I thought it's better to make this progress thread separate from other things I do, which I also use as a source of income, so it will be organized better.
I picked a project-production niche in Russia, where I provide services to already existing businesses, and those, who are just starting. It includes design/advertising/copywriting aspects.
My own start was the fastest I can remember, and took 2 weeks to execute, which was possible mainly because I already have experience, and my partner was doing stuff on his own, while I was focusing on my tasks.
Main insight here:
- The right partnership, which in my situation is based on proven friendship and common long-term goals in life (almost each previous project we did together) - can be a key to a lightspeed execution. I now see why some people struggle to launch their project - they just can't bear it alone.
Based on our previous experience (I used to work many hours a day, doing website-works for ~100$/hour, and Phil was solving problems, which clients wouldn't have in the first place, if they hired him earlier), we quickly figured that our services will be focused on business owners who able to spend solid money, paying for proper and quick execution.
We've focused all of the materials in our presentation on comfort, high quality, and safety of further actions of business owner, because we take care of all the fundamentals and consult him about anything he will face.
We based our services on science and accurate knowledge, to eliminate any guessowork. We also threw out everything we can't deliver on such level, or which is not cost effective in terms of time/profit ratio.
It already cost us some clients, which I'm sure will cost even more, but it preserved us from a lot of frustration, clients we can't efficiently deal with, and saved us a lot of time.
To save even more time, we used specific titles and wording in our pricelist, which make sense only to those, who understand what they deal with in business, and presented only particular expensive services on our website, so no unwanted "clientele" would even bother themself writing to us.
Main insight here:
- Targeting specific clients in your project presentation is what defines the workflow. If it's possible to target a specific type of client, whose needs you can fulfill the best - do this.
If they need something else, which you can provide them with - you can mention it in conversation, and still provide the service.
Getting rid of small-services saved us from hundreds of inquiries on things, which we wouldn't want to do - unwanted contact requests and unnecessary traffic.
We participated in a conference, answering questions on our topic, which got us 3 clients in the day one, which we now have closed. We didn't put a link/mention to our services, people found out our contacts indirectly, which was interesting to watch, because my new skype account received 28 contact requests atm, from people, mentioning where they came from.
I, personally, failed here a lot, answered some questions the way I shouldn't have, and some very good enterpreneurs, which we now see we could really help a lot - got lost.
Learning from that, I'm now absolutely comfortable with asking people dozens of questions, if it's necessary.
Also, we lost one ~7k$ client just because I mentioned that I can help him out with his voice for videos he will shoot, because I used to do that for deputies, who need to do public speeches. He thought that it's too much for one person to provide not just business services, but also provide something else equally good, which I felt immediately. Now I won't mention anything like that, until client asks for it.
Main insight here:
- Don't be uncomfortable doing what it takes, no matter how you feel about it - if it's necessary to ask 10 elementary questions - ask.
- Don't ever show-off.
On the other hand, we tried to call some of our local businesses - received few emails, and talked with 3 business owners, which we now need to write to. I can tell that offering services is either not my good skill, or it's just really that ineffective as it seems, but I still need to find out how they will react, and if we will work with them eventually.
Total by the end of august.
__________________
Total clients: 4
Total income: 890.700 RUR (~13.613$)
Total profit: ~874.000 RUR (-13.373$)
Time spent total: ~27 hours
Breakdown:
~6 hours on creating a headline + the message for ask-me-anything conference
~2 hours answering questions
~7 hours on skype/phone conversations with potential clients
~2 more hours on project discussions.
~2 hours on making a blog-post on social media design.
~3 hours on writing a note on design
~2 hours on doing a voice-over for this note*
~3 hours spent on design-related things
Gave my partner 3k$, and we both dropped 13% into our bank, in ratio 65%/35% USD/RUR, for further needs.
You can ask questions, because most probably there is a lot I forgot to mention.
I picked a project-production niche in Russia, where I provide services to already existing businesses, and those, who are just starting. It includes design/advertising/copywriting aspects.
My own start was the fastest I can remember, and took 2 weeks to execute, which was possible mainly because I already have experience, and my partner was doing stuff on his own, while I was focusing on my tasks.
Main insight here:
- The right partnership, which in my situation is based on proven friendship and common long-term goals in life (almost each previous project we did together) - can be a key to a lightspeed execution. I now see why some people struggle to launch their project - they just can't bear it alone.
Based on our previous experience (I used to work many hours a day, doing website-works for ~100$/hour, and Phil was solving problems, which clients wouldn't have in the first place, if they hired him earlier), we quickly figured that our services will be focused on business owners who able to spend solid money, paying for proper and quick execution.
We've focused all of the materials in our presentation on comfort, high quality, and safety of further actions of business owner, because we take care of all the fundamentals and consult him about anything he will face.
We based our services on science and accurate knowledge, to eliminate any guessowork. We also threw out everything we can't deliver on such level, or which is not cost effective in terms of time/profit ratio.
It already cost us some clients, which I'm sure will cost even more, but it preserved us from a lot of frustration, clients we can't efficiently deal with, and saved us a lot of time.
To save even more time, we used specific titles and wording in our pricelist, which make sense only to those, who understand what they deal with in business, and presented only particular expensive services on our website, so no unwanted "clientele" would even bother themself writing to us.
Main insight here:
- Targeting specific clients in your project presentation is what defines the workflow. If it's possible to target a specific type of client, whose needs you can fulfill the best - do this.
If they need something else, which you can provide them with - you can mention it in conversation, and still provide the service.
Getting rid of small-services saved us from hundreds of inquiries on things, which we wouldn't want to do - unwanted contact requests and unnecessary traffic.
We participated in a conference, answering questions on our topic, which got us 3 clients in the day one, which we now have closed. We didn't put a link/mention to our services, people found out our contacts indirectly, which was interesting to watch, because my new skype account received 28 contact requests atm, from people, mentioning where they came from.
I, personally, failed here a lot, answered some questions the way I shouldn't have, and some very good enterpreneurs, which we now see we could really help a lot - got lost.
Learning from that, I'm now absolutely comfortable with asking people dozens of questions, if it's necessary.
Also, we lost one ~7k$ client just because I mentioned that I can help him out with his voice for videos he will shoot, because I used to do that for deputies, who need to do public speeches. He thought that it's too much for one person to provide not just business services, but also provide something else equally good, which I felt immediately. Now I won't mention anything like that, until client asks for it.
Main insight here:
- Don't be uncomfortable doing what it takes, no matter how you feel about it - if it's necessary to ask 10 elementary questions - ask.
- Don't ever show-off.
On the other hand, we tried to call some of our local businesses - received few emails, and talked with 3 business owners, which we now need to write to. I can tell that offering services is either not my good skill, or it's just really that ineffective as it seems, but I still need to find out how they will react, and if we will work with them eventually.
Total by the end of august.
__________________
Total clients: 4
Total income: 890.700 RUR (~13.613$)
Total profit: ~874.000 RUR (-13.373$)
Time spent total: ~27 hours
Breakdown:
~6 hours on creating a headline + the message for ask-me-anything conference
~2 hours answering questions
~7 hours on skype/phone conversations with potential clients
~2 more hours on project discussions.
~2 hours on making a blog-post on social media design.
~3 hours on writing a note on design
~2 hours on doing a voice-over for this note*
~3 hours spent on design-related things
Gave my partner 3k$, and we both dropped 13% into our bank, in ratio 65%/35% USD/RUR, for further needs.
You can ask questions, because most probably there is a lot I forgot to mention.
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