Harsh truths for freelancers and agencies

I’ve sold $15,000,000+ in design projects in the last 4 years. Here’s some harsh truths 👇

1. Big companies with big budgets pay for security

2. Small companies with small budgets pay for flexibility

3. Freelancers will make money helping agencies. Agency partners will make more

4. AI will won’t help small studios win bigger clients, they’ll still pay a premium for security

5. $5k/mo is bad deal for both sides

6. Fixed-cost / fixed-timeline is about to be the most lucrative way to structure projects for mid-size agencies +

7. <$50k projects want upfront rates for flexible time, >$50k projects want predictable cost + time

8. Async-only leads to low impact work. Real results require collaboration

9. Trello boards aren’t process. Process matters.

10. Design subscriptions are fading fast. Too many customers got bad results. Design twitter ruined what should be a good model

11. Agencies/freelancers with huge distribution can charge an audience premium

12. Agencies need to start giving equity to employees

13. Agency > Venture Studios will do a lot more equity/cash deals to ship products

14. Procurement teams are still the final boss for agencies <15 ppl

15. Sites that win Awwwards pay 10x less than “boring” enterprise. Enterprise is where the money is.

16. RFPs are represent bad clients. Avoid.

What did I miss?

Design agencies never hit big revenue numbers until they add engineering. Revenue then becomes a 70/30 split with engineering dominating. At that point are you even a design shop? But you all aren’t ready to have the conversation yet.