Side by side
| BizBootstrap | Agency | Freelancer | Hiring a CTO | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| How you pay | One monthly fee from £499, no setup fee | Large up-front project quote, change requests extra | Day rate, open-ended | Full-time salary, often plus equity |
| Time to start | First sprint within a week | Weeks of proposals and contracts | Depends on availability | Months to recruit |
| Who you get | A technical lead plus a team covering design, web, mobile and AI | A team, but often junior staff after the sale | One person and one skill set | One senior person who still needs a team |
| Flexibility | Change priorities every sprint; pause or change plan monthly | Fixed scope; changes cost extra | Flexible, but capacity is limited | Hard to scale down |
| Code ownership | Yours from day one, in your GitHub | Often handed over at the end | Varies | Yours |
| Risk | First-sprint guarantee, then monthly | Paid up front | Key-person risk | A wrong hire is costly |
Agency, freelancer and hiring descriptions are typical patterns, not quotes for any specific provider.
When each option makes sense
Choose an agency
You have a fixed, fully specified project, a large budget, and do not expect it to change.
Choose a freelancer
You need one specific skill for a short, well-defined task.
Hire a CTO
You have raised funding, found product-market fit and are ready to build an in-house team.
Choose BizBootstrap
You need a product built and improved over time, with senior judgement, predictable costs and no lock-in. We will also help you hire when you are ready.
See if we are the right fit
Book a free call. If another option suits you better, we will say so.
