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Lead Gen. - From Action Faker to €€€ - While Getting My Shit Together

A detailed account of a Fastlane process...

cini

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Background: 23y/o, live with my parents, no “real job” at the moment.

I am not going to lie, my situation is pretty much the same as the guy in this thread.

https://www.thefastlaneforum.com/community/threads/fear-and-action-faking-in-entrepreneurship-a-19-year-olds-guide-to-askholing.74070/

I am massively guilty of action faking, and it's driving me crazy.

I have been beating my head against the wall for over a year now, trying to make my first $ online, but back then i didn't know that my problem was not my method, but my mindset.

In Short: My mind is a clusterfuck of negative thoughts. I'm shy, socially awkward and most definetly have low self-esteem.

So join me in this quest. I will cold call, network, and approach business owners until I beat the ever living shit out of my insecurities.

I will try to bring balance to my life, go to the gym, be a bit more outgoing and try to comunicate more with my family.

Oh yes, and i will make money too.

My Service:
I will develop and rent out Lead Generation systems (website+adwords/bing ads) to small businesses.

Goal:
My goal is to get clients, become a freelancer and make 2'500 € pre-tax per month before the end of the year.

The Next Step:
Next step is to write a script and start cold calling businesses outside my city.
Will update this thread at least once a week.

It is time to break out of this pattern and change.

ps. sorry if this first post is weird and a bit all over the place.
 
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CareCPA

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Welcome.
...
ps. sorry if this first post is weird and a bit all over the place.
I think this is an excellent example of your insecurities. Don't apologize for your progress thread intro - own it. If it's not what you want it to be, go back and make it what you want it to be.
The same will apply to business. If you aren't getting the results you want, don't sit there and apologize to yourself - figure out what you need to do to get where you want to be, and make it happen.
 

cini

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What a glorious start.
This week i did nothing.

I wrote half of a cold call script and read about 50% of unscripted , but overall this week has been disappoing. The fact that I can't muster the courage to call a stranger is making me neurotic.

The good news is the book and this forum have all the info i need to make the change.

I'm going to catch up on some reading, then try again next week...
 

Sander

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Deleted48117

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What a glorious start.
This week i did nothing.

I wrote half of a cold call script and read about 50% of unscripted , but overall this week has been disappoing. The fact that I can't muster the courage to call a stranger is making me neurotic.

The good news is the book and this forum have all the info i need to make the change.

I'm going to catch up on some reading, then try again next week...

Hey mate, don't wait til next week. Why would you wait?
 

jpanarra

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Hey man... Go read my thread..

Progress Thread - Deaf and Daft, getting my first sale

I'm Deaf.. and I've made Cold calls and am still making them... You have no excuse.. go on the internet find someone that you can try and sell to.. Then pick up the phone and start dialing...

My worse experience cold calling was somone picking up the phone and as I'm explaining what i have to offer the dude on the other end goes "F*ck OFFFFFF" and hung up... I doubt you'll get that on your first few tries... So... PICK UP THE F*ckING PHONE
 

Andy Black

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cini

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Hey mate, don't wait til next week. Why would you wait?
Fear, Insecurities, Inexperience? I don't know. I have 0 excuses.
Who do you already know who might need your help?

Maybe take a leaf from @Mckenzie's book:
Says I don't have permission to view the page. Anyway thanks for stopping by Andy, I learned a lot from your posts :)

If i think about it there are people i can help.

I'm friend with a florist, he could use a new website and some facebook marketing tips. But no adwords services and this is why i have been hesitant to help him. Maybe i should just go out of my way and help him?

Also the dentist I go to regularly could use my services. He knows what I do (broadly) and I know he needs clients. The problem is just having the courage to ask him!:clench: I will see him this august, so we'll see.

In short yes, i can find friends of friends who might need help, and that is what i'm going to do.

In fact, I forgot to say this in the first post, but i barely have any experience.

I'm thinking of postponing the cold calls until i have two or three projects under my belt.

I will contact the florist this week and help him any way i can. Who knows, maybe I'll even get some referrals doing this.

Thank you for all the posts and attention. I am very grateful that some of the fastlane Gods are watching. I'm not going anywere. I will keep reporting my failures and my achievements until I reach my goal, whether that is six months from now or six years.
 

Andy Black

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cini

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Quick Update:
AndyTalks with @Contrarian about starting his side hustle in local lead gen
Man... this podcast was a real kick in the butt. Thanks, much needed.
This week i set up 3 landing pages + relative adwords campaigns.
I didn't want to spend my own money but i guess this is the easiest method to get business. I have around 400€ left in my debit card... Hope they last
To Be Continued
 

Andy Black

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Quick Update:

Man... this podcast was a real kick in the butt. Thanks, much needed.
This week i set up 3 landing pages + relative adwords campaigns.
I didn't want to spend my own money but i guess this is the easiest method to get business. I have around 400€ left in my debit card... Hope they last
To Be Continued
Actually, I found the quickest way to start was to ask around amongst people you already know.

As described here:
 
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cini

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Small Update:
This weekend I managed to launch my first serious website and campaign. Overall this is what happened
Campaign launched saturday night.
Sunday: 209 impressions | 9 clicks | 2 conversions.
I'm very happy about this, however i made a lot of mistakes.
  1. I went with the shared lead model (my website is one of those "get 3 free quotes in less than 24h"), and I quickly realised how impractical this is.
  2. The business owners i've been calling so far (3) are all foreigners, in fact i think everyone in this vertical is a foreigner.. i mean... nothing wrong with them of course, but communicating has been very challenging. what is going to happen when i start to talk about adwords, marketing and leads? :rofl:
Next: this is what i'm going to do:
  1. switch from shared lead to exclusive lead model.
  2. keep on giving away free leads and see who can be a suitable business partner.
In the end, i'm not progressing as fast as i can. I'm getting a job in september so i can finally bid recklessly on the search terms i want.

Still confident i can reach my goal by the end of the year.:praise:
 

cini

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Switched from shared leads to exclusive leads model and am focusing locally. I sent two leads via sms to a guy and today he calls me up.
He's like whats the deal, why are you giving me free work. :rofl:I wasn't prepared for this so i try to explain everything in simple terms. Told him i do marketing and i act as a middle-man. That's it, no mention of websites or ads, not even internet.
We agree on a trial period of two weeks. After that if he's happy then we can make a deal.:thumbsup:
If this works and we make a deal then i can scale to 8 other cities.

Lesson Learned:
When selecting the business you are going to send leads to, try to find someone who offers several other services. this way if you end up making a deal, you can upsell him on more advertising of all his other services. (for example if you are generating plumbing leads, try to find a business who does plumbing and hvac).

Whats next:
Search volumes are really low in my country, and in some verticals you need weird legal permits. For this reason, I want to Take Over the anglosphere, the big cities with millions of people.:cool:
More people = more demand for certain services = more search volume = more competition = higher cpc = more ad spend === bigger and fatter monthly retainer for me. Makes sense.

Question: does anyone know how to access google from different cities? i tried to use proxies but it is not accurate enough. i want to look at search results around the world.

By the way thank you all for the kind posts and messages.
 
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Andy Black

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Switched from shared leads to exclusive leads model and am focusing locally. I sent two leads via sms to a guy and today he calls me up.
He's like whats the deal, why are you giving me free work. :rofl:I wasn't prepared for this so i try to explain everything in simple terms. Told him i do marketing and i act as a middle-man. That's it, no mention of websites or ads, not even internet.
We agree on a trial period of two weeks. After that if he's happy then we can make a deal.:thumbsup:
If this works and we make a deal then i can scale to 8 other cities.

Lesson Learned:
When selecting the business you are going to send leads to, try to find someone who offers several other services. this way if you end up making a deal, you can upsell him on more advertising of all his other services. (for example if you are generating plumbing leads, try to find a business who does plumbing and hvac).

Whats next:
Search volumes are really low in my country, and in some verticals you need weird legal permits. For this reason, I want to Take Over the anglosphere, the big cities with millions of people.:cool:
More people = more demand for certain services = more search volume = more competition = higher cpc = more ad spend === bigger and fatter monthly retainer for me. Makes sense.

Question: does anyone know how to access google from different cities? i tried to use proxies but it is not accurate enough. i want to look at search results around the world.

By the way thank you all for the kind posts and messages.
Use the ad preview tool. I find it a bit flaky though (sometimes shows no ads when surely there are some running).
 
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My situation a few months ago was almost identical to yours was in your OP. Felt like I was reading my own writing for a second.

I think the exclusive lead strategy is the way to go. I just put up my first lead gen site and Adwords campaign today for a local niche (I was just selling web design before).

Rather than looking for business owners who needed leads I kind of just did some keyword research and jumped into something with a decent amount of volume. Something I know I can get some leads for. Hopefully it's not too competitive but we'll see.

I plan on reaching out to business owners once I have some leads coming in.

Before I decided to do this I was cold calling/emailing prospects but I think this method is more efficient. It proves that you can deliver and sounds like a great way to get clients on board. I may still continue to send 5-10 strong cold emails a day to see how it pans out.

Like Andy said, reaching out to your personal network is a good strategy too. I built a website for my dad's business and he doesn't need leads because he's booked via word of mouth at the moment, but now he's going to put me in touch with a friend of his in a different vertical who is interested in talking to me about doing a lead gen site.

It's all about trying out different methods. Never spread yourself too thin, which is something I learned from Fanatical Prospecting. Good book on prospecting if you want to check it out.
 

focusedlife

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It's all about trying out different methods. Never spread yourself too thin, which is something I learned from Fanatical Prospecting. Good book on prospecting if you want to check it out.

Excellent book! Waaaay better than his follow up (in my opinion, of course), "Sales IQ" (couldn't stay awake through it).
 
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