There isn’t a general rule of creating an individual profile or an agency profile. It depends on your needs based on the 3 common scenario for freelancers.
Upwork works. There is no denying about it! Otherwise, it wouldn’t have 1.7 million actively individual freelancers and agencies combined available for hire.
And if I do a job search, there are more than 100k open jobs by millions of registered clients.
So the question is how can you make it work.
Should one create an individual freelancer profile or an agency profile?
There are advantages and disadvantages to both, but mainly it depends on your goals. And even if you’ve already created one, there is an option to switch.
Freelancing on sites like Upwork is one of the best things that has ever happened. It has given freelancers like me the freedom of time (Work anytime), freedom of location (work from anywhere) and freedom of choice (You choose clients).
There are many agencies on Upwork doing more than million dollars in revenue every year. Likewise, many individual freelancers are generating much better revenue than many top paid Indian CEOs.
So there can’t be a general statement like should one be creating an individual profile or an agency profile. It all depends on your need.
Still, we have three common scenarios:
3 Common Scenario for Easy Decision Making
- Starting as an Individual – If you are an individual who wishes to work for clients, don’t go for an agency profile to begin with (Why clients prefer individuals over agencies). Once you have a sufficient number of clients to form a company, convert the individual profile into an agency profile.
- Starting as a team but one individual is prima facie clients – If you are a team of people starting as co-founder or partners (Here is my guide on how one should and when one shouldn’t partner), agency profile is the right way to start. If only one person is prima facie the client, an individual profile won’t be a bad idea either.
- Starting as a team – If more than one person will be interacting with the clients, it is a better choice to start as an agency in Upwork.
Choose the one that best suits your needs and use a template for all your Upwork proposals to get more response from clients.
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