In October 2023, Upwork published a new feature on their platform: Profile Boost. Basically, it is similar to the previous Proposal Boost that almost all freelancers hated. So, of course, they went and implemented the same thing for profiles! đ
As with every new feature Upwork launches, there was a lot of desperate laughter, crying, ridiculement, straight-out ranting, and all that usual stuff on their Community Forum. This was no exception. Does Upwork Profile Boost help and is it in general useful? This is what every freelancer wants to know.
But I would not venture there even in great need. Iâve been there. Itâs not just messy but also quite toxic. Those of us who know what it is just donât waste time on it anymore.
(If you are willing to try and see it for yourself, please report back your findings!)
Anyway, I posted about this feature on LinkedIn and asked for volunteers to run a little experiment. The reception was very good. I mean for the experiment, not so much for the feature.
What is this new feature?
The process is pretty straightforward. How the profile boost feature works is this.
The Profile Boost feature is an option available on your profile page.
On the Profile Boost page, you see 5 things you need to select:
- Category that you focus on
- Specialty i.e. your specific niche
- How many Connects you are bidding per click
- How many Connects are the limit at which the boosting will stop (daily and overall)
Optionally, you can set a kind of end date for it. Then you just click on the button if you manage to find it. On my friendâs 4K screen, it looked like it was a mile away from the context. Strange design⊠but on small screens, it is easier to find.
The Profile Boost page.
At this point, the obvious parts that I was very skeptical about were:
- The lack of keywords. The Use of wide categories will work very poorly, especially for those with highly specific niches. For me, as I do consulting only, being in the âAR/VR Developmentâ category is too generic.
- The category and specialty selections are unnecessary. It is illogical to boost your profile in other categories than what the profile belongs to. This should be a selection of the General Profile or either one of the Specialized Profiles that you can select here.
So, by default, for those who have already been successful on Upwork because of picking a specific niche and owning it, this feature wonât do anything much. That was my hypothesis purely because of the way it was implemented.
What did we do and who were our Upwork superheroes?
So, who are these Upwork superheroes who so selflessly invested their Connects so that you donât have to? Hereâs a brief introduction.
- Haleemat Kolawole is an administrative virtual assistant starting up on Upwork
- Raphael Schagerl has been a self-employed data analyst who runs DataStacked.co for over a year
- Saad Ullah Butt mainly writes about crypto/blockchain-related topics and has been providing also many other services at saadbutt.com
- Yours Truly has a somewhat well-established Upwork business that you can read all about on these pages đ
Our Upwork superheroes!
The four of us noble freelancers, solopreneurs, and independent professionals formed the Upwork Boost Busters Gang (a.k.a. The Fellowship of the Coconut) with variable backgrounds and location, each of us having a different niche, some of us starting up, and some having done it all on that platform.
On October 8, 2023, we boosted our profiles for two weeks and we put the selection at 2 Connects per click. We set the limit to 10 Connects.
This way, we could see if there are any differences in WHOM the profile boost feature could help⊠if any of us, in fact.
We considered many other options for how we could have organized this, but knowing that most people wonât bet many Connects on this feature at first, 2 Connects felt like a good number. 1 Connect would be too little knowing how Upwork tends to run these things, hahah!
The results of the first week
All of us being super excited (not!) about our boost that most definitely goes beyond our wildest dreams, we checked in to share the analytics pages.
These were the first results. (I marked the experimentâs start date with an orange bar, the rest is original.)
Haleematâs analytics for Week 1.
Raphaelâs analytics for Week 1.
Saadâs analytics for Week 1.
My analytics for Week 1.
So, not much indeed. Our observations were that, interestingly, there were two distinct patterns: No clicks, invitations, or jobs, and lower profile views somehow. Specifically:
- None of us got any jobs because of the profile boost.
- None of us got any invitations.
- Haleemat, Raphael, and I got 5 impressions, all of them coming on the same day, but 0 actual clicks.
- Saad did not get any impressions at all, at this point.
- Profile views dropped for Saad and me compared to what we used to get before! We did not have the Availability badge on.
- Profile views dropped also for Raphael, but as he stopped using the Availability badge, that was probably the cause rather than the profile boosting.
- Haleematâs profile views look about the same as before, with no change.
So, after the first week, halfway through the experiment, we got nothingâŠ
The results of the second week (final results!)
How about the second week, did that go any better?
No, not really. We already saw it all. Here are the final results from all of us.
Haleematâs analytics for Week 2.
Raphaelâs analytics for Week 2.
Saadâs analytics for Week 2.
My analytics for Week 2.
That was it. After getting exactly the kinds of results we expected, we concluded the experiment on October 21. With two weeks of boosting, all we got was a maximum of 5 impressions on the next day when we started. That was indeed it.
The only interesting thing to note on Week 2 was that Raphael and I had an option for the Impressions and Clicks view to be shown for 30 days. Saad and Haleemat could only see the 7-day view.
Interesting, huh? đ
Wow.
Does Upwork Profile Boost help? Our conclusions
Here is the overall conclusion of how well the Upwork Profile Boost feature works.
What our superheroes say
Here is what our superheroes thought about the Upwork Profile Boost feature after two weeks of giving it a try:
Raphaelâs conclusion:
âI’m sure I’d love the âBoost Your Profileâ feature… if it actually boosted my profile.â
Haleematâs conclusion:
âWhen Profile boost doesn’t yield the expected lift, it has the potential to become a bust. :-)â
Saadâs conclusion:
âThe boost feature… is more like a loot feature. While artificially increased exposure can help, it just goes to show that it is you and your services that matter eventually.â
And the conclusion of Yours Truly is:
âThe Profile Boost feature didnât boost my profile at all. In fact, it did the opposite. This feature wonât bring you coconuts nor will it bring you even peanuts. Somehow, Iâm not surprised. ;-)â
How poetic, isnât it? đ
None of us was surprised by the results⊠since we know how Upwork normally works. Honestly, it looks like a momentary rip-off designed to bring some Connects to Upwork but actually, since none of us got even a single click, the feature doesnât seem to work even for the platform itself!
Complete waste of timeâŠ
But it is not all bad. No, not at all. The best part is that trying out Profile Boost is completely FREE! Yes, none of us lost any Connects trying! Thatâs the part that we can highlight as being good and working exactly as promised. No clicks on the profile, no Connects debited from your account.
In reality, we invested nothing, and we got nothing. We lost some time, though.
Brilliant! đ
What is left to do i.e. limitations of this little experiment
Obviously, we could have run this experiment on a much larger scale and with more Connects invested in boosting or for a much longer time.
Here we tried what most people would probably try at first. Just bet 2 Connects per click knowing that most of the others just trying this out might bet just 1 Connect.
So, with these limitations in mind, we cannot really deny or confirm whether the Upwork Profile Boost can help freelancers. But we can say, that boosting just a little to try things out wonât result in anything else than a tiny increase in hopelessness, desperation, and frustration.
So, itâs just another day on Upwork! đ
Wrap up
So, does Upwork Profile Boost help in any way and should you try it out for yourself? We can safely say that boosting 2 Connects per click wonât produce anything useful to you. We tried it so that you donât need to.
Should you boost your profile with even more Connects, say 50? Maybe it works better that way. But do you really want to spend $7.5 marketing yourself when the only thing promised is a click on your profile even in the best case?
Well, thatâs up to you to decide.
By the way, if you found any of the content helpful, I think our superheroes wouldnât mind you telling them that! So, please, go and connect, thank them kindly, and follow them on LinkedIn!
- Saad Ullah Butt, Blockchain and Crypto Content Wizard
- Haleemat Kolawole, Empathetic and Tech Savvy Administrative Virtual Assistant With Customer Service Experience
- Raphael Schagerl, Data & Business Intelligence Analyst
- Mikko J. Rissanen, PhD, The Organizer of the âUpwork Boost Busters Gangâ đ
