Creating a project in Project Catalog is another way to connect with clients and earn. Creating a project allows you to craft clear, defined work with set timing, details, and pricing.

We review all projects for quality and professionalism. Once your project is approved, you can highlight it on your profile. Setting up a project in Project Catalog allows you to sit back and let clients come to you!

With Project Catalog, you also get a contract cancellation grace period which allows you to cancel a contract within 24 hours of receiving requirements from your client without impacting your Job Success Score.

Planning a Project


You may already know what services you would like to offer for your first project. If you are undecided, think about the work you have done in the past. Here are some things to consider:

  • What work have you enjoyed the most?
  • Out of all the skills and services you offer, what seems to be most in demand? What do clients request most often?
  • Which of your skills or services are easily packaged as a fixed-price job with set deliverables?
  • Do you have work samples available that can help you sell your project? You can add pictures, a video, and PDF work samples to your project. Choosing a project that you can market with samples can help you be successful from the start.

Another way to get ideas for your project is to browse through Project Catalog. Look at what other freelancers are offering. But also think about what you might be able to offer that’s unique or more specialized than what’s already available.

Remember, you can edit every part of your project later. So, feel free to give it a go! You can continue perfecting it as you learn more about how Project Catalog works for you and your clients.

Build a Project


You can post up to 20 unique, feature-rich projects in Project Catalog at any one time. (You can also have 20 more in review.)

1. Open Your services

Sign in to Upwork. Select Find Work and choose Your services

You can also find the dashboard from your profile page. Scroll down and choose Manage Projects.

2. Start a new project

Choose the green Create Project button to start a new project.

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3. Add the details on your Project Overview page

Describe what you’ll do for your clients and how your project will benefit them.

Choose your details carefully. Your title will display on your project listing as one of the first things that clients see, and categories are how they find your project — clients won’t be able to find projects if they’re not in the right category.

You can also add custom search tags to tell clients exactly what you offer or what makes your project stand out.

Create a title

Your title is your first chance to tell clients what you’re offering. It’s also a call to action, to encourage clients to open your project and learn more.

For the most effective title, consider these tips:

  • Say what you offer in just a few words, so that clients can scan it in a glance
  • Use search tags to help clients find your project instead of making your title longer
  • Remember that the words “You will get” are already built into the title, so what you add should finish the sentence and not repeat those words
  • Make sure your title relates to your project and clearly describes what you’re offering — do not use a vague description such as “you will get something special”
  • Do not use all caps in your title and don’t capitalize for emphasis — follow regular capitalization rules
  • Double-check your spelling and grammar. Misspelled words and grammatical errors may cause clients to reject your project and not look at what you offer. We may ask you to revise your project if we see spelling and grammar errors, which could cause a delay in it being added to Project Catalog. Please consider using a program that checks your spelling and grammar or have someone else proofread for you.

A vague description, repeating words, all caps, or spelling and grammatical errors are all issues that could keep clients from wanting to consider your project. To help you succeed, we might also ask you to revise your project if there are errors. First impressions are very important to get clients to look at what you offer.

Choose a category

The category is where your project will show up in Project Catalog. Clients use categories to search for what they need, so it’s important to pick one that best represents your work.

Start by using Browse all categories to narrow down your search and find one that makes sense for your project. Note that you should only use the Other category if your project truly doesn’t match any of the offered categories.

Finding the right category is really important to the success of your project. So take time to review the options — you want to make sure clients see the great work you can do for them.

If you’re stuck, you can look at similar projects in Project Catalog to see how they are categorized.

Add some specifics

Below the category, you’ll see details that apply to your category, with checkboxes that you can mark if those details apply to your project. These details will help clients find your project.

If image tagging is available for your category, these details will also be the choices you’ll have for tagging images in the gallery section.

Add search tags

You can add up to 5 custom search tags to tell clients exactly what you offer or what makes your project stand out. We suggest including common keywords and similar terms to what a client might search for. If someone was looking for a project like yours, what would they search for?

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If you are an agency manager, this section is also where you will choose your billing account. You can start the project for yourself as a freelancer, as your agency, or as a subteam of your agency if you have teams.

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4. Set the price and scope

Because Project Catalog lists work on demand, it's important to decide the project pricing and scope right away.

Package tiers

You can choose to give clients more options by adding 3 different tiers to your project. You can build tiers with different titles, descriptions, levels of service, delivery days, revisions, pricing, and more.

Offering 3 tiers may help you sell your project by attracting a wider variety of clients who each have specific needs and budgets.Your clients can choose the tier they want based on how they want to use their logo, what they want you to provide, and what they can afford.

For example, if you create business logos, the first tier may include 5 logo design drafts, 5 revisions to the client’s logo choice, and the final logo in a printable file and vector file. The next tier may include more choices and revisions, plus add a 3-D mockup and stationery design. The final tier may include all those features plus a social media kit.

For each tier you create, you can write your own custom title and description by selecting Add Custom Titles and Descriptions. You can also choose from an available template of service tier options to provide more details. Adding these custom titles, descriptions and details can help your clients understand what you offer.

Add-ons

Once you finish creating your project tiers, select the add-ons that you want to offer. Scroll down to the “Choose add-ons” section, just below the Price and scope.

Choose from pre-populated add-ons, or create your own custom add-on. To create your own, select the Create custom add-on button. Then add the title, description, price, and the number of additional days you will need to complete this add-on. You can create up to 3 custom add-ons.

Add-ons have one price per project. However, if you include extra-fast delivery as an add-on, you can customize the additional delivery days needed per tier.

Starter: an entry-level, basic project at a lower price.

Standard: a project with a few extras at an average price.

Advanced: a project with extra frills and details at a higher price.

Pricing

You’ll choose predetermined pricing for each project. Project prices can range from as little as $5 to as much as $500,000.

When deciding on your prices, think about past work you’ve completed and what you earned. When were you paid what your effort was worth to you? How often have your clients been willing to pay that amount?

Consider the amount of time you’ll spend completing a project and the amount of skill you need to complete it. The more skilled you are, and the rarer that skill is, the more you may be able to charge.

You’ll also need to consider what you’ll earn after freelancer services fees are deducted. The freelancer service fee is 10% of your earnings on the project.

If you’re unsure what to charge, try looking at what other freelancers are charging on Project Catalog for similar work, especially those who have about the same amount of experience as you.

Delivery Days

Set a custom delivery time with Delivery Days for each project. Delivery time is a huge determining purchase factor for clients. Make sure you set a delivery date that is manageable, but attractive to potential clients.

Remember that the Delivery Days for each project include the time it will take you to deliver a complete project, starting after a client submits their requirements to you. You can still send revisions after the delivery date, but a client can request a refund for a project delivered late.

Revisions

Choose how many reviews and revisions a client will receive, from 0 to unlimited, for each tier you create. These revisions are changes that you’ll be willing to make during the specified Delivery Days, so be sure to choose a number that matches what you can provide during that time period.

Once you submit your final work, your client can still request changes as part of the review process. However, those changes are not part of the predetermined revisions that are included within the Delivery Days.

Set the custom tiers in Project Catalog Only one tier in Project Catalog

Add-ons for Project Catalog

5. Create a gallery to showcase samples of your work

Your project will display with an image or a video as its cover. Since this is the first thing that clients see, it's important to add high-quality pictures and/or a video. You can also add PDFs to showcase work samples. Remember to only include materials in the gallery that directly relate to the specific service that you are offering in your project.

For best results with images, consider ones with a 4:3 aspect ratio that are less than 10 MB and under 4000 px in width or height. You can crop an image though, if the original aspect ratio is something different. We'll scale the image to 1000x750 pixels. When you have multiple images, these will show as a carousel on your cover. So, choose each one carefully.

For some project categories, you’ll have the option to tag your images. When you upload an image, a preview of it will appear with options to crop it and add tags from a drop-down box. The drop-down box appears below the Help Clients Find Your Work heading. Tags are based on the details you selected for your project on the overview step. Choose the most appropriate one from the available drop-down choices.

For video, we recommend including audio. If you are using your video as your cover, clients will see 5-10 seconds of the video when they hover over your project. Learn more about creating picture-perfect images and videos here.

For PDFs, you can include 2 files that are less than 2 MB each. They can have unlimited pages, but we will only show a preview of the first 3 pages. Prospective clients will be able to see this preview within the project tile and on the project details page. Note that the PDF cannot be your project’s cover — you will still need to upload pictures and/or a video.

We recommend giving your PDFs a title, so that clients can see what they are about at a glance. If you’re offering a service in a language other than English, we suggest you write details in English as well as in the language you support.

When your project displays to a client, it looks like this:

 

 

PRO TIPS

One of the biggest reasons we can't approve a project is because of issues within the gallery. Make sure you review your materials and avoid the following:

  • Low-quality (pixelated, distorted, poorly cropped, etc.)
  • Clickbait (shocking or misleading wording designed to catch attention so that people will open a link to content)
  • Including your contact information (such as phone number, email)
  • Any logos other than logos you own
  • Text-heavy images or videos — display text samples in a PDF instead
  • Images, videos, or PDFs that violate policy (including inappropriate language or plagiarism)
  • Materials that don’t represent the type of work you are offering

Note: One of the biggest reasons we can't approve a project is because of issues with the project's gallery content. Please take a minute to carefully review the guidelines here so we can approve your project.

6. Add client requirements

What information do you need to complete the project? The client requirements should answer any questions or provide any details you will need to complete the project.

Your client must send this information to you after purchasing your project, but before you start work.

Important:

The client’s requirement submission, review, and approval are steps that are already built into the process. You won’t need to build these in your Project Catalog project steps in the next section


create-a-project-requirements.png
7. Describe the work

create-a-project-description.png

The project description has three parts. You'll be able to add:

  1. Project summary, where you can explain what sets you and your project apart.
  2. Project steps, which are broken down into two parts:
  • Work steps: Here you break down your work process to help your client understand exactly what will happen from start-to-finish as you complete the project.
  • Review and payment: This step is automatically built into the process, you do not have to add it. This is the point where you've submitted your work and the client will review the work and release payment
  • Any frequently asked questions that you think a client may ask, with your answers to those questions.

Important:

Remember, the client’s job of submitting requirements, reviewing, and approving your work are already built in. Don’t add these to your work steps.

8. Submit your project

The last step to creating your project draft is to set the maximum number of projects that you are willing to accept at one time. We limit this to 20. When you’re finished drafting your project, submit it. You’ll see it display in the Under Review tab with a timestamp.

 

 

We'll review for completeness and professionalism. And that’s it! You’ll be up and running and ready for clients to find you!

A project can be in one of three stages.

 

  • Under Review/Pending Approval: Our team is reviewing for completeness and professionalism. You’ll be notified when the review is complete.

  • Approved/Accepted: Congratulations! The project will move to your active projects tab, and be switched on automatically. You’ll receive an email confirming that your project is live.

  • Needs Changes: Check your email for an update and suggestions from our team. You can choose to apply the notes and resubmit your project, or remove it and start a new one.

Preview or edit a project


You can preview or edit any approved project in your Project Catalog by choosing the three dots (...) button. From there, you can choose to Preview your project, Edit the details, or Remove it entirely.

Note: Approved Projects are automatically switched on for clients to purchase. If you don't want your project to be visible to clients, click the Visible toggle switch to turn it off temporarily.

SHARE AWAY!

Once your project is ready to go, you can share it on social media or with a dedicated link.

Pro Tips


Is your project attractive to clients? Check out the following best practices to create a professional project, or explore the rest of our Pro Tips here!

  • DO choose professional images that speak to your work -- and be sure you have the right to publish them!
  • DO make the project easy to browse.
  • DO proofread your work. No typos, please!
  • DO carefully select your category. Your project won’t be accepted in the wrong category!
  • DO NOT use click bait, text-heavy graphics, or the Upwork logo/badge.
  • DO NOT share your contact information or personal information.

We cannot advise on the price, scope, or substance of your project. That’s up to you!

Frequently Asked Questions

Can agencies have projects on Project Catalog?

Yes, with limitations. Currently an agency manager can create a project that pays earnings to their agency. The feature is not available to all agency members yet, but more updates are coming in the future.

How do I add a project for my agency?

If you manage an agency, you will choose your billing account in the project overview section. You can choose to start the project as a freelancer or as an agency or agency sub-team, if applicable. Note that only agency managers can start an agency project.

Why can’t I create a project through my agency?

At this time, only agency managers can create agency projects. You can still create a project as a freelancer if you are not exclusive to an agency. If you are the agency manager and still having difficulty, please contact customer service for assistance.

How do I offer add-ons to my project?

On the pricing page, scroll down to the “Choose add-ons” section. Choose from pre-populated add-ons, or create your own customized add-on. To create your own, click the Choose add-ons button. Then add the title, description, price, and the number of extra days you will need to complete it.

How is the delivery date impacted with add-ons?

Thanks for your question. You can set how many additional days you will need to deliver the extra work. If a service will not impact your delivery date, set the additional day to zero.

How many custom add-on services can I add to my project?

You can add three customized add-ons to a project.

Can I set different add-on prices per project tier?

For most add-ons, the price is per project, not per tier. However, if you are offering extra-fast delivery as an add-on, you can customize your delivery date and price per tier.

What is “extra-fast delivery”?

Extra-fast delivery means that you will finish the work more quickly than usual. For example, say you have a starter package for logo design that includes a 3D mockup and you’ve listed delivery days as “5.” As an add-on, you can offer delivery in 3 days.

What happens if I edit an active project to include add-ons? Does it need to be re-reviewed?

We will re-review your project. However, while we are reviewing it, clients will still be able to see it in search and purchase it.

How do I tag my images in Project Catalog?

When you upload an image, a preview of it will appear with options to crop and add tags from a drop-down box. The drop-down box appears below the Help Clients Find Your Work heading. Your tag options are based on the details you selected in the project overview section. Choose the most appropriate words from the available drop-down choices. You can edit your image tags anytime by clicking the edit icon on the image.

How do I edit tags or add tags to existing images?

Select the edit icon on the image. This will take you to the image preview, where you will be able to add or edit your tags.

Will custom search tags that I add in the Project Overview section be available to tag my images?

No, custom tags are not available for image tagging at this time.

I tried to tag my images but don’t have the option. Why?

For now, this feature is only available to select freelancers in some design categories. We hope to expand it to other categories in the future.

How do I see different choices for tagging in the drop-down box?

The choices in the drop-down box come from the details you selected in the overview section. If you want more details to be available, you’ll need to edit the overview section.

My project was archived and that category is no longer available. Why?

Now that consultations are available in all categories for Project Catalog, we are eliminating consultation as a category for projects that were not set up through the consultations feature.

If your project is impacted, we’ll notify you through email, and your project will be archived. If you would like to set up a new consultation project, you can learn more about consultations here.

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