I need help with getting clients!

[Guest12k7911]

Hi, I started freelancing after reading @Fox’s legendary web design thread. I tried cold emailing (no reply) , cold calling ( no one was interested in) and platforms like fiverr & facebook. I couldn’t find a single client in a little over a week. I tried to talk about their business’ problems instead of talking about my skills. Can someone tell me what I could possibly be doing wrong? Thanks!

 

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[Subsonic]

Hi, I started freelancing after reading @Fox’s legendary web design thread. I tried cold emailing (no reply) , cold calling ( no one was interested in) and platforms like fiverr & facebook. I couldn’t find a single client in a little over a week. I tried to talk about their business’ problems instead of talking about my skills. Can someone tell me what I could possibly be doing wrong? Thanks!

Your not doing enough lol.

Make 100 calls for 100 days and you will have enough customers to buy a car.

If you had a 5% (super good btw) conversion rate on calls and give up after 30 calls you could have just gotten unlucky (statistically) and stopped digging 5ft from gold.

 

[Guest12k7911]

Your not doing enough lol.

Make 100 calls for 100 days and you will have enough customers to buy a car.

If you had a 5% (super good btw) conversion rate on calls and give up after 30 calls you could have just gotten unlucky (statistically) and stopped digging 5ft from gold.

I actually did near 10 calls a day. Also used an AI for cold emailing to a point my account got temporarily banned and I had to appeal lol.

Do you think running ads would be beneficial? I don’t want to be the guy who always cold calls to find business owners, I want them to find me. It’s easier when someone is aware they need a website as well.

 

[ChasingDream97]

Russell brunson secrets trilogy read that especially the one on traffic . it should fix all your traffic issues if you take action. the premise is simply don't wait for your customer to find you but instead congregate where they are already and just go from there providing value without selling initially .

 

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[Guest12k7911]

Russell brunson secrets trilogy read that especially the one on traffic . it should fix all your traffic issues if you take action. the premise is simply don't wait for your customer to find you but instead congregate where they are already and just go from there providing value without selling initially .

How can I provide them value without the website? Should I try giving away free e-books on SEO so that I can explain them the importance of having a website via e-mail?

 

[ChasingDream97]

I tried to talk about their business’ problems instead of talking about my skills.

when you say you did that how did you do it. in the tone everything you are doing is wrong or i have a better idea and this is how i can help

 

[Guest12k7911]

when you say you did that how did you do it. in the tone everything you are doing is wrong or i have a better idea and this is how i can help

I avoided making any comment about their current websites since some people might find it offensive. I just told them I help business owners get more clients/sales by building a custom tailored website and doing SEO opitimization. I also asked them a few questions depending on their niche to show them I’m interested in problems they face while getting clients. What’s ironic is that none of them believed I could help them get clients and I couldn’t get a single clients for myself. I’m not sure if they were right…

 

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[ChasingDream97]

How can I provide them value without the website? Should I try giving away free e-books on SEO so that I can explain them the importance of having a website via e-mail?

not exactly. most people don't have the attention span to read a whole book from an unproven random person . provide value in terms of conversations and free consultations only seling once you've proven to be trusted

 

[ChasingDream97]

I avoided making any comment about their current websites since some people might find it offensive. I just told them I help business owners get more clients/sales by building a custom tailored website and doing SEO opitimization. I also asked them a few questions depending on their niche to show them I’m interested in problems they face while getting clients. What’s ironic is that none of them believed I could help them get clients and I couldn’t get a single clients for myself. I’m not sure if they were right…

they don't believe you because they don't trust you at the moment and trusting a random person with their business is too big of an ask

 

[ChasingDream97]

I avoided making any comment about their current websites since some people might find it offensive. I just told them I help business owners get more clients/sales by building a custom tailored website and doing SEO opitimization. I also asked them a few questions depending on their niche to show them I’m interested in problems they face while getting clients. What’s ironic is that none of them believed I could help them get clients and I couldn’t get a single clients for myself. I’m not sure if they were right…

to get more client lower the risk for them but at the same time make the problem so big that they have to take action right now.

 

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[WillHurtDontCare]

I actually did near 10 calls a day. Also used an AI for cold emailing to a point my account got temporarily banned and I had to appeal lol.

50 calls is nothing. Also, a lot of those AI tools are shit - as you can tell by the fact that your account got suspended. How many emails did you send? Did you just send an email blast to 5K people?

Think of a type of business owner that you might be able to help and put yourself in their shoes.

Think of the things that tug at their emotions:

• Are they doing OK in business, but they know they could do 10x better and they're constantly angry at themselves because they know that their competitors do 10x their revenue?
• Do you think they are losing sales because their website is confusing and they don't even mention what they do until scrolling down several sections (losing customers in the process)?
• Are they losing sales because their website calls to actions (signups, phone numbers, email etc) don't work?

Sign up for apollo.io and build a list of prospects. Then start going through their websites and take notes of things that could have an emotional impact on the buyer - IE, you're losing sales because your phone number doesn't work, or you'd get more sales if you said what you'd do in the above the fold section instead of in the footer. Think of anything that would get the excited or angry and write it down. Then start manually emailing about those ideas.

And do more cold calls - call them and say "Hi {name}, this is a cold call. Would you like to know why I'm calling?" then pause. Most people will tell you no or to F*ck off, but the candor will disarm them. If they ask you to tell them why, tell them you are a web designer and that you found their website and had some tips on how they could improve their web sales. Give them some useful feedback, but don't give them everything. If they're still interested after you give them 1-2 meaningful ways to improve their site, go into your pitch on the type of work you could do for them.

Also, if you're really serious about web design, sign up for @Fox 's legends course and join their Facebook group. Fox is a winner who puts a lot of effort into helping his students, and you'll have access to a big community of people doing the same thing. I actually signed up for that course to improve my marketing skills for selling software consulting, so I'm recommending it from experience.

 

[Black_Dragon43]

Hi, I started freelancing after reading @Fox’s legendary web design thread. I tried cold emailing (no reply) , cold calling ( no one was interested in) and platforms like fiverr & facebook. I couldn’t find a single client in a little over a week. I tried to talk about their business’ problems instead of talking about my skills. Can someone tell me what I could possibly be doing wrong? Thanks!

The answer is simple: go work for free, or go to Upwork and work for pennies till you get a few case studies. Would you accept to pay top dollar for surgery by a doctor who never operated before in his life?

I don’t think so. Therefore the only way you’d get someone to pay you top dollar as a complete beginner is by scamming them, which as you’ll learn isn’t easy at all.

What you need isn’t to make sales. You need work experience. End of discussion.

 

[Kung Fu Steve]

I couldn’t find a single client in a little over a week.

I actually did near 10 calls a day.

You tried for a WHOLE WEEK!?

... and you made TEN calls!?

Man. Can't imagine that amount of workload. You must be exhausted!

Your not doing enough lol.

Make 100 calls for 100 days and you will have enough customers to buy a car.

@Subsonic here is right. You haven't even scratched the surface, dude.

I'm teasing you (playfully) but you are in desperate need of a wake-up call.

I just shouted into the other room asking my lady "hey, how many calls have you made each day this week?"

Her answer? "175 to 250. 175 is a slow day." and then she followed up with, "The way I figure it, it took me 158 calls yesterday to make $1600."

When *I* did cold calling to book speaking gigs I was doing 200 calls a day. On a good day I'd book 2 appointments.

And those 2 appointments could've been good, bad, or ugly. I wouldn't know until I showed up.

The work ethic has got to increase by 10 or 20x on your part.

 

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[Guest12k7911]

The answer is simple: go work for free, or go to Upwork and work for pennies till you get a few case studies. Would you accept to pay top dollar for surgery by a doctor who never operated before in his life?

I don’t think so. Therefore the only way you’d get someone to pay you top dollar as a complete beginner is by scamming them, which as you’ll learn isn’t easy at all.

What you need isn’t to make sales. You need work experience. End of discussion.

I offered working for free in some facebook groups but i realized people don’t value free work at all. maybe i should create mockup websites for different niches?

 

[Guest12k7911]

You tried for a WHOLE WEEK!?

... and you made TEN calls!?

Man. Can't imagine that amount of workload. You must be exhausted!



@Subsonic here is right. You haven't even scratched the surface, dude.

I'm teasing you (playfully) but you are in desperate need of a wake-up call.

I just shouted into the other room asking my lady "hey, how many calls have you made each day this week?"

Her answer? "175 to 250. 175 is a slow day." and then she followed up with, "The way I figure it, it took me 158 calls yesterday to make $1600."

When *I* did cold calling to book speaking gigs I was doing 200 calls a day. On a good day I'd book 2 appointments.

And those 2 appointments could've been good, bad, or ugly. I wouldn't know until I showed up.

The work ethic has got to increase by 10 or 20x on your part.

yeah i agree with you but i am a full time medical student and a game developer. so i didn’t have time for more than 10 calls a day and counted on cold emails a bit too much.

 

[Guest12k7911]

50 calls is nothing. Also, a lot of those AI tools are shit - as you can tell by the fact that your account got suspended. How many emails did you send? Did you just send an mail blast to 5K people?

Think of a type of business owner that you might be able to help and put yourself in their shoes.

Think of the things that tug at their emotions:

• Are they doing OK in business, but they know they could do 10x better and they're constantly angry at themselves because they know that their competitors do 10x their revenue?
• Do you think they are losing sales because their website is confusing and they don't even mention what they do until scrolling down several sections (losing customers in the process)?
• Are they losing sales because their website calls to actions (signups, phone numbers, email etc) don't work?

Sign up for apollo.io and build a list of prospects. Then start going through their websites and take notes of things that could have an emotional impact on the buyer - IE, you're losing sales because your phone number doesn't work, or you'd get more sales if you said what you'd do in the above the fold section instead of in the footer. Think of anything that would get the excited or angry and write it down. Then start manually emailing about those ideas.

And do more cold calls - call them and say "Hi {name}, this is a cold call. Would you like to know why I'm calling?" then pause. Most people will tell you no or to F*ck off, but the candor will disarm them. If they ask you to tell them why, tell them you are a web designer and that you found their website and had some tips on how they could improve their web sales. Give them some useful feedback, but don't give them everything. If they're still interested after you give them 1-2 meaningful ways to improve their site, go into your pitch on the type of work you could do for them.

Also, if you're really serious about web design, sign up for @Fox 's legends course and join their Facebook group. Fox is a winner who puts a lot of effort into helping his students, and you'll have access to a big community of people doing the same thing. I actually signed up for that course to improve my marketing skills for selling software consulting, so I'm recommending it from experience.

thank you. this was really helpful!

 

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[Guest12k7911]

You tried for a WHOLE WEEK!?

... and you made TEN calls!?

Man. Can't imagine that amount of workload. You must be exhausted!



@Subsonic here is right. You haven't even scratched the surface, dude.

I'm teasing you (playfully) but you are in desperate need of a wake-up call.

I just shouted into the other room asking my lady "hey, how many calls have you made each day this week?"

Her answer? "175 to 250. 175 is a slow day." and then she followed up with, "The way I figure it, it took me 158 calls yesterday to make $1600."

When *I* did cold calling to book speaking gigs I was doing 200 calls a day. On a good day I'd book 2 appointments.

And those 2 appointments could've been good, bad, or ugly. I wouldn't know until I showed up.

The work ethic has got to increase by 10 or 20x on your part.

also how is it possible to call 200 different people everyday? I usually take my time to ‘study’ their websites so that takes like 20 minutes for each person. that would take me 66 hours to call 200 people. maybe my method is wrong?

 

[Black_Dragon43]

I offered working for free in some facebook groups but i realized people don’t value free work at all. maybe i should create mockup websites for different niches?

No don’t blankly offer to work for free. find someone who needs a website and do it for them for free. If they don’t need or want a website, then you’re wasting your time!

 

[ChasingDream97]

No don’t blankly offer to work for free. find someone who needs a website and do it for them for free. If they don’t need or want a website, then you’re wasting your time!

how about keeping it as something to showcase in their portfolio though

 

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[Kung Fu Steve]

yeah i agree with you but i am a full time medical student and a game developer. so i didn’t have time for more than 10 calls a day and counted on cold emails a bit too much.

Then why are you wasting your time with web development? In my humble opinion, you're going in 3 radically different directions.

"The man who chases two rabbits catches neither."

Or...

The man who tries to be a medical professional, a game developer, and a web designer will fail at all three.

Nothing wrong with a side hustle but man, you've got to be able to direct some focus in one project at a time.

also how is it possible to call 200 different people everyday? I usually take my time to ‘study’ their websites so that takes like 20 minutes for each person. that would take me 66 hours to call 200 people. maybe my method is wrong?

I would never end a day without the next day's list of prospects to call.

I would organize my outbound by call 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5. I wouldn't waste time leaving voicemails (or I used a VM drop service). I would follow up every call with an e-mail. Everything was pre-scripted and recorded. I wouldn't leave it up to chance or how I felt that day.

It takes discipline. But out of 200 calls, how many do you think even answered the phone? I could make 10 calls in 2 minutes -- especially if they didn't answer the phone. The volume you need to even get someone on the phone, and then have a meaningful conversation, and then to even book a follow-up... you've got to understand the numbers game.

Better to batch and take notes. Study 50 websites the night before, write down the notes, call them and leave a meaningful message about what you saw you could fix.

But before anybody gives you any more advice -- I'd ask you... are you really trying to do this or did you just think this was going to be a get rich quick thing?

You already said you're in school AND a game developer... neither one of those are joke and both take serious dedication.

If you're just looking for extra income while you go to school, maybe you just get a job?

 

[WJK]

I offered working for free in some facebook groups but i realized people don’t value free work at all. maybe i should create mockup websites for different niches?

You've already decided that you are going to fail before you even start. Uh????

 

[Guest12k7911]

You've already decided that you are going to fail before you even start. Uh????

what do you mean? i tried to work with someone for free, that was the conclusion after that. i am not a native english speaker, maybe you misunderstood because of that.

 

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[Guest12k7911]

Then why are you wasting your time with web development? In my humble opinion, you're going in 3 radically different directions.

"The man who chases two rabbits catches neither."

Or...

The man who tries to be a medical professional, a game developer, and a web designer will fail at all three.

Nothing wrong with a side hustle but man, you've got to be able to direct some focus in one project at a time.



I would never end a day without the next day's list of prospects to call.

I would organize my outbound by call 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5. I wouldn't waste time leaving voicemails (or I used a VM drop service). I would follow up every call with an e-mail. Everything was pre-scripted and recorded. I wouldn't leave it up to chance or how I felt that day.

It takes discipline. But out of 200 calls, how many do you think even answered the phone? I could make 10 calls in 2 minutes -- especially if they didn't answer the phone. The volume you need to even get someone on the phone, and then have a meaningful conversation, and then to even book a follow-up... you've got to understand the numbers game.

Better to batch and take notes. Study 50 websites the night before, write down the notes, call them and leave a meaningful message about what you saw you could fix.

But before anybody gives you any more advice -- I'd ask you... are you really trying to do this or did you just think this was going to be a get rich quick thing?

You already said you're in school AND a game developer... neither one of those are joke and both take serious dedication.

If you're just looking for extra income while you go to school, maybe you just get a job?

well, i’m not planning to freelance forever. i just need some initial budget for my mobile game and i live in a country where i dont speak the language and not so many people know english. so its kind of impossible to get a job, but i know what you are saying.

 

[WJK]

what do you mean? i tried to work with someone for free, that was the conclusion after that. i am not a native english speaker, maybe you misunderstood because of thath.

One person and that's it????? One and done????? Are you kidding????? You worked at it for a week????? It's all a numbers game. Big numbers of contacts on your part to create customers. You just don't get it and there's no way I can help you understand the job. So, good luck!

 

[Guest12k7911]

One person and that's it????? One and done????? Are you kidding????? You worked at it for a week????? It's all a numbers game. Big numbers of contacts on your part to create customers. You just don't get it and there's no way I can help you understand the job. So, good luck!

I just realized what you’re trying to say. Yeah, I was being lazy.

 

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[WJK]

I just realized what you’re trying to say. Yeah, I was being lazy.

No duh man! I've been self-employed for 47 years and I've been really successful. But, only you can do the work and get the skill set to make it happen for you.

 

[Guest12k7911]

No duh man! I've been self-employed for 47 years and I've been really successful. But, only you can do the work and get the skill set to make it happen for you.

I am going to work really hard this week. How many free websites do you think I should build? or maybe it’s not about the quantity but I should work for free until I understand the value I am trying to provide? Also do you have other tips? 47 years of experience sounds really cool!

 

[WJK]

I am going to work really hard this week. How many free websites do you think I should build? or maybe it’s not about the quantity but I should work for free until I understand the value I am trying to provide? Also do you have other tips? 47 years of experience sounds really cool!

Make as many as you can for as many people as you can find. Hone your skills. Get faster. Get better. Create a library of templates. Make friends and contacts. Be giving and kind. Make it about the person you are serving and their needs Get them to coach you on how things work for them. Try to learn as much about their businesses and challenges as you can. Ask questions. Listen twice as much as you talk. Everyone's favorite subject is themselves so talk about them and their baby -- their business.

After you serve them and make friends, you are in the perfect position to ask for something. Ask for referrals. If you can get a referral in exchange for your "free" work, you've found a way for them to compensate you. You can also ask them for good reviews of your work on social media -- another value they can give you in exchange. But remember. You must give first without the expectation of getting anything back. When the customer feels like they have received value, they will want to give back.

When I started in real estate in 1976, there was no training, cell phones, computers, or hardly any b&w copy machines. Now you have books, podcasts, forums, and all kinds of information available at your fingertips. Take advantage of as much of this wealth of information as you can absorb.

 

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[Simon Angel]

@Wilsonn You're a soon-to-be doctor; try adding value to your circle/industry first.

1. Check if your professors, lecturers, or other well-known doctors in your city have websites

2. Hit up the one you like the most (It'll help a lot since you already have a relationship with them) and create a killer website for them

OR

3. Help doctors who are at the beginning of their careers (e.g., people who graduated last year) and are short on cash.
*I'm sure they'll be very happy to take you up on that offer.

For the actual web design part...

Think of the user experience a person interested in your client's services will have while using the website, and make it as simple and smooth as possible.

You could just do one-page websites, sort of like a business card, but with a contact form at the bottom and a LOT of easily clickable phone number/call buttons so that they can easily book a consultation or call them on the spot.

You also want the website to look as cool/representative as possible (so that your doctor friend can brag to their other doctor friends) AND with enough function added to make their day easier and online presence better.

And if you're using WordPress, make sure to use Yoast SEO and prioritize keywords that highlight the doctor's name, profession/conditions they specialize or treat in, and the city/area they're in—this is a fast & easy way to rank them up to the top of the first page locally, which will actually bring them more business.

Once you do this at least once for FREE, here's how you get PAID:

1. Ask your happy client to refer you to people who might also need your service

2. Leverage their name and website when interacting with the new prospect to increase your chances of closing them

3. Create a case study of your FREE client's website – e.g. track how many consultations have been booked, how many calls have been made through the website, and come up with some gross estimate of how much money that translates into

(Ask your client what their average lifetime customer value is and a gross estimate of their callers > customers percentage)

4. Ask for an amount that will look like a steal. For example, if your doctor friend's FREE website helped bring $10,000 in revenue in the past 5 months since you've created it, then that's easy $24K+ in additional revenue per year, so charging $2,000 - 2,400 will look like you're giving away free money and would be hard to say no to.

 

[Guest12k7911]

Thank you for anyone who tried to help me or simply left a laughing emoji. I got 3 clients for $6K combined.