All good advice but my experience with agents has been slightly different. Sure a lot of them are hollow shells, but I give them my rate, some of them are succe

All good advice but my experience with agents has been slightly different. Sure a lot of them are hollow shells, but I give them my rate, some of them are successful in negotiating their fees on top of the client and I have gotten a fair amount of work from agencies. I would not discount them entirely just don't spend a lot of time chasing their lead and doing prep work for them to represent you and stay firm on your rate. A good deal will fall through but you can find some gems this way. A lot of large corps use agents to find freelancers and have exclusive contracting arraignments with the agency.