Hiring an Agency? Ask 3 Questions to Check if It Is Worth It

Hello Fellow Founder or maybe going to be founder. We are on a mission to help non-technical founders build their products/services in the most efficient way possible. Via us, hopefully, but even if not, helping you with this blog will make us pretty satisfied. Getting on, we realized one of the major problems that founders face is how to finalize an agency? How to make sure they are good to hire?

With AI-written case studies and little-to-none exposure to technology, companies from all over the world are promising to deliver in weeks. Then why do tech giants have a minimum six-month delivery line and hundreds of pages of contracts with detailed SDLC? We know, being a non-technical founder, these questions would bug you as much as they bug us. Because, certain promises, let's say, are just fluff.

The keywords, the voice and tone, and each and every claim looking similar, we understand how founders must be flabbergasted with so many agencies proving to be the "Best agency" of them all.

We ourselves have seen various examples of people who have no experience yet are super sure about delivering. Whereas young tech talent needs to be encouraged, there is a very big stake that founders have to lose if their agency:

• Ghosts them
• Leaves them with an undone product/service OR, the worse
• Delays the timeline of launch by months because, guess what, AI doesn't fix all the development loopholes.

So, the best bet a founder can take is to take a deep breath before signing a contract and ask these three questions to their agency. To make sure you don’t forget the best, we have also included a checklist towards the end of this blog.

Have They Done the Type of Project You Are Giving Them?

Simple as it sounds, ask your agency, "Do you know what you are doing, bro?" It is important to background check your agency before hiring them for any kind of project nowadays.

Have they developed any standard precautions that protect your product/service from being delayed? Have they worked on a similar project and tech stack before? Please conduct a relevant experience check. Check the background of their tech team; many times the team isn’t as smart or capable as the founder or manager they assign to you. But remember, it’s the team that will work on your project. So, always check their efficiency via social profiles.

Read about their past projects as well. Have they scaled a client from nothing to something? Basically, do they have a rags-to-riches story, or maybe a product/service they are truly proud of. Even one well-done project is proof that their team has got some mettle to prove.

Hence, never skip background checks.

What’s Their Team Size, and Are They Already Overwhelmed?

So, a trend which is viral, especially with a lot of regional development agencies, is that they feel the quantity of clients is above the quality of clients. Lack of experience and a good sales budget often lets agencies take up a lot of smaller clients with a team size that's very small.

What we want to warn you about is that development is a job that needs its own time for every developer to rewind and chill. If your agency has people overworked on multiple projects, there are high chances that they will not be able to put their best foot forward for your project.

Now, you may think, why will the founder or manager inform you about this? Don’t worry, we will tell you the trick. Ask them about their current clients and what kind of work they are dealing with. In order to impress you or bring you in, they will try their best to inform you about the versatility or plethora of things they are managing "efficiently." Next step? Ask their team size, ask if your developer or team will be working exclusively for you or not. Because, think about it, why pay a premium high-ticket amount if your team is already working on ten other things on your payroll?

What Is Their Plan Post the Delivery of Your Project?

Now, this question is something they wouldn't see coming. We would love to spill some beans for you here. AI can help agencies scale and build fast, but the right type of agency will spend a good amount of time researching your niche and strategizing with you. Hence, they will definitely think of a plan for how they can help you scale post-delivery, too. Because, it’s also an incentive for them, right? It helps them create an active relationship with their client and also gives founders a cushion to rely on, as only people who build the project are better able to improve it further.

Though, this is not how novice agencies think; they often have ready processes and plans on how they are going to submit your app, website, or software. But if you ask them about how they would like to maintain it, they may have no clue, because for that, you need market research. There is little AI can do if you do not test your idea in the market. A good agency will always give you inputs on what not to do and give you internal feedback and insights on how the particular product/service can scale post-delivery.

But if your agency doesn’t have an idea when you bring up this question, and they don’t come back to you with good research, you have your answer that they might not be worth it.

Conclusion: Free Agency Check Template

We understand how keeping a track of all these things can be difficult, hence we created a template you can download, print, and check off while evaluating your agency: FREE Agency Hiring Check Template by ByteHint

We hope this helped you! If it did, please share with fellow founders!

By the way, we build products and services ourselves. Our way of doing things is:

• Keeping it transparent
• Focusing on Quality over Quantity
• Prioritizing the mental health of our employees because our team works for you and they need to be in best shape to be able to help our clients

If you are going to build a product or service, we may be able to help you out building it in the right way: Hit us up to check if you fit the lead criteria for ByteHint!