I started doing some sporadic freelancing outreach starting early to mid September because I want to start making some income from freelance work. Spoke to 8 businesses so far.
Business + outreach method + gatekeeper talked to:
Business 1.
Some local startup whose co-founder somewhat knows of me from an incident during my university days. We never spoke in any way before, but pretty certain they remember me. Fired a LinkedIn message to ask whether they were interested to hire a freelancer to help with their sales but didn't get a response yet
Business 2.
Another business owner that I've interacted with briefly before on some online platform. Sent a digital message to ask whether they were interested to hire a freelancer and offered to use coding experience to help with automating some of their processes. I did get a response from them but nothing happened from that conversation.
Business 3.
Went in person to approach a man in his 60/70s at the jewellery shop he runs because I've purchased some of his services a few times before.
Business 4.
Did door-to-door approach to a flower shop 2 times over a 2-week period (had other stuff to do in between). Ended up speaking to the business owner on both of the visits. The outcome was me walking away feeling the business owner was too difficult to work with and also that she did not want my help.
Business 5.
Was walking around a shopping mall and noticed a shop that was selling carpets and other related services. Found out that another guy who was hanging around the vicinity was the business owner and began a chat with a casual question about his business.
He mentioned that the biggest problem was that there was not enough demand for his products and services, and complained of the area around his shop not having much foot traffic.
His other marketing channels seemed off in the sense that he thought that his family member was running his website for him but in reality there was no website running on the domain name stated on his shopfront banner, and he didn't even know that his own website was down.
He was a bit judgemental after I told him some things about my background, but the more important observation was that it seemed his own mindset and assumptions would make it difficult for anyone trying to help him, so probably won't pay him a second visit.
Business 6.
Did door-to-door approach to a shop selling freshly cooked salad-style food and spoke to the only employee present (likely the (or one of multiple) business owner who looks oldest early 40s). This was inspired by the shop not having their instagram set up yet. The guy asked me why I thought it would be helpful to set up his instagram, and he seemed grateful about my offer to help after I told him I wanted to help him get more customers, but also said that help was not needed. I got the vibe that he didn't want to reveal more information about the business from the last few sentences about help not needed so I didn't press further.
Later found out that the shop had only been running for a few months.
They already have quite a few posts on their facebook. So probably not much I can help from a marketing perspective as they can definitely handle the social media marketing themselves.
Business 7.
Spoke to the only employee via door to door approach at a small courier/logistics business (the boss/business owner was not around). Seemed that the employee was quite cynical about what I could possibly want when he first saw me at the door but we got into a conversation and exchanged contact information at the end. A revealing moment was when he mentioned that his boss told him to replace the laptop he was using because it was too old, but he himself didn't want to because he briefly asked me a question about whether it would work to just upgrade the RAM. I got the vibe from this that he was concerned about losing his job, and would be quite opposed to someone else helping out who could make his job redundant, especially because the business still runs on extremely old systems. I may be able to contact the business owner directly but don't have so much interest to go further on this one.
Business 8.
Happened by chance. I was going there to see business B but ended up talking to the owner of business A. Was in some office building checking out a business that I wanted to purchase something from (business B). It turns out that the office unit adjacent to business B was a small specialized law firm (business A) by the name of "[name of business owner] LLC" . As I was inspecting the outside of business B, a large man in a white shirt and tie came out of business A and just stood still outside his door doing nothing. I decided to just have a chat so I turned my head and pleasantly asked "Hi, are you [name of business owner]?" and he said yes.
He sort of asked me why I was hanging out there and there was a brief chat, then:
I later check his website and find that https is not working, and he probably didn't even know that he had a website. Don't see any way I can further help this business. But this has given me inspiration to try talking to other similar businesses.
For businesses 1 and 2, I did some research on them before reaching out, and what I offered in my outreach message was what I felt was the best way that I could be useful to them.
More on businesses 3 and 4 in later posts.
Business + outreach method + gatekeeper talked to:
Business 1.
Some local startup whose co-founder somewhat knows of me from an incident during my university days. We never spoke in any way before, but pretty certain they remember me. Fired a LinkedIn message to ask whether they were interested to hire a freelancer to help with their sales but didn't get a response yet
Business 2.
Another business owner that I've interacted with briefly before on some online platform. Sent a digital message to ask whether they were interested to hire a freelancer and offered to use coding experience to help with automating some of their processes. I did get a response from them but nothing happened from that conversation.
Business 3.
Went in person to approach a man in his 60/70s at the jewellery shop he runs because I've purchased some of his services a few times before.
Business 4.
Did door-to-door approach to a flower shop 2 times over a 2-week period (had other stuff to do in between). Ended up speaking to the business owner on both of the visits. The outcome was me walking away feeling the business owner was too difficult to work with and also that she did not want my help.
Business 5.
Was walking around a shopping mall and noticed a shop that was selling carpets and other related services. Found out that another guy who was hanging around the vicinity was the business owner and began a chat with a casual question about his business.
He mentioned that the biggest problem was that there was not enough demand for his products and services, and complained of the area around his shop not having much foot traffic.
His other marketing channels seemed off in the sense that he thought that his family member was running his website for him but in reality there was no website running on the domain name stated on his shopfront banner, and he didn't even know that his own website was down.
He was a bit judgemental after I told him some things about my background, but the more important observation was that it seemed his own mindset and assumptions would make it difficult for anyone trying to help him, so probably won't pay him a second visit.
Business 6.
Did door-to-door approach to a shop selling freshly cooked salad-style food and spoke to the only employee present (likely the (or one of multiple) business owner who looks oldest early 40s). This was inspired by the shop not having their instagram set up yet. The guy asked me why I thought it would be helpful to set up his instagram, and he seemed grateful about my offer to help after I told him I wanted to help him get more customers, but also said that help was not needed. I got the vibe that he didn't want to reveal more information about the business from the last few sentences about help not needed so I didn't press further.
Later found out that the shop had only been running for a few months.
They already have quite a few posts on their facebook. So probably not much I can help from a marketing perspective as they can definitely handle the social media marketing themselves.
Business 7.
Spoke to the only employee via door to door approach at a small courier/logistics business (the boss/business owner was not around). Seemed that the employee was quite cynical about what I could possibly want when he first saw me at the door but we got into a conversation and exchanged contact information at the end. A revealing moment was when he mentioned that his boss told him to replace the laptop he was using because it was too old, but he himself didn't want to because he briefly asked me a question about whether it would work to just upgrade the RAM. I got the vibe from this that he was concerned about losing his job, and would be quite opposed to someone else helping out who could make his job redundant, especially because the business still runs on extremely old systems. I may be able to contact the business owner directly but don't have so much interest to go further on this one.
Business 8.
Happened by chance. I was going there to see business B but ended up talking to the owner of business A. Was in some office building checking out a business that I wanted to purchase something from (business B). It turns out that the office unit adjacent to business B was a small specialized law firm (business A) by the name of "[name of business owner] LLC" . As I was inspecting the outside of business B, a large man in a white shirt and tie came out of business A and just stood still outside his door doing nothing. I decided to just have a chat so I turned my head and pleasantly asked "Hi, are you [name of business owner]?" and he said yes.
He sort of asked me why I was hanging out there and there was a brief chat, then:
Me: Is your business good?
Owner: We don't discuss our business with others, things about our clients and our business, we don't discuss with others
Me: (Politely and pleasantly said that I'm not asking about his who clients are, but just whether his business is doing well)
Owner: (Pleasantly and jovially) Oh no sorry we don't discuss our business with others
Me: Oh Ok no worries
(Conversation turns to an exchange about how and what I should/trying to do with business B. He mentioned he's just standing outside to stretch his legs)
Me: (I notice he's still friendly with me so I ask: ) Have you ever considered building a website?
Owner: Oh for that stuff I just outsource all that to my admin staff.
Me: (I don't press further divert the conversation to topics other than his business, as learnt from the objection handling part of Josh Braun's B2B guide recommended by IceCreamKid: Pressure or no pressure? )
(A girl in rather casual clothing who exited his office to use the bathroom is done and returns to the office. Probably his admin staff)
(End of conversation and he follows the girl in to his office closing the door behind him)
Owner: We don't discuss our business with others, things about our clients and our business, we don't discuss with others
Me: (Politely and pleasantly said that I'm not asking about his who clients are, but just whether his business is doing well)
Owner: (Pleasantly and jovially) Oh no sorry we don't discuss our business with others
Me: Oh Ok no worries
(Conversation turns to an exchange about how and what I should/trying to do with business B. He mentioned he's just standing outside to stretch his legs)
Me: (I notice he's still friendly with me so I ask: ) Have you ever considered building a website?
Owner: Oh for that stuff I just outsource all that to my admin staff.
Me: (I don't press further divert the conversation to topics other than his business, as learnt from the objection handling part of Josh Braun's B2B guide recommended by IceCreamKid: Pressure or no pressure? )
(A girl in rather casual clothing who exited his office to use the bathroom is done and returns to the office. Probably his admin staff)
(End of conversation and he follows the girl in to his office closing the door behind him)
For businesses 1 and 2, I did some research on them before reaching out, and what I offered in my outreach message was what I felt was the best way that I could be useful to them.
More on businesses 3 and 4 in later posts.
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