u/Slow_Height3706

Has anyone ever changed their mind about an agency after the first call?

I'm at the stage where every WordPress development agency starts looking the same. Nice portfolio, nice promises, similar pricing... but I know that's not what determines whether a project goes well.

I had an intro call with IT Monks this week, and it made me realize I'm probably asking the wrong questions. What ended up telling you the most about a WordPress development agency before you signed? Was there one question or one answer that completely changed your decision?

I’m looking into an HLS stream that takes around 3–4 seconds before playback starts.

The initial .m3u8 request has noticeably higher TTFB than I’d like, so I’m trying to figure out how much of the startup delay is coming from the manifest request itself.

I’m considering edge-caching the .m3u8 manifest to reduce the distance between the viewer and the initial request.

For those who have optimized HLS startup times, did caching the manifest at the edge make a noticeable difference for you? Or were other parts of the startup sequence usually a bigger factor?

every agency i speak to about GEO claims to be an expert in generative engine optimisation right now. six months ago half of them had never heard the term. now it is on every agency website with a dedicated service page and a case study that was probably written in the last ninety days. i have been doing GEO work for my finance brand long enough to know what good looks like and what is just repackaged content marketing with fancier language. and i have had enough bad agency experiences to know that a polished pitch and a real working relationship are two completely different things.

After working with a few freelancers and running an agency setup, one thing became very clear getting clients on Upwork isn’t the hardest part.

The real problem is keeping up with bidding consistently.

Most agencies I saw (including ours at one point) had the same issue:

* Too many good jobs, not enough time to apply

* Opportunities getting missed because someone saw them too late

* Proposals being rushed or inconsistent

* No proper system for applying 24/7

Even when the team is skilled, the pipeline breaks at the “application” stage.

We tried fixing it in different ways delegating, scheduling, batching but it still didn’t solve the core issue: Upwork moves too fast for manual bidding.

That’s when we started thinking more about automation around the bidding process itself.

Not replacing humans, but handling the repetitive part of:

* finding relevant jobs

* filtering them

* sending structured proposals

So the focus stays on closing clients instead of chasing listings all day.

Curious how other agencies handle this do you fully rely on manual bidding, or have you systemized it somehow?