People are sometimes surprised that UX research consultants are charged out at so much more than developers – the day rate can be 50% to 100% higher. So are UX research agencies more profitable as a result? Surprisingly, the answer is often no.
When you visit a top UX agency in the heart of London, what do you see when you walk in the door?
Lots of empty desks. Not because of layoffs, but because most consultants are working in labs or doing off-site consultancy projects. This means there are a lot of overheads for space and for kit that’s just sitting there, unused. When you hire a UX agency, this is one of the things you’re paying for, and it’s not money well spent.
Another problem is billing efficiency. UX research engagements can be very short – sometimes as little as two or three days (for expert reviews), usually a couple of weeks long (for face-to-face user research and analysis). The shorter the project, the bigger an issue you get with gaps between projects. In an agency, resourcing becomes a crazy Tetris game that’s almost impossible to win. Consultants end up with a lot of bench time, where they’re waiting around being paid but not bringing in any money. If you hire a UX agency, you’re having to cover this cost, and again, it’s not money well spent.
Also, agencies often try to include a research assistant and some senior consultant time into the costing. The fact is, if you get an experienced consultant, they usually don’t need support from anyone else. UX research is often well suited to “lone wolf” consultancy.
Enter the UX freelancer:
- She’s nomadic, and works on-site with clients. No overheads there.
- She has Morae and a couple of laptops. She can set up a research lab in any room in seconds, no need for an expensive facility with half-silvered mirrors.
- Having worked at an agency for a couple of years, she has all the credentials she needs.
- She’s able to charge less than half what an agency charges, and still make a very comfortable living.
- What’s more her low rate also means she’s more cost effective to hire for long engagements – which means better billing efficiency for her.
Today, clients seem to be waking up to the value of freelancers, where historically they seemed to be more risk averse, gravitating to well known agencies. Just last week I was talking to Be Kaler Blake (Director of Futureheads, a London-based UX recruitment agency), who described the market for UX freelancers as “buoyant” – an unusual word to hear in the midst of a worldwide financial crisis.
So, how do agencies feel, knowing that every time they train up a new consultant, they are paving the way for a new freelancer who may ultimately become a competitor? And what does this mean for the industry in general?
One way or another, things are changing. Charging £10,000+ for single round of usability testing used to be such an easy way to get by.
I have often thought of another benefit to using freelance UX people.
In most agencies nowadays, the UX people are king. They get to specify the ideas+concepts, and effectively define the later volume/complexity of the production work.
Is it not in the client’s interests to make UX work financially independent of production? I don’t know of any agencies who deliberately ‘expand’ the production work through UX, but I wonder….
*ducks*
You’re right about UX research suiting the ‘lone wolf’ consultant.
Most UX agencies typically assign a single consultant to UX research projects, Sometimes overseen by a more senior practitioner. Agency consultants in this situation frequently refer and take advice from colleagues within their agency, so the client benefits from the collective experience of the agency’s best practitioners.
It’s possible though for a client to have the best of both worlds by hiring a freelancer who’s done solid time in the agency environment to benefit from collective knowledge and experience, but who maintains a network of colleagues to bounce and share thoughts with. There are more and more of us around.
My thoughts are that there is room for two to three person freelance alliances. Pairing a freelance UX researcher with an IA for example might come in at less than the agency rate for just one of these but provide the client with double the value.
Surely the future of UX Research is for companies to bring the work in-house? Why pay even half of a what an agency charges if you can get this core skill in an employee?
@Ben – Another issue with “full service” agencies is that they inherently can’t have an impartial research department. The whole point of engaging in research is to get an objective view on things.
@David – I agree. As someone who’s built an in-house role for myself, having worked agency-side, I can confirm the cost savings for my employer are huge. To be honest I don’t really see UX freelancing as “the future” per se, but it’s definitely flourishing at the moment.
@David,
Agree on cost, but there is an argument against it.
I’ve seen in-house web teams produce very stale work because they’re basically only working on one thing, but that’s by no means a rule (looking at you Harry!).
I’d argue that the variety of work at an agency is a plus to most people’s skills; it broadens one’s experience.
Yep, definitely very interesting times for UX consultants. Considering their career options, a consultant who has served 2+ years of bog standard usability testing, essentially has two options at the moment: “Do I stay here and become a ‘senior consultant’, responsible for selling and scoping projects? Or do I just keep doing what I’m doing, only pocket more cash by going freelance?’.
I guess it depends on what floats your boat about your job. Me, I love meeting new clients and talking about their problems, but I know some people who have no interest in the strategic and business elements of an engagement and prefer to concentrate on the subtleties and challenges of the design issues.
Whilst the freelance market is bouyant, one thing I find distressing is that as a career it has a relatively low glass ceiling. Whilst contractors in other areas of the technology and media sectors may be product and marketing managers, UX freelancers are rarely used as anything but a testing and wireframing resource. This doesn’t insure us very well as individuals against a shift in the market.
For the traditional consultancies, I agree it’s increasingly difficult for them to compete with 1-2 person operations on cost. There’s been a trend for some time towards specialisation and attempts to get out of the usability-test-and-report space. Some are trying to own more of the client’s design process, others such as HFI are concentrating more on the strategic end of the market, whilst others increasingly specialise in technology (e.g. analytics, eyetracking, etc).
Anyway, until someone wants to hire a strategic UX advisor at freelance rates, I’m staying put!
“Why pay even half of a what an agency charges if you can get this core skill in an employee?”
I think then the question becomes one of exposure and breadth of experience.
It’s like horseradish. “To a worm in horseradish, the world is horseradish.” – Yiddish expression
All else being equal, for a UX professional, I think it’s best we expose ourselves to a multitude of experiences in different domains (it doesn’t even have to be in technology). This opens our eyes and minds to better ways of interacting with technology. For this reason, I think a UX professional operating in a UX consultancy will more likely expose him to a multitude of experiences.
That has been my personal experience having worked in a UX consultancy and an MNC…and not back in a UX consultancy.
Then again, if you are one that believes Apple creates great products with great user experiences, being that worm might not be that bad afterall, so long as you’re in an Apple..(;
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A great article, which could be pointed at freelancing in general, not just UX’ers…
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