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Managed To Build A Small Outsourcing Biz-Can't Scale Though

by Tommyg123
3 replies
Hi,

Over a year or so as a bit of a side hustle I managed to build up a little business selling myself as a marketing adviser. I used the asset I had available which was my Father, who ran marketing agencies back in the 80's (now retired) and he lent a hand on ideas until i picked it up.

I managed to, fortunately, find a couple of reasonably large companies early on (literally two) that had some pretty terrible stationary, brochures, website etc and over the course of a year or so revamped their "look" and brand and was a steady trickle of money most months. Brochure here, inforgraphic there with a decent website job adds up. After a lot of trial and error I have found some reliable/good people to outsource the work too and now have a team i can rely on for

I lost my main job recently (in finance) and want to try and scale this up and seem to be getting some interest but all the jobs i'm getting are one-off jobs with very small margins for me. If im only making $300 or so profit on a job that is a LOT of $300 jobs i need to get over the year to make a meaningful wage.

I need to try and find some way to get a customer once and then keep them as a drip feed of money. Any ideas of how to A/ Sell myself as something to be paid monthly instead of one off jobs B/ ideas of services I can sell to businesses that give more of a reliable cash flow?

I have tried SEO which has a lot of potential but am a little wary of it. I find the quotes need to be pretty high to provide enough hours to get results (which not many people will go for) and clients seem to have very unrealistic expectations of what can be achieved by SEO, they think 3 months of spending $600 a month and they will be top of Google.

Guess im looking for a bit of motivation as much as anything this is a viable business i can build.

Thanks for your time
#bizcant #build #managed #outsourcing #scale #small
  • Profile picture of the author animal44
    What businesses want is more sales, so learn direct response marketing.
    Simple thing you could do is customer reactivation letters/emails. Charge a percentage of the increased profit. You'll make far more money.
    Then take over email/direct mail marketing on the same basis - get customers coming back more frequently.
    Example, one small business, 30,000 on their customer list, customer reactivation generated some 344,000 for the client, plus our percentage and retainer 124,000. Amount of work, minimal :-)
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  • Profile picture of the author Ron Lafuddy
    Originally Posted by Tommyg123 View Post

    Hi,

    Over a year or so as a bit of a side hustle I managed to build up a little business selling myself as a marketing adviser. I used the asset I had available which was my Father, who ran marketing agencies back in the 80's (now retired) and he lent a hand on ideas until i picked it up.

    I managed to, fortunately, find a couple of reasonably large companies early on (literally two) that had some pretty terrible stationary, brochures, website etc and over the course of a year or so revamped their "look" and brand and was a steady trickle of money most months. Brochure here, inforgraphic there with a decent website job adds up. After a lot of trial and error I have found some reliable/good people to outsource the work too and now have a team i can rely on for

    I lost my main job recently (in finance) and want to try and scale this up and seem to be getting some interest but all the jobs i'm getting are one-off jobs with very small margins for me. If im only making $300 or so profit on a job that is a LOT of $300 jobs i need to get over the year to make a meaningful wage.

    I need to try and find some way to get a customer once and then keep them as a drip feed of money. Any ideas of how to A/ Sell myself as something to be paid monthly instead of one off jobs B/ ideas of services I can sell to businesses that give more of a reliable cash flow?

    I have tried SEO which has a lot of potential but am a little wary of it. I find the quotes need to be pretty high to provide enough hours to get results (which not many people will go for) and clients seem to have very unrealistic expectations of what can be achieved by SEO, they think 3 months of spending $600 a month and they will be top of Google.

    Guess im looking for a bit of motivation as much as anything this is a viable business i can build.

    Thanks for your time
    Wow! You're going backwards and taking on water, since your post last year.

    http://www.warriorforum.com/offline-...-scalable.html

    Now you've lost your source of steady income.

    The "side deal", which you refer to as a business...isn't. A real business makes at least enough money to pay the bills. It also grows.

    Yours hasn't done either one.

    Time is not on your side. The longer you are out of the job market, the harder it will be to get back in.

    My advice, is to get off the forum. Focus all of your efforts on getting back into the work force.

    When you get your primary situation stabilized, you can look into side income again.

    Good Luck!
    Ron
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  • Profile picture of the author savidge4
    The absolute most important thing I have learned over the years.. YOU will never scale this business.. A team will. Convert the "I" to "We" and see where that gets you.

    Here is the big thing... $300 isn't much.. do it 10 times a month.. 20 times a month, and you have something. You are the one talking "Scale" and that is what scale is. Put on the hustle and get to it.

    Call everyone you have done work for.. and straight up ask for some referrals. Call everyone you have as much as talked to about business.. given bids to... call and see how they are doing. If you are not at the very least talking to potential clients... then go get yourself another 9 to 5.


    Originally Posted by Tommyg123 View Post

    Hi,

    Over a year or so as a bit of a side hustle I managed to build up a little business selling myself as a marketing adviser. I used the asset I had available which was my Father, who ran marketing agencies back in the 80's (now retired) and he lent a hand on ideas until i picked it up.

    I managed to, fortunately, find a couple of reasonably large companies early on (literally two) that had some pretty terrible stationary, brochures, website etc and over the course of a year or so revamped their "look" and brand and was a steady trickle of money most months. Brochure here, inforgraphic there with a decent website job adds up. After a lot of trial and error I have found some reliable/good people to outsource the work too and now have a team i can rely on for

    I lost my main job recently (in finance) and want to try and scale this up and seem to be getting some interest but all the jobs i'm getting are one-off jobs with very small margins for me. If im only making $300 or so profit on a job that is a LOT of $300 jobs i need to get over the year to make a meaningful wage.

    I need to try and find some way to get a customer once and then keep them as a drip feed of money. Any ideas of how to A/ Sell myself as something to be paid monthly instead of one off jobs B/ ideas of services I can sell to businesses that give more of a reliable cash flow?

    I have tried SEO which has a lot of potential but am a little wary of it. I find the quotes need to be pretty high to provide enough hours to get results (which not many people will go for) and clients seem to have very unrealistic expectations of what can be achieved by SEO, they think 3 months of spending $600 a month and they will be top of Google.

    Guess im looking for a bit of motivation as much as anything this is a viable business i can build.

    Thanks for your time
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