Early access open
Marketing is unlicensed, but it is not unregulated. The Australian Consumer Law applies to every claim made in your name, and the liability for a misleading claim sits with the business being advertised, not the contractor who wrote it.
This page covers what gets subcontracted in this sector, the credentials worth confirming, and how a job runs on Workforce Marketplace. Early access is open.
What gets subcontracted
The work most often subcontracted covers:
- Campaign strategy and creative development
- Paid media buying and management across search and social
- Search engine optimisation and content marketing
- Email marketing and automation build
- Social media management and community handling
- Analytics, tracking implementation and reporting
- Public relations and media outreach
Credentials that matter here
There is nothing to license, so the confirmations are about accountability and access:
- An active ABN and evidence of genuine business operation
- Professional indemnity insurance, which matters here because the exposure is advice and claims rather than physical damage
- Platform certifications and agency status, verifiable directly with the platform
- Ownership of your own accounts: ad accounts, analytics properties, domains and pixels should be owned by you with the contractor granted access, not the other way around
- Written confirmation of who approves claims before they are published
The account ownership point is the one that causes the most damage. Agencies that build campaigns inside their own ad accounts leave clients with no history, no audience data and no ability to leave. Own the accounts and grant access.
What to confirm before work starts
An active ABN. Where a supplier does not quote one, you are generally required to withhold 47 per cent of the payment and remit it to the ATO. Their GST registration also tells you whether the price should carry it.
That the credential is held by the entity you are contracting with. A person can hold a qualification while the business you are paying holds nothing. Check the name on the document against the name on the invoice.
Insurance appropriate to the scope. Public liability is the common one. Depending on the work you may also need professional indemnity, and workers compensation if they carry their own staff.
That the engagement is genuinely a contract for services. Since the Fair Work amendments the test looks at the real substance of the relationship rather than the label on the paperwork, and getting it wrong creates back-pay, superannuation and payroll tax exposure. Contractor vs employee in Australia sets out how it now works.
Writing a scope that gets comparable quotes
Marketing engagements need the deliverable separated from the spend. State what the fee covers and whether media spend is separate and paid directly by you, what the reporting cadence and metrics are, who owns the accounts, data and creative assets, who is responsible for substantiating claims and complying with the Australian Consumer Law, what the notice period is, and what happens to campaigns and assets at the end of the engagement.
How it works on Workforce Marketplace
Post the scope with the payment structure it actually uses, whether that is fixed price, hourly, daily, quoted or split into milestones for staged work. Subcontractors apply, and you compare them side by side rather than chasing callbacks.
Every account is ABN-verified at sign-up. Beyond that, subcontractors can submit licences, certifications and insurance for verification, which we review rather than grant automatically. Their profile shows the status against each credential without showing the document, the licence number or the ABN. Verification is opt-in, so a profile may hold credentials that have not been submitted, and it reflects the document as at the date it was reviewed rather than standing indefinitely.
Applying for work costs nothing and there are no leads to buy. Payment runs through Stripe, and Workforce Marketplace never stores your card or bank details.
Related guides
- Find subcontractors in Australia
- How to find subcontractors for your business
- What insurance does a subcontractor need in Australia?
- How to invoice as a subcontractor in Australia (with GST)
Post work, or apply for it, from the same account. Early access is open.