Methods To Get Offline Clients

Hey again, first off I want to say thank you to everyone that has given me some great advice in my other two threads the responses have been fantastic so thank you all.

Ok so not to try and be annoying but I see in other forums questions all over the place regarding how to get offline clients...

As you all might know I am not one for cold-calling...Well at the moment anyway until I just bite the bullet and pick up the phone but for now I would like to know what are your various ways for getting offline clients?

I would like to make this a thread with everyones ideas and methods that work for them when acquiring leads.

So as with everything in life, its nice to give first before others will give in return so I will start of with these methods that I have tried so far....

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Local free papers

I look to see who is advertising in the paper that gets delivered for free and see if they have a website mentioned in it then I will go to their website and send an email about one of my services. I know I could really learn more as to how to approach using email but what I have tried already.

Friends & Family

This might seem obvious to some but not to others, its very simple. List down any friend or family that you know either has a business or has an influence over a business, this is easy to quickly build referrals or a small portfolio when first getting started.

These 2 methods are all that I have tried at the moment as currently I am building up a portfolio of my services for free before I can start offering them for sale..

Reason for this is basically because I still have to register as a business to trade and pay tax etc, so for now building portfolio.

Looking forward to hearing your methods.