Advice to all of the one-man “agencies” making posts on here about hitting a growth wall, or getting burnt out with too many clients…you need to decide if you’re actually an agency or really just a freelancer

I keep seeing posts from people starting marketing/SEO/PPC/design etc businesses, and pretty quickly hitting a brick wall. They feel burnt out with no way to grow.

Usually the same situation plays out. You launch and immediately take on as many clients as you can (mostly small scale). Soon you find yourself with 8…10…15+ clients. You feel like you're maxed out with workable hours and drowning with tasks, but still not hitting revenue goals. You don't know how to grow from here.

I've been an independent consultant on/off for ~10 years. I've been in the same boat when I started out. And I've talked to countless others who hit the same wall.

I often find this is because people who should be acting like freelancers are trying to act like an agency, while not being optimized for either.

When you're totally maxed out theres really only 2 paths to move ahead:

1. Cut back to fewer clients, Raise your prices (Freelancer)
2. Maximize # of clients, Hire/Outsource workload (Agency)

The advice I give everyone in this situation is you need to made a firm decision which path you want to take.

If you try to ride the fence (stay a one-man operation while taking on a ton of smalltime clients) you're going to get buried in work w/ no work/life balance…and still stagnate on earnings.

As a freelancer you should build your business / pricing around your own capacity. Double your hourly rate, and if you lose 50% of your clients…you're in the making the same money w/ better work life balance (and ultimately higher quality output).

Everybody is different, but I've found maintaining 3-5 clients at a time max is the ideal # for most successful freelancers. Your best bet is trying to get 1-2 big clients on retainer to cover the bulk of your earnings target, and filling in the rest with project work as you can. Once you're maxed out hours, aim to grow by raising your rates rather than taking on more work.

Its a whole different ballgame if you choose to be an agency. This game is all about growing your client base, generating a constant flow of leads, while delegating work to a qualified team (either other contractors or actual hires). If you're not a highly organized person adept at project management, this probably isn't the path for you.

The only wrong path is having no path.