I Tested Every Upwork Profile Section: A 23-Profile Experiment That Changed How I See Talent Search

In an effort to crack the code behind Upwork’s Talent Search rankings, I decided to run an experiment using a word I made up: lvttst. The idea was simple—ask 23 participants to insert this word into different sections of their Upwork profiles and track the results over two weeks. The results? Some were expected, others surprising, and one was a real shock!

The Word and the Experiment Setup

I asked participants to place lvttst in the following sections of their profiles:

• Title (general profile)
• Overview (general profile)
• Consulting text
• Portfolio title
• Portfolio description
• Portfolio picture
• Education
• Other experience (title)
• Other experience (description)
• Employment history (title)
• Employment history (description)
• Project catalog (title)
• Project catalog (description)
• Specialized profile title
• Specialized profile overview
• Team/company overview
• Team/company title
• Skill custom in consulting
• Certificate title
• Work history (a real job with the word)

If you were counting = (20 so far here but 3 will be added later in this story)

Early Expectations: Specialized Profiles and Agency Profiles

One thing I suspected from the start—and was quickly proven true—was that specialized profiles don't rank well, and neither do agency profiles. These profiles didn’t appear in the top rankings, which I had expected, but it was still useful to revalidate.

The Ranking Shockers: Employment History Leads the Way

What truly shocked me was the section that ranked the highest. It wasn’t the title, which many would assume plays a crucial role in rankings. Instead, Employment History emerged as the most influential section:

1. Employment history title came out on top.
2. Employment history description followed closely behind.
3. Portfolio title ranked next.
4. Portfolio description also performed well.
5. Only then did the Overview section show its influence.

Surprisingly, the Title—which most think is the most important—only ranked after all of these sections.

What Happens When You Change the Title?

To further test my theory, after one week, I asked one participant with a title entry to move the word lvttst to the very beginning of their title. The result? They jumped to the top of the rankings. This confirmed that the position of the word in the title does matter.

Overview and Multiple Mentions: Does It Matter?

Next, I experimented with the Overview section. I asked one profile to add lvttst as the first word in their overview(21), and another to insert it three times(22) in the same section. The result? Surprisingly, it didn’t make much of a difference. All three profiles with the word in their overview ended up ranking next to each other and randomly shifted positions each day. This shows that repeating the word doesn’t seem to help.

Employment History: Title vs. Description

I also retested the Employment History section separately for both title and description. The person with three employment history entries(23) (each containing the word) ranked higher than the one with only one employment history entry. This suggests that having multiple mentions in employment history gives you a better chance of ranking higher.

Delays in Ranking

One consistent trend I noticed was that profiles with the word added later didn’t immediately rank high. They only started appearing in the appropriate place after a day’s delay, which suggests that changes to your profile might take some time to reflect in the rankings.

Other Experience: Does It Matter?

Interestingly, the Other Experience section didn’t seem to impact the rankings. Despite inserting lvttst into both the title and description, it didn’t push the profiles higher.

The Final Puzzle Piece: A Real Job with lvttst

One of the most surprising parts of the experiment was when I posted a real job using lvttst. I won’t reveal all the details here—this piece of the puzzle is reserved for my clients during consultations. But let's just say it added another layer of validation to my findings.

Conclusion: Some Sections Carry More Weight Than Others

After two weeks of testing, one thing became clear—each profile section has some weight in determining your ranking, but Employment History (both title and description) plays a much bigger role than most people realize. Title placement matters, but it's not the only factor, and making changes to your profile takes time to show results.

A huge thank you to everyone who participated in this experiment! The insights gained have been eye-opening and will undoubtedly help improve profile rankings on Upwork.

It was a big job! By the way, the talent search is not broken anymore like it was last week.

Hugs,

Tamara