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I am an experienced web developer. I have 4+ year professional experience in web development and i started doing freelancing work one year ago. Till now i have successfully completed 5-6 projects that i got from local contacts. Now i want to start bidding on freelancing websites and i have also stated a it company.

So, my question is that which is better option to bid on freelancing websites as an 'Individual' or as a 'Company'. and which will attract client more. Also if i bid as an individual and successfully completed some projects than would it be legal to add those projects in my company portfolio as i am associated with that company. or should i have to bid as a company to add those projects in my company portfolio.

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  • In any case you can add the projects that you develop in your personal portfolio, because you are the "creator", if you do that by yourself or in the company name, you will always be able to say that you are the creator of that particular graphics or solution. Unless you are a company's employee, in this case in some countries this is not permitted. – Mario Jul 27 '16 at 8:01
  • Thanks for your reply Mario, That mean if i am co-owner of company i can add all my personal projects in company portfolio. right? – Vinit Singh Jul 27 '16 at 8:15
  • yes, that's correct. you can add your personal stuff to the company portfolio. – user152 Jul 27 '16 at 8:17
  • @VinitSingh if you are business partner, ceo, or co-worker you can add your works to your portfolio, where I live the law says that you can't if you are an employee of the company or if you signed a contract in that sense. You should read the copyright laws in your country to be sure. – Mario Jul 27 '16 at 8:20
  • @Mario ok mario which will be more effective way to bid on freelancing websites. to bid as an Individual or to bid as a Company. – Vinit Singh Jul 27 '16 at 12:27
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I haven't seen where its mattered too much. When I have hired for smaller projects I haven't cared if it's a company name or individual name. If I was hiring for "the next Uber" application, I would probably pay much more attention to the freelance profile than the name. A quality proposal, good price, a good profile, and responsiveness has been what I used to hire people more than the name.

I would think responsiveness is almost the key. I found people that were awesome on everything, but I couldn't get a hold of them via Skype or email. I moved on to the next person who was available to talk to me.

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I'm going to offer a few counter-points to Dustin's answer. From my experience, presenting myself as the owner of a company, as opposed to a freelancer, led to a number of positive things (keep in mind this is all anecdotal):

  • Presenting as a company allows you to increase your rates. From my experience, there was a limit to how much I could charge as an individual. Even with project/value based pricing it was hard to demand the higher prices I knew other developers were receiving. However, when I started my company and brought on just one more person I then had a team I could market. This increased our perceived value and trust, allowing us to charge more.

  • Presenting as a company increases your perceived stability. Some clients (not all) are put off by working with an individual. This often depends on the size of the client, scope of the project, and importance of the project. For large, critical, tasks many clients are not comfortable hiring a freelancer. What happens if you suddenly fall ill? What happens if you stop answering their phone calls? While all of these things can happen with companies as well, companies are inherently more stable because they have a greater number of individuals who can fill in if something happens.

  • Presenting as a company increases your perceived value. An individual freelancer has a finite number of skills, and while they might be an expert in several different areas, they cannot be an expert in everything (this is why, when selling yourself as a freelancer, you need to niche down and find your specialty). While a company cannot be everything for everyone either, they can offer a broader range of skills simply because they have more talent to draw from, inherently increasing their real and perceived value.

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Which is better option: Individual.

Most clients like to hire individual freelancers rather companies/agencies. I've seen a lot of jobs with something like this in the title 'Companies..No need to bid', 'Agencies stay away'. Just a few reasons why I much prefer an Individual over a company:

  1. I believe Individual freelancers are more talented than a company hiring low grade talent.

  2. I can directly see their credentials, their reputation & can directly speak to them. With companies I will be arranged to some guy whose credentials I've not know.

  3. I perceive individual freelancers are more 'value to money' even-though the bid is same. Companies incur a lot of unnecessary expenses & I'm the one indirectly paying them.

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3-plus years on Elance and Upwork and I don't think it makes much difference.

I bid as an individual on freelance sites, but I have a company presence that I use away from the freelance sites. I keep them separate because I want people who are searching for my business to end up on my web site, not my freelance profile.

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