Starting Offline Web Design/SEO/ORM Business. Tips/advice?

Jeez...you know what I pitty the poor business that you sucker in actually. Full time 17 year old student using Fivferr gigs for sEO to makr up...wow sounds VERY professional. You only seem interested in your profits.

Why don't you leave this alone? You aren't committed to it. You lack the maturity and expeeince to go into B2B Stick to Clickbank sh**

I would prefer to do that but as a full-time student with sports and other extra curriculars, I would much rather outsource most of it. It will cost me more, but will still provide a profit. I do agree with you as far as the price point goes. Whatever your prices is, remain firm.

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Thank you weepingwillow for your grammatically correct and very mature response commenting on my maturity. Clearly any company that has employees is a scam as well because the owner does not do all the work. My commitment doesn't have to be solely placed in the gritty SEO. I can be committed to finding the absolute best services that a client could use, while maintaining a professional business relationship that is mutually beneficial and margins that make my effort worth while. Clearly you're very committed to your business because you decided to ask if anyone offers services the exact services you told me I should do myself.

Mikey,

I've PM'd you but seeing some of the replies I thought I'd add some of my thoughts. I personally deal with offline clients ALOT. As people have stated, the hardest part is finding clients - trust me its not easy no matter how cheap your service is!!

Therefore you must keep the clients you do have VERY happy by offering them exceptional services for a price that is good for both yourself and your client. Don't get too focussed on what benefits you the most, think what the client will benefit from. At the end of the day, the more you results you deliver, the more they will order from you!! Recurring income without having to do the whole sale pitch!

Then think - those clients you have might be so impressed with your service they'll recommend you to a friend or business associate - there is simply no better form of advertising!!

My first few clients I barely broke even on, but now I've gained about 20 clients from them so in the long run, its profited me hugely.

Another point to bare in mind, you're thinking that by telling a business owner you can make websites etc for extremely cheap then they'll instantly want to buy. NOT TRUE!! A lot of web design companies local to me charge a minimum fee of $6000 for a basic website. Now if some college kid walks in saying they can do it for $250 then they'll instantly think you're having a laugh - sounds too good to be true! The people you're selling to are business people as well and very savvy so don't be naive, just because they don't know everything about websites doesn't mean they're stupid!

Just my 2 cents.

BHP

First off, thanks BHP for your detailed response. I really appreciate anyone who has taken out any time to help me out. I agree with you strongly about customer retention over grabbing a quick buck. It seems that many people are mistaking my desire to make a profit for a get rich quick scheme. The only reason I keep mentioning profits is basically because, well, that's what were all in business for! But, my profit cannot be at the expense of the faces of businesses and their legitimacy. For this reason, I want to get high quality services to sell to them, but obviously at a cheaper price. Keep in mind that when I mention good profit I'm really referring to a very basic margin because as a student, I really don't need much. It would be great to have a business for the experience and also to make a little side cash to put away for college etc. I wouldn't try to sell some low quality BS services to anyone because I would be able to relate to them if they were promised a great product or service and in return they just got jipped. Also, as far as pricing, I mentioned about an $800 web design package, which around here is the norm, but said package would truly be a well designed, optimized site. I do feel that charging an exorbitant amount will deter a lot of the businesses I'm looking to contact as they're more of mom and pop stores and smaller businesses and because it's a little unfair imo. On the other hand, if I was to build a huge site with graphics all over and extreme amounts of content, then it would only be reasonable to charge a large amount.

You left me a message but your message box is full. My skype is UrbanAndrew

What are peoples thoughts on names for offline companies?

Any ideas?

Maybe we could have some thoughts on company names....

BHPlatinum said:

What are peoples thoughts on names for offline companies?

Any ideas?

Maybe we could have some thoughts on company names....

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I mean I had a few in mind, but I really don't think it matters too much. I would imagine that the most important thing is to have a legitimate sounding name and not like "GET RICH FASTER SUPER EASY COMPANY" lol. What do you think?

From being in the trenches myself, I recommend sticking to one service where you can grab residual income. For me it was organic SEO (all outsourced). First I made sure I could deliver results without a doubt (as long as they weren't penalized) and then I took action to get clients.

My first deal was from a cold call. I called many businesses in my city, and finally got a bankruptcy lawyer to agree to a results in advance SEO service. The deal was, once I got him on page one for one of his keywords, he would be billed $250 and a minimum of $250 per month thereafter. Once he saw I could get results, he went straight to $800 per month to target more keywords. I was ecstatic, and saw the true potential at that point... almost 2 years later, I have grown steadily and support a family/pay the mortgage etc. By far the most important thing has been building relationships, delivering value, being genuine, and a consistent way of getting new leads. Hope this info is useful to someone.

Arsis said:

From being in the trenches myself, I recommend sticking to one service where you can grab residual income. For me it was organic SEO (all outsourced). First I made sure I could deliver results without a doubt (as long as they weren't penalized) and then I took action to get clients.

My first deal was from a cold call. I called many businesses in my city, and finally got a bankruptcy lawyer to agree to a results in advance SEO service. The deal was, once I got him on page one for one of his keywords, he would be billed $250 and a minimum of $250 per month thereafter. Once he saw I could get results, he went straight to $800 per month to target more keywords. I was ecstatic, and saw the true potential at that point... almost 2 years later, I have grown steadily and support a family/pay the mortgage etc. By far the most important thing has been building relationships, delivering value, being genuine, and a consistent way of getting new leads. Hope this info is useful to someone.

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Did you hire someone to do SEO or purchase services? Any recommendations for outsourcing?

I'm hoping after a certain point, I won't need to actively seek out more clients due to recommendations and referrals from previous successful relations. Do you ever let your clients know they're free to refer people? If so, do you offer discounts or a monetary reward?

Cold calling is king! Do it right away!

Wow nice work Arsis! Do you think you would be able to apply the same concept for a significant move in SERP instead of actually getting on first page? And by agree do you mean he signed a contract so that he couldn't flake out on you if you actually did get him to first page? I would love to talk some more about the topic! I sent you a PM!