Smart Thinking? How I plan To Start My Website Design Business for Offline Businesses

Is there a possibility that maybe its because you are a hater (though Im sure Plato has a better word for it), as are many technicians, looking for a reason to keep considering yourself the only one qualified to work on the web?

You always find what you are looking for whether its good or bad. Many people simply have a "witch Hunting tendency"... They are always looking for reasons why others ideas are stupid... because it helps them feel superior... Could be that too. Im sure its a classic condition.

You can usually tell a sufferer by the way they go out of their way unnecessarily to make a point of others ignorance, and crush their spirit, discourage their ideas... you may even find that almost every other sentence they contribute is about others ignorance. Pay attention.

You can track back alot of naysayers posts and find that they habitually every other post are talking about how ignorant someone elses ideas are, usually even full of adjectives... Some people build virtually half their content on pointing out ignorance in others. Pay attention to what kinds of posts you are drawn to and what category you fall into.

Im just making suggestions to help answer your question, perhaps thats why you are reminded at this particular juncture.

Personally? People are always reminding me "are you sure thats how you want to be categorized..."?

Hmm... thats probably what half the people on the mayflower were asked before they got on the boat and came over here to start this great country I call home.

Personally... I fall into the category that, if you want a 3 page template site and you only want to spend $300 bucks. I will build it for you! If I dont know how I will get someone else to for 100 bucks and make a profit on it.

Thats the Warrior way!

Im also in the category that will tell a broke newby to go out and do the same thing, and put some money on their families table and learn as they go.

Sometimes I feel the warrior forum is being taken over by technicians personally, arent they supposed to be getting paid by the hour from real entrepreneurs...?

What happened to "Miraculous overnight success stories"?

Dont we create those anymore... cuz thats what keeps me doing this... creating those.

In truth, in the regular non IM business world "making sales" is no miracle at all, its just normal. Newbies take sales jobs all the time and go out and sell products they only have a few hours of training on, and they learn as they go, and they usually make sales before they become an authority...

Why wait? Lets create your miracle TODAY, and learn as we go!

What happened to talking about newbies making "Money" after only a week of joining the warrior forum? Like in the old days.

Istvan, did you stop believing in that? Is that perhaps why you are drawn to discouraging newbies for jumping in and taking action...?

15 years ago we were ALL ignorant about the web... didnt stop the warrior forum from being a major part of the new frontier, even the dot com BOOM!

Lets get some sales people!

Do you know of any sales jobs in the brick and mortar world where they will keep a newby for 90 days without producing business? Do they just train them for six months until the newby salesperson is an "authority" before they stick them out in the field?

No they train them as they go and stick them out in the field immediately, and expect the newby to start getting sales within DAYS or a couple of weeks at very most...

So, perhaps you are thinking like a technician and not an entrepreneur who sees opportunity... Who knows? It could be a number of things. Perhaps you arent recognizing the true needs of the 200k revenue business owner (about the revenue of an average small home decor retail shop) who pays himself 50k per year, spends over half his revenue on overhead, and barely has an advertising budget and still wants to be on the web.

Perhaps you are thinking in terms of major corporations who are in an entirely different world a universe away from this type of client, with half million dollar ad budgets, or maybe even million dollar ones... who knows.

I admire this guy (the OP) for having the balls to do more than just sit around reading marketing material for the next six months. You dont have to stop to smell the roses... you can smell them while you are running with them in your hand.

On qualifications:

Their are alot of musicians who graduated from highly esteemed colleges and are much more highly qualified than myself who didnt get a fulltime publishing deal and make a fulltime living in music...but I did.

A technician an entrepreneur does not make. SALES is what determines an entrepreneur. You can HIRE a technician.

If someone pays me to do something I dont know how to do, Im smart enough to take the money and use it to get the job done... but you WILL NOT catch grass growing under my feet because I dont know something.

Now its clear from reading the rest of the OP's post that he DOES know something about word press... he isnt completely ignorant... he only said he cant build from "scratch".

Let me ask you?

If a person can only build with word press themes, and they dont know how to build from scratch, are you saying they have no business performing the service of putting together a 3 page website for a small business owner?

I would really like to hear the answer to that.

Also the word "found" in his post, I assumed was meant to imply that his research has indicated to him that this would be a good business plan.

Your quotes were very selective. Might want to read up on some Freud or Plato for the reasons... as for now I hope I have helped answer your question directly.

My sig today is dedicated to the naysayers.

Yes but if the OP offered to go around to local businesses and offer YOUR design services would you take him up on his offer?

So maybe he can outsource?

People dont believe in that anymore or what?

as I said... "Technicians". They are able to work because of salespeople.

If you pay me enough I will sell your automobile repair services even if I dont know anything about automobiles...

Let me ask... would you take on an automobile repair shop as a web design client and sell their services on the web to internet customers , even though you dont know how to repair automobiles?

Of course you would.

If you thought you could make money driving around selling automobile repair services, even though you didnt know how to build automobiles, wouldnt you sell those customers anyway, and find an auto tech to do the work?

Or maybe, as in the case of the OP here... its just a quick fix like changing a tire, nothing fancy... and you feel that its not rocket science, and you can figure it out for yourself... you are gonna turn away the business?

Let me guess... are we all supposed to stop selling beauty salons our services because nobody is qualified to sell beauty salon services on the internet unless they have a degree in cosmetology? How could they possibly understand the needs of a hair salon customer?

Lol.

Some people are looking for a reason to hate.. Its GLARINGLY clear in some of the posts above.... people are virtually saying "These little chumps drive our value down...", and being hateful (hence "hater").

I guess everyone needs someone to blame for their failures...

Which proves everything Im saying here. Consider the source.

Perhaps some of these people would be more comfortable in a "tech" forum as opposed to a "money making" one.

Then You MUST hate John Dar... post as well.

Exactly right.

I admire the OP's ambition, but the true way to make money online is to believe you are giving the client a good deal. A .tk domain will only hurt your clients.

So what your saying is as internet marketers we're granted a free pass to ignore the fundamental rules of business?

I'm not questioning the OP's ambition.. It's a bad idea because of his business strategy.

If he had done even a little market research, no doubt he would have noticed that this industry is completely over saturated with more talented, more experienced, and more ambitious ENTREPRENEURS who will charge the same or less and deliver a better product.

Everyone and their brother is doing web design these days. What is he going to offer to his clients that will separate him from the 20 (or more) other web geeks competing for business in his area?

You don't need an MBA to realize this is just bad business.

And I'm not a "Developer." Geeze...

I agree with a lot of what you're saying - EXCEPT you do need to know something about building websites.

The problem with jumping into web design in the way the OP is looking to, is that the kind of website you can put together for $250 doesn't really HELP the business. It's more of a online business card. Here we are, here's what we do, and here's how to contact us.

Every website I build for a customer - and I've built many (haven't added them to my portfolio, but still) required more than a simple 5 page website.

When you talk to a customer and find out what they really NEED, you find that there's a lot more functionality / plugins, etc.. that go into making a site useful. I spend a huge amount of time finding plugins that can perform the functions that my clients require - music players, job postings, shopping carts, forums, event planning, booking, RSVP functions, etc..., etc...

Now if you take the time to learn how these things work, and how to integrate them into themes in a useful and functional way, then you'll not only improve your skill set, but you'll be providing your customer a website that's actually useful.

Second, I've NEVER had a customer that was happy with the way a theme looked by default. I've built dozens of sites, and every single time I've had to make changes to styles, backgrounds, colors, fonts, layouts, etc... If you don't have basic CSS/HTML skills, then take the time to learn them by playing around with free themes.

You don't even need a hosting account to test with as you can setup a virtual host right on your computer using locally installed WAMP of MAMP software - which are available for free.

WAMP = Windows, Apache, MySql, PHP, and installs these on YOUR computer, so that you can then install and test websites as though they're online.

You can learn more about that here: Local server setup | drupal.org

Until you learn more about this, I'd recommend offering your services for cheap, and explain that you're a bit of newby but if they give you a shot you think you can make a site that will help their business. After a few of those you'll be ready to ramp up a bit.

That's pretty much how I got started - except that I built a bunch of sites for myself first, and once I showed friends and associates some of my sites, they hired me (for cheap) and I worked my way up from there.

Now plenty of the sites I've build for customers earn me $1000 or more but the key is that they're WORTH IT to the customer. They look the way they want it to look, and provide the function they want it to provide. They're not simple business card sites.

Focus on giving the customer what they want and you'll be successful and gain repeat customers and referrals. If you only give the customer what you think they need, you'll never get your business off the ground.

Good luck!