34know a lot of people do this. It's up to
13:37you. It's going to cost you. So Upwork
13:40take 10% as a fee. It will cost you a
13:42little bit. What I will say though is it
13:44will make it will add social proof to
13:46your platform and just a couple of
13:48reviews do make your profile stronger
13:50and they do stand out more. So, if you
13:53have the budget and you want to do that,
13:55you can do that. That being said, you
13:56can still do it the the the proper way.
14:00Um, it may just take you a little bit
14:01longer, but that's fine. So, that's
14:03that. Next up, proposal writing. So,
14:06before I jump into proposal writing, I'm
14:08going to take you through these are
14:10actually some people from my community
14:11that I've helped, friends, and people
14:13from my community that I've helped
14:14develop their output profiles. And
14:16you'll see that they actually all look
14:17very, very similar. So, here's mine. The
14:20video for me, I think, is the main
14:22selling point. 80% comes down to the
14:24video. It does not have to be super
14:27professional, super properly filmed.
14:29When I started out, it definitely
14:30wasn't. I had a little green screen that
14:32I bought off eBay for like $20. I threw
14:34that behind me and I had a little video
14:36in there that I filmed off of a cheap
14:38camera that I got down at the local
14:39shop. I've since changed it obviously as
14:42my profile scaled, but don't overthink
14:44it and don't let like expensive
14:46equipment or nice setups get in the way
14:48of you getting a clear video in there.
14:50The main thing is just smile. Look like
14:52someone that can communicate well. Look
14:54like someone that's nice and easy to
14:55talk to and look like someone that knows
14:58what they're doing to a degree and
15:00someone that's responsive and can help
15:02people deliver solutions. That's pretty
15:04much it. But you see here, clear
15:06metatitle, clear description on exactly
15:08what you can do. Try and throw as many
15:10meta words in here as possible. And
15:12you'll see we all have a similar thing.
15:14Clear photo of the the face. Clear
15:16video. Clear photo of the face. Clear
15:18video. Clear photo of the face. Clear
15:20video. Similar kind of design on all of
15:22these profiles. Now, how do you actually
15:24send proposals? The interesting thing
15:27with this is that five years ago, preAI
15:30nice detailed proposals did really well
15:33because clients were like, "Damn, this
15:35person has spent so long properly
15:37formatting out these proposal responses.
15:40They've put so much information. They
15:42must be really invested in the project."
15:44Fast forward to today with AI and
15:47everybody's just AI generating proposals
15:49that are formatted amazingly, but they
15:51stink like AI and clients can smell it
15:53from a mile away. So, how do you stand
15:55out? Well, on the client dashboard, this
15:58is what proposals look like. So, when
16:00they post a job on Upwork, they see
16:03this. So, as you can see, you've got
16:05around about 100 words to stand out.
16:07They can see some basic information
16:08about who you are and what kind of
16:10projects you've done and your reviews
16:12are really important. They see up to 100
16:14words, let's say, of your cover letter.
16:17And it's so like this one's chat GBT. So
16:19is this one because it's got emojis in
16:21it. This one, yep, probably also chat
16:23GPT. I reckon this one may also be chat
16:26GPT. So, I think every single one of
16:27these are chat GPT. What me and and my
16:31community members and other people that
16:33I've helped out do, which works really,
16:34really well, is throw all of that out
16:37the window and instead be super direct.
16:39So, what this looks like, you can do
16:42this in as few words as possible. So, I
16:44think a really good intro is something
16:47like, I have done this already, all in
16:49caps. it immediately grabs attention,
16:51doesn't look too GP generated. Then from
16:54there, I usually recommend using a Loom
16:56video. Now, if you're not familiar with
16:58Loom, it's just basically just a really
16:59easy way that you can record your screen
17:01and your your face. But you record a
17:03Loom video, and in that Loom video, you
17:06basically introduce yourself, you stand
17:09out, and you basically say, "Hey, look,
17:11my name's Adam. I read through the job
17:12description, and I I've actually done
17:14something similar for these clients, X,
17:16Y, and Zed." You don't need to talk
17:17about it too much. Um, if you could show
17:19a quick demo, like really quick, that's
17:22fine. But the main point of the Loom
17:23video is to say, "I've done this for
17:25blah blah blah. I think I can get
17:26started on this ASAP and I'm very
17:28confident I can deliver it. If you're
17:29willing to award the contract, I can get
17:31started tomorrow, whatever the case is,
17:33today even." But what you're doing is
17:35you're using very few words and you're
17:37actually using your face and your
17:39communication skills because the point
17:41of this is to stand out. Now,
17:43automatically you're standing out with
17:44something like this because it grabs
17:45attention and it's not chatp generated.
17:48Then you're giving them a chance to see
17:50who you are, how you can communicate,
17:52and what you're capable of straight
17:54away. They don't need to jump on a call
17:55to do that. Because keep in mind, there
17:57could be 10, 20, 50 people that have
17:59applied. If they can get to know who you
18:01are without getting on a meeting with
18:04you, and they can see that you've
18:05actually read the job description and
18:07given real advice or real insights into
18:10how you could possibly solve it, I'm
18:12telling you right now, you're in the top
18:135 to 10% of people applying for a
18:15project. You do that 5 to 10 times a
18:17day. it's inevitable that you're going
18:19to start winning some work. So, you'll
18:20see here the exact same stuff. I'm going
18:22to make this entire uh document free for
18:26you guys to access, but it'll have all
18:29these screenshots on it. U but you can
18:30see here, same kind of approach. Now,
18:33how do you write proposals in a way that
18:36are going to get you looked at,
18:38especially when you have a less
18:39developed pro profile? And also, how do
18:42you write them in a way that you're
18:43protected in the case that you can't
18:45deliver something? So, first off,
18:48writing proposals. I just touched on
18:50that. I'd recommend using that exact
18:51same approach. If you're new on the
18:53project and you haven't got that much
18:54confidence yet, what you can do, and I'd
18:57recommend possibly saying this on the
18:58call rather than the proposal, but what
19:00you can do is remove the risk for the
19:02client by saying, "Look, I'm new on
19:04Upwork. I've been doing this for a large
19:07number of time and worked on a number of
19:09projects, but I'm new as a freelancer
19:11and I'm trying to develop my profile and
19:13go above and beyond for my first few
19:15clients so that I can start to develop
19:17some reputation on this platform.
19:19Because of that, I can do this project
19:21quick like you you need to undercut so
19:23lower price point uh you can do it
19:26quicker. You can basically get in and
19:28get things done. But the other thing is
19:30you can say if the if the output is not
19:33complete or not delivered to a cord of
19:35your satisfaction, you can refund the
19:37entire I'll give you a full refund, no
19:39questions asked. Uh and so what you're
19:41doing there is you're basically saying,
19:42look, if I give this a shot for a couple
19:45of days and I can't deliver something,
19:47I'll give you a full refund. And
19:49usually, as long as you display that
19:51you're making progress and you're honest
19:54and you communicate well and you're
19:56making some progress and you're trying
19:57and you're cheap, if you're if you're
19:59doing something for like a fixed price
20:00at the start, $100 project or $10 an
20:03hour, whatever, the client's not going
20:05to ask for the refund in most scenarios.
20:06They'll be like, "Okay, cool. Here's a
20:08couple extra days. See what you can get
20:09done." Because if you take money out the
20:11equation at the start here, we're just
20:12looking to get paid some money for
20:14learning. So even if you're getting paid
20:1550 bucks and it takes you 50 hours,
20:18you've just learned a really valuable
20:20skill. So next time you go and do that
20:22same thing, you're going to be able to
20:23do it quicker and for a higher price. So
20:25don't get fooled here. You're you're
20:27getting experience and skills. You and a
20:30little bit of money. But it's really
20:31about experience, skills, and reviews.
20:34Stop. You got to stop thinking about
20:35earning bucket loads of money in this
20:38particular phase. Now the next part is
20:41sales and closing. So ideally, you've
20:43got a winning profile that can attract
20:45people um but it can also win win you
20:47jobs when people look at it. Then you
20:49learn how to send out proposals um and
20:51how to get proposals that actually get
20:52viewed. And the third part is usually
20:54what happens here is you'll have to jump
20:56on a meeting to close the deal. How does
20:59that work? Now the way I think about
21:01sales calls in my opinion is the same
21:03way that you go to the doctor and talk
21:05with the doctor. Typically what happens
21:08is that two minutes of small talk intros
21:11look like a nice person, you know, ask
21:13them ask some questions, smile, just
21:16bring some positive vibes cuz I cannot
21:18understate how important just having
21:20like a friendly relationship and
21:22actually enjoying talking to a client
21:24should be. If it's too businessy, too
21:27serious, and it's not fun, you're going
21:28to get bad outcomes cuz nobody's
21:30enjoying it. Try and make it as
21:32enjoyable as possible. But what happens
21:34with the doc usually go in there for 2
21:36minutes, ask how the day is going,
21:38little bit of small chat and then for 15
21:40minutes, what usually happens as the
21:41patient is you go in there and you get
21:43whatever problems you have off your
21:44chest. So that might be you've got a
21:46sore shoulder and it hurts when you, you
21:49know, do this or you lift boxes or you
21:50do whatever the case is. You basically
21:52tell them all about your problem. So
21:54that's 2 to 15 minutes roughly. The same
21:56thing will happen with clients that jump
21:58on a call with you. They might have a
22:00problem. They, you know, their admin
22:02staff spending 20 hours doing something.
22:04Can you use an AI automation to complete
22:05it? They're getting really frustrated.
22:07Whatever the case is, that's that. From
22:09there, we then have you offering the
22:12solution. So, the same way the doctor
22:13will be like, "Okay, let me take them
22:16through some motions, figure out where
22:18the pain is, start to diagnose the
22:19pain." That's what you're going to do
22:21from the 15 to 25 minute mark roughly.
22:24This is all an estimation, but you're
22:26going to listen for the first 15
22:27minutes. Then from there, you're going
22:29to be like, "Okay, cool. I've actually
22:31seen similar use cases of this or
22:33similar examples of this, and typically
22:36those people are suffering from blah
22:37blah blah." And the typical way we've
22:40solved those issues is blah blah blah.
22:42So, that's all going to happen in this
22:4315 to 25 minute mark. And you're going
22:45to show them that you understand what
22:48pain they're experiencing in whatever
22:50case it is. And you've worked with
22:52something like this before. and you know
22:53of some solutions. Now, in the early
22:56days, you might have to do a little bit
22:58of waffling here. So, the key thing here
23:01is you don't have to get these solutions
23:02correct 100% of the time at the start.
23:05And if you don't know the answer to
23:06something, that is okay. Some quick ways
23:09you can get around that is one, straight
23:11after the call, do some research and
23:13follow up with more researched
23:15solutions. B, if you don't know
23:18something on a call, it is okay to be
23:19like, "Hey, look, I've heard of this,
23:21this, and this that could solve that,
23:22but I'm not 100% sure." And what I'll do
23:25straight after this meeting is I'll
23:26quickly just check my notes or do a
23:28quick do some research or ask someone
23:30that I know that has done something like
23:32this and I'll get back to you on on a
23:34recommendation on how to solve that.
23:36That's fine. And then 25 to minute 30
23:39minutes. This is super important. In
23:41here, we need to map out the next step.
23:45So, what we're doing here is we the
23:48earlier you get financial investment for
23:50the client from the client, the more
23:51likely you are to win the work. And that
23:53is a real tip. So, ideally, if you're
23:56not signing a contract straight after
23:57that discovery call to at least get
23:58started, you're mapping out the the date
24:01for a next follow-up call. But for most
24:03projects of low value, you should be
24:05able to get financial investment
24:07straight after this meeting in most
24:09scenarios. Now, I've also got a video on
24:12how I do this typically. You can watch
24:13that on YouTube. But the other thing
24:16with this is don't be afraid to make
24:18mistakes here. I definitely wasn't a
24:20sales closing pro when I started at all.
24:22There's probably a lot of sales calls
24:23that I got on that flopped. But if you
24:25can record them and at least analyze
24:27yourself after and start to reflect. The
24:30main thing is just about getting the
24:31reps in. Like for this for this stage
24:34here, it can take time, but that's fine
24:36cuz you'll learn these skills. These are
24:38super valuable no matter what you do.
24:41So, so don't be afraid to keep just
24:44honestly keep sticking with this. You
24:45might jump on your first few sales calls
24:47and not close the deal. That's okay.
24:49Again, it's all about reps and I need to
24:52hone into the fact that like you need to
24:53keep pushing through. A lot of people
24:56will quit because they'll do a couple of
24:58sales calls and be like, "No, this
24:59doesn't work." Maybe they said something
25:01embarrassing. Maybe the client made them
25:03feel stupid. Whatever the case is, I'm
25:05telling you, you need to push through
25:07that. And once you get through to these
25:08later stages, you'll look back on that
25:10and be like, damn, look how far I've
25:12come, you know, and you'll be handling
25:14things like a boss because you learned
25:15all the hard lessons down here. So that
25:18is everything from 0 to 1k. I'm just
25:21going to quickly talk you through where
25:23I came from so you can see how long this
25:25took me and how long I know it's taking
25:27other people. So I came from a
25:29construction background, no technical
25:30experience at all. I'd worked eight
25:32separate jobs before I turned 21. None
25:36of them were techreated at all. Uh I was
25:39very busy. I was working two jobs plus I
25:42was doing university which I later
25:44dropped out of and I was doing Upwork
25:45consulting on the side. But everything I
25:47was I was I was definitely focused on
25:51the freelancing. Um so I did a personal
25:53project when I f I discovered it in June
25:552021. I tried to build a personal
25:57finance app that probably went for like
25:592 or 3 months. It failed. But again,
26:01that was the personal project that I
26:03used to as social proof for what I was
26:06doing. And it taught me a lot of the
26:09basic skills to be able to answer some
26:11basic tech questions. From there, along
26:13I was doing this alongside jobs. I
26:15obviously wasn't working at it
26:16full-time. It took me over a year to get
26:20to $1,000 earned on Upwork. You break
26:22that down into days, it's $1.93 per day,
26:25but I just stuck at it over a long
26:27period of time. you can do it a hell of
26:29a lot quicker than me. I didn't have any
26:31mentors or anything like that that were
26:33really showing me how to learn these
26:34skills and how to do this to a degree.
26:36So, it took me a long period of time. I
26:38know people, some of these guys here,
26:40they're doing it in 30 to 60 days or
26:42less. And that is so doable if you know
26:44what you're doing. But I'm just trying
26:46to reiterate that like the people that
26:48are at 100K, 200k plus, typically they
26:51probably did kick the for a long
26:53period of time to then get the
26:55confidence and like the amount of skills
26:57that I learned in these phases have
26:59aided me to become a lot better at
27:01scoping and a lot better at everything I
27:03do later on in this journey. So that's
27:06that. Now the next step is walking. Here
27:08is optimizing and going value. So if
27:11you've made it to here, congratulations.
27:13you're above 80% of people that can
27:14never get past this. If you are here,
27:17honestly, it's really just about
27:19repetitions, getting better and better
27:20and better. So, what do I mean by that?
27:22In here, you're now a little bit
27:24familiar with client management. You're
27:25familiar with the soft skills. You're
27:27familiar with Upwork proposals and how
27:28to work through that. You're familiar
27:30with some of the technical expertise
27:32required to deliver solutions. And this
27:34is all about basically, long story
27:35short, getting better at what you're
27:36doing. And now is when you start to grow
27:38your hourly rate and earn a little bit
27:40more money. And [clears throat] it's
27:42also where you start to optimize some of
27:44your processes. So maybe discovering a a
27:46specific niche that might be a little
27:48bit more tailored to your skills and a
27:49bit more profitable. Maybe that's
27:51learning how to smoothen the service
27:52life cycle. How can you smoothen the
27:55onboarding process for clients? How can
27:56you ask better questions? How can you
27:58scope things out better? How can you
28:00send invoices and build better payment
28:01models? All that kind of stuff. So
28:03what's going to happen here is you'll
28:05start to earn amounts of money that may
28:07allow you to take this more seriously,
28:09might allow you to quit your job. Um,
28:11but it's also going to start
28:12dramatically improving your confidence
28:14and it's going to give you a real solid
28:17base for you to start building a a very
28:20successful freelancing career or an
28:22agency. Now, this typically happened to
28:24me around about I guess it would be this
28:27phase. Things started to move it very
28:29quickly from Feb 2023. So, you see from
28:31Feb 2023, this entire process is
28:34exponential and I went from doing you
28:36know $1,852,000
28:38on Upwork. In a year from there, I did
28:4125,000. So, as you can see, it took me
28:43like, you know, almost two years to get
28:45to 1.8. From there, it took me a
28:48following year to times that by 26, I
28:50guess you can call it, or 20, whatever
28:52it is, um, to get to 26,000. And around
28:56about here in December 2023, I built my
28:58agency. So, I was starting to earn
29:00enough money to be able to hire somebody
29:02else to help me with delivery. And how
29:05that works is my hourly rate, let's say,
29:07was $40, $50 US an hour. So if I can
29:10hire someone for 20, $30 US an hour, I
29:13can now start to slot in there as more
29:14of a project manager and I can start to
29:18deliver more work and take that middle
29:20ground. Again, to be able to do that
29:22properly and to be able to manage
29:24projects, you need a really good
29:25understanding of the of how the actual
29:27process works. And I think any good
29:29project manager knows how to do delivery
29:31if they need to. And there was a lot of
29:33times I was still jumping in and doing
29:34delivery and fixing things and and
29:36helping out. So by no means is it
29:38completely out of the equation in this
29:40phase. But once you get there, you then
29:42move into running. So again, this is
29:45just this is just iterating and getting
29:47better and better. Still, you go from
29:48that 10 to 100K phase. And basically
29:51what this is is it's just doing more and
29:53more projects, getting better and
29:54better, smoothening the life cycle out
29:56more, understanding your niche even
29:58better, and essentially growing your
29:59hourly rate more and more and more
30:01through more social proof. So you can
30:02see here from Feb 2024 to Feb 2025. This
30:06is through Upwork alone, I was doing a
30:09lot more than this off of Upwork as
30:10well, but the growth can be replicated
30:12through the Upwork earnings. I then did
30:1480K. So again, that's probably four
30:17times the previous year roughly. And I
30:19was able to do things like build a
30:20YouTube channel and my community. Um,
30:23and from there, you know, we've grown
30:25exponentially since this point as well
30:28through Upwork alone. I don't use Upwork
30:30that much anymore because I run an
30:32agency. But what I'll be talking about
30:34here is once you've got through that
30:36phase and you've got a really solid
30:39knowledge that you've developed through
30:40your freelancer career, you have three
30:42paths. one the highly profitable
30:45freelancer you can just sit on earning
30:47you know$150 USD dollars an hour for the
30:50rest of your life and that's pretty much
30:51going to enable anything that you want
30:53to do if you want to travel you can do
30:55that you're flexible uh and you can earn
30:57a lot of money and you're in control of
30:59your own career no one can really fire
31:01you because you can easily go and win
31:03work whenever you want and you can
31:05manage multiple clients at one time to
31:06reduce that risk two is the agency model
31:09if you want to build an agency you can
31:12then start using that social proof to
31:13win work. You can start hiring people.
31:16Um, and you can start to build out a
31:18agency model and then possibly explore
31:20things like running ads or building more
31:22of a process to build a larger company,
31:25which is the route that I've gone down.
31:27Or three, you can use all of your
31:29experience to then go in and build a
31:31product like a SAS product, possibly an
31:33education product, whatever the case is.
31:36Again, the basis for all three of these
31:38become so much stronger when you've done
31:41this hard yards here and you've learned
31:43all of the skills the hard way. Because
31:45what I'll tell you right now is there's
31:46no shortcut to learning these skills. At
31:48the end of the day, you have to learn
31:49them somewhere. And the best place to
31:51learn them is in a nice playground where
31:53the worst case scenario when you make a
31:54mistake is maybe you lose a couple of
31:56hundred or you waste 20 to 50 hours. Um,
32:00and waste is the wrong word because you
32:01still learned something. So when you get
32:03to here, you realize that this was by no
32:06means a waste at all. And whilst you
32:08might not have learned that much earned
32:09that much money, you earned a hell of a
32:11lot of skills. So from there, you get to
32:14the 100k plus or the flying, which is
32:17building an agency, building a product,
32:19building an education platform, whatever
32:21the case is. Now, let me pitch the
32:23alternative to you. This takes a lot of
32:25time. So if you have a lot of money but
32:27not much time, you could jump straight
32:29to building an agency with no tech
32:31experience and doing all this. But what
32:33happens if you do that is you have a
32:35lack of experience in business faculties
32:38and that means you have a really big
32:39reliance on everyone around you. So I
32:42haven't actually seen many examples of
32:44this working well at all to be honest.
32:46But you end up relying on tech expertise
32:49to build projects. You end up relying on
32:51HR. you end up relying on all these
32:53different people to manage your business
32:54because you've never managed your
32:55business and you don't understand how
32:57that works and they have a complete hold
32:59over you and also they could be doing
33:02things really badly. But if you don't
33:04understand how those processes work, you
33:06can't tell who's good from who's bad.
33:08The other thing is you're going to have
33:09difficulty making decisions because you
33:11have no business experience really. Uh,
33:13and so you're you're going to be making
33:16a lot of mistakes that you would
33:17otherwise be making here on small
33:19amounts of money, but you're going to be
33:20making mistakes on big amounts of money.
33:22So mistakes that you make here could
33:24cost you 10 $20,000 plus. The other
33:27thing here is big overheads. So you need
33:29to hire people straight away in this
33:30approach. So you're going to be spending
33:32a lot of money before you make money.
33:34Whereas in this approach, you're not
33:36spending much money. It's it's pretty
33:38very very cheap to do, but you are
33:40spending a lot of time. So yeah, those
33:43that's the pros and cons because I see a
33:45lot of people that go like oh no this is
33:47too long it's too slow or whatever the
33:49case is they want to jump straight to
33:50here. I haven't seen many people that
33:52have done this successfully that haven't
33:53got experience. If you come from a
33:55corporate seuite background or you've
33:57got 20 years industry experience or you
34:00know you've you've managed business
34:01whatever the case is you might be able
34:02to do this but for the average person
34:04the vast majority of people I think
34:06there's really no other way to getting
34:08to this point than doing the hard yards
34:11and going through here and you can
34:12achieve this in 6 to 12 months
34:14realistically with the right guidance
34:16and a lot of hard work. Now that's
34:19pretty much everything in a nutshell. I
34:22know it was a lot of waffling. So,
34:23that's pretty much the entire process in
34:25a nutshell from start to finish on how
34:28you would go from someone that's earning
34:30no money online to how you would go to
34:32making six figures plus online as a
34:34freelancer and then paving the way to go
34:36ahead and make agencies, make
34:38businesses, make products. It took me 4
34:40years to figure this out. I know a lot
34:42of people that have done it in 60 days
34:44or less. Pat actually went through he
34:46has previous experience in sales. I
34:49mean, he knows how to do this, but he he
34:51did 20K in Upwork in less than two
34:53months. So, he is actually he's he's one
34:58of the people that actually helped me
34:59start in the beginning, but he is
35:02proving that that can still be done in
35:042025.
35:06And so, if you're interested in figuring
35:08out, you know, if you need a little bit
35:09of extra help, you want to talk to other
35:10people that are doing the same thing,
35:12feel free to comment on this video, cuz
35:13I'm sure there's a lot of people that
35:15watch this channel that are trying to do
35:16exactly that. You're welcome to join my
35:18community where we have weekly Q&As's
35:20and we talk about exactly this AI skills
35:22and how to freelance and how to sell
35:25those solutions to businesses. And I
35:26wish you all the best and I hope you
35:28found some value in here. The last thing
35:29as well is if you want to view my
35:31profile with Upwork profiles, you can
35:33view all of these publicly by going to
35:35the search bar in Upwork, searching for
35:37talent, and then typing in whoever you
35:39like. So find someone that's in your
35:41niche that you want to replicate and
35:43just copy the way their profile looks.
35:45You don't need to copy it absolutely
35:46word for word, but just rip out most of
35:48it. You know, take a look at their video
35:50and copy it as much as possible. Uh
35:52because obviously what they're doing is
35:54working. So, I would recommend not
35:56reinventing the wheel wherever you don't
35:57have to. Good luck, all the best. And I
36:00want to hear about your Upwork success
36:02stories. And put in the work and don't
36:04give up. Those are the only two things
36:06that I can tell you and this should work
36:08out for you.

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