Free directory, 47k agencies - should we charge them or buyers?

We've been running Pick an Agency free for both sides: agencies can claim and manage their profile at no cost, and buyers get access to 47,000+ indexed agencies plus a free AI matching tool that returns 5 fitted firms in 60 seconds.

The directory is useful enough that it works. We get steady organic traffic, agencies actively claim profiles, and people actually use the matcher. But we're at an inflection point and I'm genuinely torn on the next move.

The tension: every successful directory I look at eventually monetizes one side. Clutch charges agencies. Sortlist charges agencies. GoodFirms has a freemium model. The question is who should pay us, and I'm not sure the answer is obvious.

Option A: charge agencies a listing or verification fee. It's predictable, aligns with the SaaS playbook, and plenty of directories prove it works. But it feels like we're then incentivizing agencies to pay us rather than serve buyers better. And it changes the dynamic of what we're indexing - suddenly we might have selection bias toward whoever can afford the fee.

Option B: monetize buyers instead. Premium matching, priority support, saved searches, lead export. This keeps agencies free and theoretically keeps us aligned with finding the right fit. But most buyers don't need those features. They just want to find one good agency and hire them. The addressable market is smaller.

Option C: stay free and find a different model. Affiliate commissions, sponsored content, recruiting/talent, consulting retainers. Honest answer: I'm not sure this scales to a real business, but it's possible.

Right now we're profitable enough to stay independent and keep iterating. I'm not under pressure to pick fast. But I also know that drifting longer is a choice with a cost - every month we don't decide is a month we're not optimizing for growth or building features that assume one model.

I'm curious what you've seen work when you've evaluated these trades. If you've built a B2B directory or marketplace, who did you end up charging and why? And if you've used a directory to hire an agency, what would make you pay for premium features vs just using the free version?