The Entrepreneur Forum | Financial Freedom | Starting a Business | Motivation | Money | Success

Welcome to the only entrepreneur forum dedicated to building life-changing wealth.

Build a Fastlane business. Earn real financial freedom. Join free.

Join over 80,000 entrepreneurs who have rejected the paradigm of mediocrity and said "NO!" to underpaid jobs, ascetic frugality, and suffocating savings rituals— learn how to build a Fastlane business that pays both freedom and lifestyle affluence.

Free registration at the forum removes this block.

My Journey From Full Time Employment To Freedom

A detailed account of a Fastlane process...

oa92

Contributor
Read Fastlane!
User Power
Value/Post Ratio
100%
Jan 7, 2019
25
25
My Journey From Full Time Employment To Freedom

Progress & Intro Post


I’ve never really made an introduction and now I’ve actually started something it seems like a good time to.

My background

I joined the forum about a year ago now, I’ve learned a lot and it has led me down the path I’m on now.

I’m from the south-east UK in a county just outside of London. My background is graphic design and print, I finished a part-time degree in graphic design last year and was a bit lost about what to do after that.

I’ve always wanted to start a business from a young age but never committed to anything. After reading the Millionaire Fastlane it made me totally change my mindset and building my own business is the only option for me.

I kept coming up with extravagant business ideas, I would make a start with them but I never really stuck with any of the ideas for long enough.

My Current Situation


I’m 27 years old and I’m currently employed 40 hours per week whilst working on my business in the evenings and weekends. I’m still living with my parents so there really is no better time for me to start this journey.

What’s going on now

Through this forum I found Foxes Sales Legends course, I realised web design is a great way for me to get started in business. I’ve only been in the course for a few months and so far it’s been great having the support, experience and advice from everyone. It’s really helped me kick start my business and I’ve taken steps that I probably wouldn’t have taken before.

I have also taken Steve Deans SEO course which was also great so my business is now focused purely on web design and SEO.

I’m still in the portfolio stages on my business, I have a friend who uses me for his design work and I made my first website sale about a month ago. I’m yet to secure my first SEO client.

I’m networking most weeks, cold calling, emailing, and I’m starting to look at using social media to find more clients.

My biggest challenge so for is simply finding my first clients.

Goals

Short term:
To quit my job and go fulltime with this business
To reach 6 figures in revenue
To rank my own website on page one locally for SEO and Web Design services

Long term:
Use this business to uncover needs and wants
Use this business to learn about business so I can then build a much bigger business
Sell the business

This threat will be more of a diary that will show my progress, hold myself accountable, learn from others and hopefully help others as I learn.

I’ll try to update it weekly.

Thanks for reading,
Oli
 
Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.
Last edited:

oa92

Contributor
Read Fastlane!
User Power
Value/Post Ratio
100%
Jan 7, 2019
25
25
Update 1



I did my first couple of video outreaches last week. I had been putting this off for a while now and now I’ve finally done it I regret not starting this much earlier!



I used Loom and couldn’t believe how easy it is to use. I have tracking on my emails and Loom also tracks when they watch the video so it gives me a bit more of an idea if they are interested or not.



Anyway, I sent out my first two videos one for SEO and one for web design. The SEO one worked well and I now have a potential client from it.



I will now try and send out two videos per day over the next week and then follow them up with cold calls the following week.



I’ve written a couple of web design proposals for two potential clients I met at networking and I’m waiting to hear back from them.



SEO on my own site is picking up now and I’m starting to see my rankings improve every day, I’m even on page one for a keyword that I didn’t even want on page one, but I’m happy as it shows what I’m doing is working.



So going into next week it’ll be much the same process, continue prospecting, networking, continue with my own SEO and keep on learning.
 

JG17

Bronze Contributor
Read Unscripted!
Speedway Pass
User Power
Value/Post Ratio
223%
Oct 22, 2018
81
181
London, UK
Hello mate. In a similar position (and location!) to you. Really looking forward to seeing your progress, looks like you're taking good action. Keep us updated, I'll follow.
 
Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.

oa92

Contributor
Read Fastlane!
User Power
Value/Post Ratio
100%
Jan 7, 2019
25
25
Update 2


I managed to send out at least 1 video per day and I’ve had a couple of good responses from them. I will follow all the videos up with calls next week.


I also manged to get to 2 networking events this week, made some new connections and got 2 more good leads. I’m now also offering video audits to members of my networking group as a way to lead with value and get them more interested in my work.


Having spoken with some other people within the SEO scene I found out they are getting a lot of work from Google AdWords, so I decided to buy @Andy Black's AdWords course. A few hours into the course and I already have an ad running so I’m looking forward to getting into more depth with the course on how I can improve my ads.


Initially I was just taking the course to gain more customers for myself and then once I’ve successfully done that, add it as a service I can offer. Andy advised that I should start trying to get AdWords customers straight away so I will start pushing for that too.


A lady at my networking group runs a ‘grow your business course’ which other members have recommended so I will be attending that next week, which covers things like time management and social media.


The plan for next week:


  • Get at least one video done per day (this is more realistic after a full day’s work).
  • Follow up all this week’s video’s with calls and try to set up meetings.
  • Get to 2 networking events
  • Continue with Andy’s AdWords course
  • Continue with Foxes Sales course
  • Continue improving my own SEO
  • Keep learning and moving forward every day!
 

oa92

Contributor
Read Fastlane!
User Power
Value/Post Ratio
100%
Jan 7, 2019
25
25
Update 3

I’ve decided I’ll probably update this about once every 3/4 weeks now. Or if anything significant happens.

At this stage, most of what write will be very repetitive but I suppose that’s the reality of this journey.

I’ve been continuing with the video’s daily and following them up with calls about a week later. People tell me they stand out and they like them even if they are not interested in what I’m offering, so I think I will just continue making one or two per day.

I’ve got 3 google ads running now and I really need to set some time aside to analyse what’s going on and how I can improve them. I think I need to get a good landing page created ASAP too.

I had a meeting this week with someone from my networking group about SEO. The meeting went well and he agreed to £450 per month for 12 months. The following day he emailed me saying after thinking about it more he can't justify spending that much per month at this stage. He then asked me to quote for just the on-page stuff. I’ve had to take some time to think about why he changed his mind and how I can stop that in the future.

After a live call with @Fox yesterday I think it could be down to me not being confident enough at discussing the price at the meetings i.e. finding out what they comfortable with paying and discussing and justifying why they should pay what I’m asking. Having a community and mentoring makes this journey so much better.

I also had a meeting with a local printing company last week and sent a proposal this week. This one looks like a good portfolio project. Their business has been going for 30 years now and they have a lot of happy customers but they looking for new customers due to a lot of their existing ones starting to retire. I think I could really help them out through web design.

I have a meeting with a friend next week about building him a new site, doing SEO and potentially and AdWords campaign too. I think one of my main problems at the moment is I do not have past results to show people, so I’m thinking of using this as an ultimate portfolio project. I will price it enough to just cover my expenses and focus on getting him the best results possible. I think further down the line this could pay off.

Next week will be much the same again. Creating videos, cold calling, networking, AdWords, continuing learning and improving my own SEO.

Lastly, I’m getting more and more fed up with going into my job every day. I'm hating getting told what to do all the time and it's annoying that I only really get a maximum of about 4 hours every day to work on this business. I keep thinking about quitting but I know that might be a silly move at this stage given that I only have a couple of clients at the moment and no recurring revenue yet. I keeping thinking if I do quit then I would have so much more time to find more clients and it could pay off and get to where I want to be much quicker. But if I do continue with my job at the same time it takes the pressure off and I can afford to be more picky with clients.
 
Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.

Post New Topic

Please SEARCH before posting.
Please select the BEST category.

Post new topic

Guest post submissions offered HERE.

Latest Posts

New Topics

Fastlane Insiders

View the forum AD FREE.
Private, unindexed content
Detailed process/execution threads
Ideas needing execution, more!

Join Fastlane Insiders.

Top