Offline Warriors - How do you get clients? Seriously :)

Get in touch with advertising companies in your area that don't offer web services. Ask them to refer any customers looking for these services to you for a fee.

There is enough methods just in these few posts for you to start generating some leads. It's just a matter of getting out there and getting it done. Don't stop when the first 3 things you do don't produce anything.

Will do! Thanks

DogScout: a distilled course in consulting - excellent.
GoGetta: 4-ways to get moving.

Tim: take action on the info in this thread and you'll get results. Then review, refine and do it again.

Good luck,
Don

Do you have a sample script you'd mind sharing. I will cold call even though I hate it. I gotta eat ya know :p

I use most of the above, I didn't see visiting BNI International - Business Networking and Referrals or Business Networking and Business Referrals by LeTip International, Inc. Groups mentioned. I also created a basic website to send to offline clients My Business Marketing - My Business Marketing

I charge between $1,500 to $4,000 per month to my clients.

Disclaimer: I am not an attorney nor an account.

There's no reason to incorporate at this early stage. It's just adds headaches at tax time.

You can register a fictitious name with most states (DBA or "doing business as"). You'll need to do this before you can set up a bank account in that business' name.

A business name isn't what will give you credibility with your prospects, however. Lack of one is just an excuse for not getting started. I know. I used that excuse when I kept avoiding pulling the trigger.

I still operate under my name. Think of it as "personal branding."

Tim, at some point you should likely form an LLC for liability protection as your client base grows, but that is a much longer conversation where you are going to have to do some due diligence as to what legal entity is right for you.

As far as how you present yourself to the the prospect and what your title/status is, I actually just put up a free WSO today on how to exactly position yourself with offline prospects. It even discusses that very issue (short answer: don't use any title, including consultant). Check the link out in my sig or PM me if you don't want to deal with the WSO.

I haven't had much luck with outside reps. Do you get much turnover? Do you have any tips for training new hires?

Do you have them finding or helping clients?

If finding, how do they do it? Cold-calls?

Jeff

Mav,

What types of services are you providing?

Iceman

@Tim - I feel your pain on this one. I went through pretty much your exact situation last year.

I think @NickLynn has some great advice. Referrals is what has worked best for me by far.

One thing I do is simply let people know what I do. Dinner parties, the bar, friends of friends... Let them know that you are an expert in internet marketing and search engines. You'll be surprised at how people will offer out leads and provide referrals for people you can help. Of course, this is more of a long term strategy. It sounds like you need clients now.

If you're going to be approaching businesses. Set up a professional website and gather up your past clients or people you've worked for. Let your past clients know you've set up shop for yourself and are looking for clients. Again, just ask your past clients if they know of anyone who might be in need of your services. Don't demand an answer immediately, but be sure to follow up regularly. You've got to train clients to be on the look out for you.

Chamber of commerce is a great idea. It's a strategy I'm still trying to hone for myself though. I can't really speak on it from personal experience. Although I have offered to do some free work for the Junior Chamber in my town. I'm hoping to build up good will with a new network of people and also get a reference on their website.

If you're looking for clients fast, go after small businesses. Larger ones will be RFP after conference call after meeting. This is a huge waste of time in my experience and if you don't have notable past clientele they won't be interested.

My advice would be to get to know a local niche like lawyers in your town. They're everywhere and they all need websites. Send them an email with a short 2 - 3 page white paper explaining how their competition is being listed for "town name lawyer" or "town name attorney" and they are not. Therefore they are losing out on business.

If you need to drum up biz fast for SEO. Play on their competition.

If you're serious about making money you need to stop trying to gather more information and start taking action immediately.

Here's why...

Every person in every area is in a different situation, has a different set of skills and will get different results with exactly the same actions.

Anything that puts you in contact with business owners in any way gives you a chance of getting hired.

Your highest chance of getting hired is if you've been recommended by another business owner.

So that leads to:

# 1: Ask everyone you talk to who they know who might benefit from your knowledge.

Referrals are the easiest to convert to paying clients.

The easiest way to get started from zero is to talk to people and business owners you already know...

# 2: Talk to the business owners you already know.

# 3: Talk to the owners of businesses where you're spending money (as was mentioned above...if you're a customer spending money they're far more likely to want to talk to you and you can lead into a business conversation more naturally when you're already talking about a product or service you're buying).


# 4: Ask all your friends who they might know.

OfflineBiz.com members use the Offline Gold Client Flood system to do this but the bottom line is that you systematically ask for referrals from every living breathing person you know when you're starting out.

Also remember that the advice you give when you first talk to a prospect is free so when you're asking for referrals you can offer to give the business owners people know a valuable gift consultation on their behalf.


# 5: Go to business networking meetings and any meetings and groups where business owners congregate.

Getting involved with a charity or two that has a lot of business owners can make these owners more interested in trying to help you in your business.

At business networking meetings learn to ask questions and listen.


# 6: Speak at as many business group events as you can.

Being the speaker for a business networking group gives you great posture. You're immediately seen as an expert and business owners will usually come up and talk to you after you've spoken.


# 7: Use direct mail. At OfflineBiz.com members use the Amazing 4 Line Letter which gets around 20%+ of business owners calling you.

Direct mail used effectively can get a lot of business owners contacting you which also gives you great posture.


# 8: Use email.

Dropping an email to a business owner that gets his curiosity up or opens ANY kind of communication can work.

Your response rate is likely to be lower but then it's very easy to send an email.


# 9: Use your phone.

All this carry on about "I don't want to cold call" etc etc etc.

For God's sake get over yourself. Business owners call other business owners all the time when they have something valuable to share.

Just remember these words: "I have my own business..."

They work like magic when you want to talk to a business owner.

Stop being a whimp and pick up the phone.

One secret...you can call some business owners after hours and leave a message that forces them to call you back out of curiosity.

Also if you've opened communication through email or direct mail the sooner that conversation moves to a higher level (phone conversation or face to face) the higher your chances of getting hired.

If someone emails me back and I have their phone number I'm calling them on the phone immediately.

That will convert a huge number of prospects into paying clients.

It's also not cold calling (if you're still want to be whimpy about that.) Someone who's already contacted you has expressed their interest.


# 10: Walk into businesses and talk to the owner.

If you walk through areas that have businesses you can simply smile and say hi to every business owner you see.

You don't have to try to talk to them.

If you walk on the same route repeatedly those business owners will feel like they know you after you've smiled and said hi half a dozen times.

Then you can stop and talk to them anytime you want and start asking questions.

Last time I checked there's nothing scary about smiling and saying hi to people.


# 11: Learn to ask questions and listen.

If you're talking to business owners and trying to tell them about social networking, SEO, or any other service YOU WANT TO SELL then you deserve to crash and burn.

Stop thinking about yourself and get interested in them and THEIR business.

Ask questions and listen.

Gather information.

Then when you've built some rapport and trust you can use that information to create customized suggestions.

When the business owner gets excited about one of your suggestions you can establish the value of that idea to the owner, ask for 50% in advance to get started and run with it.

That's the easiest ways I know to get hired.

One final tip:


# 12: Stop talking about what you WON'T do.

In many cases the thing you have so much resistance to doing may be the EASIEST way for you to get paying clients.

You're creating mental barriers in your mind...making that task seem a whole lot harder than it really is.

"I won't walk into businesses and talk to business owners" for example.

What do you have against walking past, smiling and saying hi to business owners you see?

That's not scary. And then talking to them after you've said hi half a dozen times and they feel like they know you.

In some cases they'll start a conversation with you when their business is quiet.

Also not scary.

But if you keep telling yourself over and over you won't do something you're making it seem scary.


It's the same with calling a business owner of the phone.

You call your friends all the time on the phone.

Stop making mental barriers for yourself by saying you won't do something.

Think of the business owner you want to call as a friend and just do it.

Sometimes things might not go as well as you'd like but who cares?

If they do go well you get some money and the business owner gets a service that makes him some real money.

Everybody wins.

I would give you one suggestion that will change your outlook on life and business forever.

Today DO the thing you're most afraid of doing.

Don't think about it or analyze it just do it.

Even if you take action almost certain you're going to fail it's better than not taking any action at all because you'll get some real live feedback and you'll see that the things you fear really aren't such a big deal.

There's an old saying:

"It's hard to steer a car that's not moving."

All the information in the world is not going to help you get hired if you're not taking any action.

We can't help you adjust what you're doing to be more effective if you're doing nothing.

There's a big long list here of things you can do.

If you want to get hired and make some money it's up to you to take some action NOW.

Kindest regards,
Andrew Cavanagh

Those who are already paying a lot for advertising (billboards, radio/tv spots, newspaper ads, yellow pages).

Only businesses with high value customers (doctors, lawyers, new car dealerships, manufacturers, contractors). Any business will want your services but only those are likely to most benefit from it and more importantly PAY YOU! The idea is each customer is MUCH more valuable to a contractor than a guy that owns a pizza place.

Believe me, everyone will be interested in what you are offering, but the hardest part is making money doing it.

Ok, on the fees part...

I have used MANY price models in businesses before but the best one to me is to have a package ready for a set price. Any deviation from that package can be adjusted for with either a 'menu' of prices or per hour or the big money maker, per month with a minimum of months.

For example

Silver Package: Ad design, Squeeze Page, Thank You Page, Autoresponder setup and 12 months of emails, $1,500. $250/MN FOR 12 MONTHS to maintain webspace/aweber/etc.

Gold Package: blah blah....

Little piece of advice, if they ask you, "How much would you charge me to do XYZ"...answer them RIGHT AWAY or tell them, well in my experience my GOLD package would cover that for exactly $2000 and $100/mn". In other words, don't say, "well let me think about that and calculate that and get back to you" If you give them a fair package offer, they will take it and it saves having to "prepare a proposal" (the guys way of brushing you off).

This is why you hopefully chose a client that is going to pay you for the valuable customers you are bringing them. For instance, do you think a guy with a pizza place that you sent two customers worth $50 is going to pay you $2000 easier than a dentist that makes $4,000 for that same amount of customers?

Tim - you've got great pearls of money making action items from everyone posting here in this thread - Andrew Cavanagh's post sums it up

Take action - test - tweak - take action - get confidence - go JUST DO IT!

in reference to your question about fees for services -

check out my sig link below for free cool stuff on that including my own packages my consulting company sells.

what type of businesses - some things to think about

1. - go after ones with high customer lifetime value (e.g. a plastic surgeon who gets one new customer that is worth $10k plus...has the marketing budget to pay YOU four figures per month to get new customers...''

some restaurants believe it or not - have high CLV!

2. ONes with a marketing budget already established -

e.g - call / email / direct mail to companies already using PPC campaigns - heck -they have already RAISED their hand to say I want to be on first page of googe

3. Try to understand the 'pain ' of one particular niche and capitalize on it - solving that pain and understanding how to talk to the prospect about the pain....so for instance - alot of professionals (dentists, optometrists, chiripractors) are starting to see a 'pain' of 'what is being said about them on the social mediasphere....

yes - I pay researchers to find that out - eg - do you know a hot topic at dentists' conferences right now...- 'what is being said about them online"

...ding ding - reputation management, social media services to that niche - HOT

You know what I mean - talk to your prospects not as a salesperson - as a consultant, developing a relationship with him/her, finding more about their industry to then understand how you can help them better.

4. Get other clients in that niche - go to other cities etc. get referrals from your clients for that niche

5. other important stuff on what customer to go after -

get a pad of paper out - write down right now your background experience - where / what industry have you worked in and understand.

reach out to that niche you have a background in.

E.g. I have a background in real estate and venture capital - talking to those prospects is easier for me than talking say to a niche I"m not as familiar - say dry cleaning
\
make sense?

Next - and important - some may disagree - it's not about money money money honey...also ...

write down what niche your 'dig' or are passionate about that you would enjoy consulting to. This can give you long term rewards beyond money!

That's some pieces of action items to add to this great thread....

ONe other point, if you are wanting to outsource the cold calling....

do what the best 'sales floors' and 'big boys' do...

The Two Step (note this is great also to do with 'warm leads' you perhaps got from a Chamber presentation, an educational webinar etc.)

You have one person (you can hire via odesk, craigslist advert. etc.) be an 'appointment setter for you'

YOu then take that appointment with the prospect (or perhaps you hire a 100% commissioned sales rep you also found via CL or other means)

Note - it is rare to outsource both steps to one person - you typically find one type of person GREAT at chit chatting, starting the relationship...

and another type of person GREAT at closing.

Good luck and you've made the right choice -owning your own consulting biz is da bomb!

HOpe that helps! Cheers, Maria

ps - I'll pm you a link to a free audio I had with JJ Childers where we discussed how to set yourself up as a consultant...

my recommendation is to first boot strap it with little expenditure possible, reinvest profits into your biz

I'm actually going to try this as well. I have a website (more like a webage) in the Dental niche that is ranking quite nicely, AND I also got a Google Favorite Places award for it! Im not sure how or why they gave me that seeing as how there is no physical building, nut I got one and im going to use it to my advantage.

I thought either creating a separate webpage for each city surrounding Phoenix, and renting the page out to ONE dentist in that city for a monthly fee....or....renting the entire webpage out to one dentist for more money. Im sure it would be easier to convince dentist into advertising as opposed to 10 or 12 in different cities....

Thanks for the kind words! I will post tonight or tomorrow how my day went. Off to shower and get dressed...oh yea, and TAKE ACTION

It's good advice but I'd word it a little differently.

When you're starting out you don't want to steer clear of any kind of payment (obviously lol).

Any experience where you're getting paid by a client is valuable to you for developing your skills.

One other thing you should keep in mind.

Small ongoing payments (like $20-$50 a month) sound appealing but often they open you up for doing a whole lot of work that really isn't worth the effort.

You'd be better off charging $250 to $600 a year.

When you're thinking about charging ongoing payments you want to make it worth your while.

Most people starting out in this niche simply don't charge enough which is fine with your first few clients but beyond that don't be afraid to charge...your clients will respect your time more and you'll make more money.

The guy who's charging $50 a month gets treated like a lackey.

The guy who's charging $500 to $1,500+ a month gets treated like an expert consultant.

Kindest regards,
Andrew Cavanagh

Yes we do that for gold members at offlinebiz.com





Great to see you're taking action.

If you focus on being low key and just asking questions you should end up converting a lot more than one in ten business owners you talk to into clients.

Also remember that the business owners who don't hire you can be a great source of referrals.



The fees you charge will be different for each project you do and based around a combination of:

# How much you're happy to do the work for (you charge at least twice that as an upfront fee).

# How much the service is worth to the business in terms of potential sales and profits (working with the business owner to establish an estimated value is crucial).

# What the business owner is used to paying for other products and services (if you're inside his payment comfort zone then it's much easier to get him to pay you that upfront fee when you're first starting).

Kindest regards,
Andrew Cavanagh