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Advice - Online Marketing Agency: Niche & Avatar

by boristheblade79
14 replies
I've been lurking here for - embarassingly - years and now the time has finally come for me to start!

Having earned a few stripes doing affiliate marketing, I want to get into building up my own online marketing agency and have started working on it. There are two specific aspects, I would be hugely grateful for to get advice:

- I am on the fence if I should start locally (Berlin, Germany) or set it up having a global niche in mind right away. On the one hand, I feel this would give me the opportunity to sell easier, given I'd be able to do door-to-door sales, participating in networking events etc. On the other hand, I am afraid, that I would be limiting myself to a niche too small without a real necessity. I'd be hugely grateful for some thoughts around that. Scale it up starting locally vs. going global right away. Berlin has a substantial start-up infrastructure so I was thinking about positioning it in the niche of 'Online Marketing tailored to Startups / Young-Starting Entrepreneurs.

- I am following Neil Patel's Marketing Program, Russel Brunson's books etc. and correspondingly am now creating my avatars (one key fan, perfect customers). I have hit a little bit of a roadblock, because I do not really know as a fact, who they are. Would it from that perspective make sense, to create the perfect customers, based on my preferences who I would love to work for, my own ideas or would that be a bad idea and if so how could I build up this understanding? I have a strong desire to get going, set it up and drive traffic, so ideally I would want to avoid having to network for months until I can get going. Again, any thoughts would be hihgly appreciated.

Hope even though I was lurking so long, some of you could provide guidance on the above and if you have thoughts in general, even more so!

Thank you!
#advice #agency #avatar #marketing #niche #online
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  • Profile picture of the author tritrain
    If you intend to meet with people locally then I'd say going 'local' would be good. It might be easier to start there and then branch out. Just my 'two cents'.
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  • Profile picture of the author Randall Magwood
    Before you start your marketing agency, test yourself and see if you can sell a $7 ebook to the ideal prospect in your niche. If you can't, and you find this very difficult to do... then how will you convince people to pay you thousands for your help?

    P.S. Don't do door-to-door selling.
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    • Profile picture of the author boristheblade79
      Thanks. Where do you see the problem with door-to-door?
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      • Profile picture of the author JohnMcCabe
        Originally Posted by boristheblade79 View Post

        Thanks. Where do you see the problem with door-to-door?
        This is the "Internet Marketing Warriors Forum", so most of the members are fixated on the Internet part. You might want to check out the Offline Forum, particularly Claude Whitaker's posts.

        As far as building your avatars around the clients you want to work with, I think that's a great idea as long as those clients actually have the budget to pay you what you want to earn.

        With "start-ups and young entrepreneurs" you have to be very selective. There's a huge difference between the budget of, say, a software start-up with a few million in venture capital and a start-up using his lunch money to promote his app.

        The problem with targeting people with no money is that they have no money. Just skim down the posts on the main forum here, and count the number of people looking for advice, coaching, research and resources for free, preferably with as little work as possible. When the $7 ebook Randall mentioned is a major decision, you should be seeing red flags.

        As far as starting locally, I think that's a good idea. Berlin is a major city. You may find that you have no real need to expand beyond the local area, especially if you can land clients with ongoing needs you can fill. Depending on your ambition, you may only need a dozen steady clients to keep you as busy as you want to be.

        Even if you want to expand, build a local base, then expand to other cities, like Munich, Hamburg, Dresden, etc. Even Alexander the Great took over the world one piece at a time.
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        • Profile picture of the author boristheblade79
          Thanks so much, John. This is so valuable for me!

          Given I have a tech-background myself, I will explore the option to narrow down towards 'Tech-Companies / Startups', know a bit about the challenges having created a tech start-up myself.

          In terms of expanding, exactly my train of thought: I am regularly in Munich for my day-job, hence this is an obvious opportunity.

          I am interpreting your comments in such a way, that the suggestion to start with a small e-book would be the recommended way, to go, so will most likely start there.

          Again, thank you so much!
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          • Profile picture of the author Frank Donovan
            Originally Posted by boristheblade79 View Post

            I am interpreting your comments in such a way, that the suggestion to start with a small e-book would be the recommended way, to go, so will most likely start there.
            I think John was referencing an earlier post to illustrate the importance of ensuring your target market actually has a realistic working budget. But an eBook isn't a bad idea as long as you also get some hard copies printed. Other than personal recommendations, nothing builds credibility like putting your own authored book into the hands of prospects when networking.
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            • Profile picture of the author JohnMcCabe
              Originally Posted by Frank Donovan View Post

              I think John was referencing an earlier post to illustrate the importance of ensuring your target market actually has a realistic working budget. But an eBook isn't a bad idea as long as you also get some hard copies printed. Other than personal recommendations, nothing builds credibility like putting your own authored book into the hands of prospects when networking.
              Exactly so.

              If the target company is so small/underfunded that a cheap ebook is anything but an impulse purchase, you'll have tough sledding getting a project of any reasonable size.

              Even if you can't fund a print run, having your book simply available in physical form gives more credibility than a Kindle-only or PDF-only version. Even if the book isn't a raging hit, being able to buy author copies as needed is a plus.
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  • Profile picture of the author writeaway
    Try join local business clubs and get connections from such organizations

    I've had clients bringing down $25,000 per month and all they did was join a local ROTARY CLUB or some other civic organization.

    You'd be surprised at how powerful WORD OF MOUTH can be
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  • Profile picture of the author Bella Lopez
    As you mentioned that you would want to avoid having to network for months before actually you can get going, it would be a good idea to start local first as it can increase the chances of driving the right traffic with relatively lesser networking.

    Then later on you can branch out to other places once it starts to really explode in your local area.
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  • Profile picture of the author Peter Marshal
    well, local would be a better idea to get going before you start your online network. you must have the encouragement for the first experience and that is the local start up.
    that is how you can set up your own online business.
    I will agree with Randall Magwood that try to follow the niche and sell something that you really want as per your desired niche.
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    • Profile picture of the author boristheblade79
      Given I've build skill sets around online-marketing and am most interested in building a process around this, unless de-validated I'll take a stab at digital marketing. Thanks for your thoughts!
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  • Profile picture of the author affilorama-portal
    There is nothing wrong about starting small. In fact, if you have not done this "thing" before then I suggest you start small. Clear your thoughts and find a niche that you think you can do well. Picking a specific niche won;t limit you to doing anything in the future. It is a stepping stone for you to start ahead (without overwhelming yourself) and preparing yourself for better, bigger goals.
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  • Profile picture of the author zeus136
    We target local and international clients. There is no reason why you couldn't target both.
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