[towelpluswater]

I'd agree. Staff aug roles for individual freelancers are always easier to find, but good luck getting a team of those unless you're a more established firm - plus, the rate and work isn't all that great. We avoid them as much as possible.

Sell project work that's strategic (ie: solving a business problem and coming with a solution), as opposed to 'We need a frontend developer for 12 months'. Better rates, opportunities to work with business instead of IT, etc.

[jasonswett]

Agreed. Although I think the reason why most freelancers sell staff aug work as opposed to what you might call "strategic project work" is that it's about 100X easier (at least in my experience) to find staff aug work.

[version_five]

The gp already alluded to it: the big difference with strategic work is you need to have the client's trust in your ability to solve their business problem, not just in your ability to code. This is why it's so hard to find, they are buying you / your team instead of just "a developer". You need to be close enough to them that they can be candid about their challenges and understand their challenges enough to provide good advice. This mostly only can happen through very strong referrals + lots of time put in getting to know the client and problem. Which is why the approach mentioned by the GP in their other comment is really the only way.