Upwork
PROJECT SNAPSHOT
INDUSTRY
Hardware, SaaS & AI
ENGAGEMENT
Project-based
TIMELINE
Defined scope
AI USED
Marketing lead
SERVICES
Messaging
Strategy
Video & photo
overview
The insight that changed everything: nobody cares about the biggest talent pool. They care about finding the right one.
For years, the leading freelancing platforms — Elance, oDesk, Freelancer.com — competed on scale. Who had the most freelancers. Who had the most clients. Upwork, born from the merger of oDesk and Elance, was positioning itself as an "Earth-sized talent pool."
We interviewed over 30 high-spending customers and discovered a fundamental mismatch between the platform's positioning and what buyers actually valued. Nobody cared about hiring from the platform with the most freelancers. They cared about finding the perfect one — the freelancer who would feel like an extension of themselves and help them simply get more done.
That insight became the foundation of a complete brand repositioning. We zeroed in on productivity and the tagline "Get more done with freelancers" — a single theme that unified creative, paid acquisition, content marketing, enterprise marketing, and product initiatives across the entire organization.
SCOPE
What we built.
01 — Customer research
30+ in-depth customer interviews that unlocked the real positioning.
Conducted in-depth interviews with Upwork's highest-spending customers to surface the real motivations, language, and decision drivers behind their freelance hiring behavior — insights that directly contradicted the existing platform positioning.
02 — Messaging framework
A single brand theme that aligned the entire organization.
Developed customer personas, a comprehensive messaging framework, and the brand values and
supporting messages that gave every team — creative, paid, content, enterprise, product — a shared strategic foundation to build from.
03 — Video campaign
Human stories captured across six countries.
Produced a global video campaign that brought the new positioning to life through real customer stories — shot across six countries, featuring the human moments behind what it means to find the right freelancer and simply get more done.
RESULTS
30+
Customer interviews conducted — the research foundation that unlocked the entire repositioning.
6
Countries featured in the global video campaign — human stories that gave the new brand platform emotional scale.
1
Unifying brand theme — "Get more done with freelancers" — adopted across creative, paid, content, enterprise, and product.
How AI accelerated this engagement
The best positioning doesn't come from the boardroom. It comes from the customer.
Upwork already had a positioning — they were just competing on the wrong dimension. It took 30+ customer interviews to surface the insight that changed everything. That's the Brandmates approach: start with the customer, find the real insight, then build the strategy, creative, and messaging around what actually moves them.
Customer research
30+ in-depth interviews with high-spending customers — the real source of the insight that repositioned the entire brand.
Organizational alignment
One messaging framework that unified creative, paid, content, enterprise marketing, and product — no more siloed positioning.
Global storytelling
Video campaign shot across six countries — bringing the human truth of "Get more done with freelancers" to life at global scale.
They have a special talent for unlocking customer insights and developing smart, ambitious programs to communicate these insights effectively.
Rich Pearson
CMO — Upwork