Literary Agents vs Direct Submissions

In the quest to become a published author, I have developed a list of publishers interested in the genre I write and are willing to online submissions directly from authors.

But instead of sending my first novel to all of those publishers, it's going to make the round of literary agents. Why?

1. Agents have access to publishers that a new novelist does not.
2. If an agent accepts your novel, you know that they are going to work at getting it published because their fees depend on it.
   (Subnote: do not ever submit to an agent who charges reading fees. Reputable agents will not charge a reading fee.)
3. The agent should be able to advise on contract offerings from a publisher.
4. As one agency site pointed out, you don't want to submit your novel to many publishers and use an agent as a last resort. Publishers are NOT going to want to see the work twice, so you are hampering the efforts of the agent.

The first two agents I have in mind will be seeing the manuscript exclusively. After that, it's time for the shotgun approach, find 5 or 6 agents will to look at manuscripts of the right genre from new authors and submit. Repeat as required.