This is my first post, other than one in the introductions forum. Because of some personal and family issues, I've bee forced to leave a stable job and move to a city of about 600k. I had plans to start a business in the next year or so, but as I said, I've had to start early.
My original plan was to offer data mining services for small businesses, but after giving it some thought, I think that type of business, while allowing me to charge nice hourly charges of $100+ per hour, will take some time to get off the ground. By chance, a friend of my wife asked if I did "internet optimization". She meant SEO. To make this long post a little shorter, I've settled on offering web design, SEO, and ORM services. I would like to solicit the community here for advice and criticism of my plan.
I've signed one client that I did web design and am doing SEO and ORM. Since it's my first client and I need the practice and web portfolio we agreed on $3800, payable with $200 up front and $300 per month for a year. I'm currently working on a contract for clients. I'm filing as a sole proprietor next week.
So that's it I guess. It's kind of scary to see it all written so quickly. I really need for this to work, but please be brutal in your comments!
My original plan was to offer data mining services for small businesses, but after giving it some thought, I think that type of business, while allowing me to charge nice hourly charges of $100+ per hour, will take some time to get off the ground. By chance, a friend of my wife asked if I did "internet optimization". She meant SEO. To make this long post a little shorter, I've settled on offering web design, SEO, and ORM services. I would like to solicit the community here for advice and criticism of my plan.
- Web design: I have a strong coding background and can use all the relevant languages (HTML, CSS, javascript, etc), so I plan to do most of the site building myself.
- Marketing: I don't really have a good strategy yet. Cold calling and cold walking are possibilities, as well as word of mouth. I've also read about the technique here of making a quick WP site of existing businesses and cold calling for it.
- Pricing: For the WP site, I plan to offer $400 flat fee. For other site building, I've found the same list of services and times they take on several websites...can't use links yet, but it's the one that has a list of services along with hours. I've tweaked it and will offer the web design part for $40-$50 per hour.
- SEO: I have no background in this, but I've been reading voraciously and think I have a pretty good grasp on the basic ideas.
- Marketing: Same as the above. I also plan to use referrals and word of mouth and pay them 10% per referral. I'm going to try the method I found on here of SEOing a generic niche page then cold calling and trying to sell ad space on it.
- Pricing: From the same link above, but now $65-$75 per hour. Stand along, one time fee of $400, $500 per month, two months up front. If they sign up for more than 6 months, I'll discount the fee.
- ORM: Same background as SEO.
- Marketing: Same as SEO. I'm also going to heavily use 7878's method. I've got a list of 25 and am sending out my first batch of letters tomorrow.
- Pricing: Unsure about this one. If it's part of a package web design deal, I was thinking maybe $300 per month. For 7878's method, same idea as stand alone SEO.
I've signed one client that I did web design and am doing SEO and ORM. Since it's my first client and I need the practice and web portfolio we agreed on $3800, payable with $200 up front and $300 per month for a year. I'm currently working on a contract for clients. I'm filing as a sole proprietor next week.
So that's it I guess. It's kind of scary to see it all written so quickly. I really need for this to work, but please be brutal in your comments!
