In-House vs. Freelancer vs. Agency vs. Design Partner – What’s the Best Option for Your Startup?
You're a tech startup. You're looking for design support to help your marketing team step out of execution, focus more on strategy, so they can launch campaigns faster, publish better, and convert more.
You likely have a marketing team of 1–5 people. Maybe you're doing all the design work yourself. If so, stop. You need a designer. Or you have an in-house designer who's overstretched and drowning in to-dos. Or maybe you're working with a freelancer or agency, but things are slow, expensive, and you need something better.
The point is, you need more design support. The question is: what path should you take?
In this article, we’ll walk through the pros and cons of each option and share our recommendation.
Prefer to Watch Instead?
Here’s a quick video that walks through the four design support options and the modern alternative to the old hiring model.
The Options
In-House Designer
Pros
- Embedded in the team and culture
- Immediate access for fast communication and iteration
- Deep understanding of your brand over time
- Full control over priorities and workflow
- Perceived stability and lower coordination friction
Cons
- Long and competitive hiring process
- High total cost (salary, benefits, overhead)
- Difficult to scale bandwidth as needs grow
- Risk of a bad hire (time and cost of re-hiring)
- Can become a bottleneck if overloaded
- Limited skill set compared to a multi-disciplinary team
Freelancer
Pros
- Flexible and affordable for small tasks
- Easy to trial and replace if needed
- Wide availability of niche skill sets
- Good for simple, one-off or overflow projects
Cons
- Varying levels of quality and reliability
- Limited availability (especially good ones)
- Often reactive, not strategic
- Not embedded in your team or goals
- Needs strong briefs and handholding
- Hard to scale or manage at volume
Agency
Pros
- Professional, polished output
- Comes with team, project managers, and processes
- Can handle high volume or large-scale projects
- Suitable for rebrands or big campaigns
Cons
- High cost (retainers, markups, scope creep)
- Slower timelines due to layers of communication
- Less flexible – rigid scopes or change fees
- Detached from day-to-day marketing goals
- Often focused on aesthetics over performance
- Hard to maintain speed for growth-stage companies
Design Partner
Pros
- Access to a senior multidisciplinary team (not just one person)
- Faster turnaround and flexible scope
- More cost-effective than a full-time hire or agency
- Strategic alignment with your marketing goals
- Can scale up or down support as needed
- No long-term commitment required
- Helps buy time while hiring in-house
- Maintains continuity if team members leave
Cons
- Still requires onboarding to understand your brand
- Less traditional model – might require internal buy-in
- External partner – not “your person” on payroll
- May need clear process to integrate smoothly
Old vs New
The Old Way - Rushed, Risky & Slow
Most startups default to hiring a designer as the first move. But here’s what that actually looks like:
- Day 0–60: Recruiting → hours lost to job specs, sourcing, and filtering
- Day 60–90: Interviews → evaluating culture fit, design tests, negotiations
- Day 90–120: Onboarding → still no design output, still waiting
- Day 120–180: Ramp-up → finally seeing results (if you made the right hire)
- Day 240+: Risk → they’re overwhelmed, under-supported, or looking elsewhere
In parallel, you’re often relying on a freelancer or agency just to stay afloat, which adds cost, context-switching, and coordination overhead.
The New Way - Relaxed, Risk-Free & Fast
Now let’s flip the script.
- Day 0–3: Kickoff with a Design Partner – briefed, aligned, and ready to go
- Day 3–7: Initial deliverables – assets in motion
- Day 7–180: Consistent, high-quality output driving campaigns forward
- Day 180+: Scale up, scale down, or transition – your choice
In parallel, you can look for the perfect in-house hire without internal pressure. No rushing means a higher chance of finding the right person. And when you do, your Design Partner can:
- Help onboard and support them
- Scale back to handle overflow
- Or continue as a flexible extension of your team
Final Recommendation
You don’t need to commit to one model forever, you just need to make the right next move.
For most tech startups, the smartest path looks like this:
- Start with a Design Partner: Get high-quality output fast, without the hiring delays or agency overhead
- Stabilize your execution: Free up your marketing team, launch campaigns faster, and build momentum
- Hire when you're ready: With clarity on what you need and zero pressure to rush the process
- Scale on your terms: Keep your Design Partner as overflow support or dial things back as your team grows
This isn’t about replacing your future team, it’s about helping you get there without compromising speed, quality, or sanity.