How do I Find my First 10 Clients as a Student with a Small Social Circle?

[IllegalRazer]

I'm planning building a course, or an "online bootcamp" as follows:
- Teaches you how to program in Python and how to make a discord bot, through explainer videos focused on the concept, and interactive practices
- Teaches you how to read the documentation so that you can extend skills from the course to any project that you want to embark in
- Live chat/video support for whenever anyone needs help to fix their code
- Weekly accountability calls to see what they are struggling on
- Details are not at all fixed
- Full money-back guarantee if they cannot make a discord bot within a certain time period (~30 days)
The main selling point is that most people want to learn how to program, but don't know where to start, and are overwhelmed by the number of unorganised resources online or don't have the discipline to push through. It doesn't have to be making a discord bot, but learning programming is often much more effective if there is some end goal/project to work towards.
I have experience in this matter, as I've been making discord bots for over 50 unique clients previously on Fiverr. I came up with this idea when one of my clients recently asked me if I wanted to teach them how to program, and I did a few sessions with him for 30 pounds an hour.

However, the main problem is, I currently don't have a very large circle of influence. I've just turned 18 and will be heading to Cambridge University to do computer science university next year (yeah, I know, probably not the most fastlane strategy, but I just have to go with what my parents want for now). The only people I can pitch to are my close family or my fellow students. Most of them either can't afford a course like this, or don't have the interest/time to do a course like this. Also it just feels kind of wrong to be selling to people so close to you. I have considered purchasing ads on reddit or google, but they are quite expensive and I don't know if I it is worth it to invest a chunk of money into it, and I don't know how effective they will be.

Am I doing anything wrong? I feel like my social circle is very small, and hopefully that will change when I attend university and beyond. However, is there anything that I can do right now so that I can find an audience to sell to? To plan ahead, what are some things I can do at this age to expand my zone of influence? Thank you.

 

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[Jobless]

Since you already have 50 clients, some of them may want the course (they trust you), secondly, they may know people in their circle who may want it (they can vouch for you). Ask them.

 

[IllegalRazer]

Since you already have 50 clients, some of them may want the course (they trust you), secondly, they may know people in their circle who may want it (they can vouch for you). Ask them.

Yeah I've just sent it out to all of my previous clients, but unfortunately I don't have a direct way to contact them. I can only message them on Fiverr as they haven't provided me with their email or anything, but let's just see what happens first. Also some of them haven't been online on the platform for a year or two.

 

[Jobless]

Yeah I've just sent it out to all of my previous clients, but unfortunately I don't have a direct way to contact them. I can only message them on Fiverr as they haven't provided me with their email or anything, but let's just see what happens first. Also some of them haven't been online on the platform for a year or two.

Unfortunately, they are not your clients then, but Fiverr's.
Think about how you can create influence long-term with a group of people who have needs and money to spend. Students are not great for this, but Cambridge students could be different. Think for example, about what type of companies are interested in hiring CS students from Cambridge, and areas in CS education that are not yet covered by university courses.

Also, upload some courses for free online. Create social media accounts, maybe a simple website, and makea few engaging course videos. Not hour-long. Easy to digest, simple to follow.

Consider also if courses are appropriate. Are you great at programming, teaching, structuring and selling a course? Do you intend to be? If not, do something else. The possibilities are endless in software.

 

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[IllegalRazer]

Unfortunately, they are not your clients then, but Fiverr's.
Think about how you can create influence long-term with a group of people who have needs and money to spend. Students are not great for this, but Cambridge students could be different. Think for example, about what type of companies are interested in hiring CS students from Cambridge, and areas in CS education that are not yet covered by university courses.

Also, upload some courses for free online. Create social media accounts, maybe a simple website, and makea few engaging course videos. Not hour-long. Easy to digest, simple to follow.

Consider also if courses are appropriate. Are you great at programming, teaching, structuring and selling a course? Do you intend to be? If not, do something else. The possibilities are endless in software.

Thank you for the advice! Ultimately I think I want to build some sort of SaaS, but it all depends on what the market needs or what ideas I have. Do you have some guidance as to how I should proceed? Is there anything I should learn, or should I just try out more business ideas until one succeeds? And is the only way to build a circle of influence to be creating content and building a social media following, or is there any alternatives? Thank you again.

 

[The-J]

I've just turned 18 and will be heading to Cambridge University to do computer science university next year (yeah, I know, probably not the most fastlane strategy, but I just have to go with what my parents want for now)

Congratulations! You're going to an elite institution with high-quality people. That's more Fastlane than you think.

By this time next year, hopefully you've met over 1000 new people, all who are connected to different people.

I will say, though: why not just sell discord bots instead of a course on how to make one? DIY and DFY are different markets, and DIY is notoriously cheap (that's why many of them DIY).

If you want money quickly, focus on DFY. Hire people and use AI to help you build them. Charge more. Make $$$. Use that knowledge to build bots for platforms used by people and orgs who make more money, like Slack and Teams. Make more $$$.

From there, maybe you scale the implementation bit, or maybe you make a SaaS. Both will make you more money than a course teaching teenagers to make Discord bots lol

I came up with this idea when one of my clients recently asked me if I wanted to teach them how to program, and I did a few sessions with him for 30 pounds an hour.

Courses are hard to make and even harder to sell. Much easier to sell implementation. You can ask for way more.

 

[Frances Kelleher]

I'm planning building a course, or an "online bootcamp" as follows:
- Teaches you how to program in Python and how to make a discord bot, through explainer videos focused on the concept, and interactive practices
- Teaches you how to read the documentation so that you can extend skills from the course to any project that you want to embark in
- Live chat/video support for whenever anyone needs help to fix their code
- Weekly accountability calls to see what they are struggling on
- Details are not at all fixed
- Full money-back guarantee if they cannot make a discord bot within a certain time period (~30 days)
The main selling point is that most people want to learn how to program, but don't know where to start, and are overwhelmed by the number of unorganised resources online or don't have the discipline to push through. It doesn't have to be making a discord bot, but learning programming is often much more effective if there is some end goal/project to work towards.
I have experience in this matter, as I've been making discord bots for over 50 unique clients previously on Fiverr. I came up with this idea when one of my clients recently asked me if I wanted to teach them how to program, and I did a few sessions with him for 30 pounds an hour.

However, the main problem is, I currently don't have a very large circle of influence. I've just turned 18 and will be heading to Cambridge University to do computer science university next year (yeah, I know, probably not the most fastlane strategy, but I just have to go with what my parents want for now). The only people I can pitch to are my close family or my fellow students. Most of them either can't afford a course like this, or don't have the interest/time to do a course like this. Also it just feels kind of wrong to be selling to people so close to you. I have considered purchasing ads on reddit or google, but they are quite expensive and I don't know if I it is worth it to invest a chunk of money into it, and I don't know how effective they will be.

Am I doing anything wrong? I feel like my social circle is very small, and hopefully that will change when I attend university and beyond. However, is there anything that I can do right now so that I can find an audience to sell to? To plan ahead, what are some things I can do at this age to expand my zone of influence? Thank you.

How about a lead magnet,do you know what that is?Also can you go into fb groups where you know these people will be and ask the owner of the group can you on do a mini class on it and or maybe offer to pay them for putting a post in there bout it.
Make sure the group is large and has your ideal people in there.Hope this helps

 

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[Andy Black]

What @The-J said. You're paid to build Discord bots for people. Can you change your business model slightly so you keep getting paid for asset(s) you build and own?

As for getting people who want to learn how Python or how to build Discord bots...

"Who already has your clients?" (Jay Abraham)

What do people already spend money on that shows they're willing to pay to learn Python, programming, or how to build Discord bots?

What communities might they be in? (Lol... are there Discord servers of people discussing how to manage their own Discord servers?)

Are there subreddits?

Are there newsletters?

What might people Google for?

etc.

 

[IllegalRazer]

Congratulations! You're going to an elite institution with high-quality people. That's more Fastlane than you think.

By this time next year, hopefully you've met over 1000 new people, all who are connected to different people.

I will say, though: why not just sell discord bots instead of a course on how to make one? DIY and DFY are different markets, and DIY is notoriously cheap (that's why many of them DIY).

If you want money quickly, focus on DFY. Hire people and use AI to help you build them. Charge more. Make $$$. Use that knowledge to build bots for platforms used by people and orgs who make more money, like Slack and Teams. Make more $$$.

From there, maybe you scale the implementation bit, or maybe you make a SaaS. Both will make you more money than a course teaching teenagers to make Discord bots lol



Courses are hard to make and even harder to sell. Much easier to sell implementation. You can ask for way more.

Thank you! I am definitely looking forward to connect with many ambitious people.

I have been freelancing on Fiverr for a while, which is why I might have subconsciously framed making bots as something that I exchange my time for and can only make small amounts of money at a time. Thanks for making me realise that I can also do this on a larger scale, directly for companies. I am realizing how hard courses will be: it takes a lot of time to setup, and a lot of time to maintain, and is also very hard to compete the variety of courses that are out there.

 

[The-J]

I am realizing how hard courses will be: it takes a lot of time to setup, and a lot of time to maintain, and is also very hard to compete the variety of courses that are out there.

The same is true for SaaS (lots of setup time, lots of dev time, and lots of competition) but I would recommend SaaS way before recommending a course. Why? It's a better value proposition. Think about it: with a SaaS, what the end user wants is easy to access and only needs someone to spend time on it, as the software's initial costs aren't very expensive compared to a custom solution.

With a custom solution & added support for recurring revenue, the end user only needs to spend money: not time. They pay a premium to have it work out of the box & not have to waste their or their company's time on it.

With a course, the end user has to spend time consuming the course and dev time (aka money) on developing the app, and then they have to maintain it themselves. Who would want a course? Someone for whom dev time is not (perceived as) expensive & has the time to consume the content in the course. Aka junior developers and broke startup entrepreneurs (if they had money they'd hire devs to build the bot they want).

See the difference? Better value propositions pay better.

With a Discord bot, though, consider: there are millions of communities, and most of the people running those communities are making exactly $0 from their Discord community. I'm a part of several Discord communities and only a few make money from them... those are all game companies, and they use Discord to sell & do CS.

 

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[fiola]

As others have said, the "Teaching people how to code" is an incredible difficult market. You can make it work, but the infrastructure needed in order to make it work is pretty complex. I've made $2mil+ revenue from in this market so if you have questions, feel free to send me a message.

 

[lamplinkwhite]

You can do Facebook, Tiktok, amazon, YouTube. Many customers are found here.