Social Media Marketing - Making $4k - Progress Thread

[coder_for_life22]

Here's my second progress thread on FLF.

My other thread can be found here: Progress Thread - Mobile Game Progress Thread

I started a social media marketing agency back in August and spent the first 2 months laying the ground work. I started the business with a colleague of mine. We both invested in the business initially and officially launched it in January(Before I even became a part of the forums here).

I read Fastlane Millionaire book about 2 years ago but never joined the community here. So I am thankful to this book for giving me my initial ideologies and motivating me.

My business partner and I are both computer scientist and built our own in house software to manage, and help grow our clients social media, particulary instagram.

Our software is built to be bot free and allows us to get very specific as far as targeting audiences for our clients. I know there is other software out there that could be used but we wanted to build something that we could have complete control over and be able to customize things to our clients needs. It took us about 4 months to build it together.

We currently have over 10 clients and also do website development and funnel creation for our clients on the backend.

I'll be updating this thread with our progress and other information as a way of journaling my journey through this and to document the process to look back on one day.

 

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[Eugen]

This seems very interesting! Watched.

May I ask you a question?

-What is the process of building a SM agency and how did you scale it? Is it just you and your colleague, or did you bring more people to help?

Cheers

 

[coder_for_life22]

@Eugen Honestly, what I've noticed so far is that its all about REAL results. Our clients have not only gotten growth but their sales and clients have also increased as a result. So this has naturally triggered a word of mouth and many of our clients have came through word of mouth. It also helps that we offer a finders fee for someone referring someone else.

It also helps that we network hard af.

Other than that, we use our own social media strategies to scale as well but so far word of mouth and the results we get our clients have been our biggest scale factor. We also make sure our customer service is A+.

As far as the process for starting, its the same as with any business. We spent a few months just building out our site, really thinking about our strategy and what we could do to make us different from others in our niche, scouted out all of our competition, and building our software(The hardest part). We could have had things up and running much sooner but we really took our time initially to make sure we had things in order because there wasn't a rush.

But I don't think there is a specific process to starting one. Just think about what type of results you want to get people, and figure out how you can do it. and get them REAL results.

 

[lowtek]

I like the results focus, for the clients. There are many charlatans in the digital marketing industry, so props for building something that actually benefits your clientele.

Any thoughts on selling your software to other firms, as an additional source of revenue?

 

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[coder_for_life22]

I like the results focus, for the clients. There are many charlatans in the digital marketing industry, so props for building something that actually benefits your clientele.

Any thoughts on selling your software to other firms, as an additional source of revenue?

We've thought about this and considered it. Maybe eventually we will come out with some form of commercial software but for now we want to keep it in house.

But good suggestion

 

[Imgal]

Our software is built to be bot free and allows us to get very specific as far as targeting audiences for our clients. I know there is other software out there that could be used but we wanted to build something that we could have complete control over and be able to customize things to our clients needs. It took us about 4 months to build it together.

Exciting to hear that you're doing so well already. Has your $2k / month got your profitable for time spent developing the software? I'm presuming when you say it's bot free that it's more of a research tool then and not anything performing activity on Instagram. If so then there's definitely a strong market for selling analysis reports as a one-off product that you can then upsell to your services. It's something that has worked really for converting clients for me in the past.

Really looking forward to watching you grow and thrive!

 

[Eskil]

My business partner and I are both computer scientist and built our own in house software to manage, and help grow our clients social media, particulary instagram. Our software is built to be bot free and allows us to get very specific as far as targeting audiences for our clients. I know there is other software out there that could be used but we wanted to build something that we could have complete control over and be able to customize things to our clients needs. It took us about 4 months to build it together.

Interesting. Do you mind sharing some of the more specific features of the tool(s) you have developed? What it can / can't do, etc.

 

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[kubikdanon]

What is your strategy for searching new clients? Also, what is the price point of your service? (is it more of an 'affordable' service [~$100/month] or is it 'high-end' service [~$500-1000/month])

 

[coder_for_life22]

Exciting to hear that you're doing so well already. Has your $2k / month got your profitable for time spent developing the software? I'm presuming when you say it's bot free that it's more of a research tool then and not anything performing activity on Instagram. If so then there's definitely a strong market for selling analysis reports as a one-off product that you can then upsell to your services. It's something that has worked really for converting clients for me in the past.

Really looking forward to watching you grow and thrive!

And we are making over $2k a month now and this is recurring. So everything is paying for itself if we manage to keep picking up 3-4 clients per month like we currently are.

Interesting. Do you mind sharing some of the more specific features of the tool(s) you have developed? What it can / can't do, etc.

It can do target audience research using algorithms we created that work hand and hand with instagram. It automatically tells us where our clients potential audiences are and also uses instagrams API to verify the 80% or more of this audience is verified accounts and not just bots. It also does hashtag research, influencer research, competitor research, and gives us data on our clients current IG page and the health of it(Engagement, etc). It also does automation for us as well as far as content management etc.

The software isn't perfect but since we are the creators we are free to do as we please. Make changes as necessary, etc. Which is why we set out to build our own initially versus using other tools.

What is your strategy for searching new clients? Also, what is the price point of your service? (is it more of an 'affordable' service [~$100/month] or is it 'high-end' service [~$500-1000/month])

The strategy for new clients has been lots of word of mouth and our immediate network. We know many people who want or needs to grow their social media with real target followers. Its not really hard to get them on board after they see the results that we get clients.

From their we usually have those clients refer someone else. We also do website development for our clients on the backend for those who need it.

Our prices vary based on the package our clients select. We offer month-to-month, 3-month, 6 month, etc.

 

[Imgal]

It can do target audience research using algorithms we created that work hand and hand with instagram. It automatically tells us where our clients potential audiences are and also uses instagrams API to verify the 80% or more of this audience is verified accounts and not just bots. It also does hashtag research, influencer research, competitor research, and gives us data on our clients current IG page and the health of it(Engagement, etc). It also does automation for us as well as far as content management etc.

What do you classify as a bot? You say you're not using them, but then say you're doing automation? That's what I classify as most bots doing so just interested in your definition.

 

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[coder_for_life22]

What do you classify as a bot? You say you're not using them, but then say you're doing automation? That's what I classify as most bots doing so just interested in your definition.

Ah yes. When I say bot free, meaning we make sure our clients do not get a bunch of fake bot followers. I know many many services that do this.(Mostly our competition). But essentially our tool does use automation so this could be classified as a bot per your response above.

 

[Imgal]

Ah yes. When I say bot free, meaning we make sure our clients to not get a bunch of fake bot followers. I know many many services that do this.(Mostly our competition)

Got ya! Very smart move. Yeah, I'm advise a few clients who came to me wanting the same follower as another industry leader... right till I showed them that their audience was 65% bots. Quality under quantity wins. Wishing you both huge success. Sounds like you're doing it the smart way.

 

[nickkenens]

Will keep following this thread!

Currently also running a local SMMA business over here in Belgium next to all the online course stuff I do.

We've currently (2 weeks ago) passed the stage of having everything set up: contracts, paperwork (which took forever...), software, etc.

I do have one question out of pure curiosity.
How did you go about networking 'hard af'?
As I personally know that the practitionership in this area is most certainly lacking on my end...

Edit: Love your software engineering background btw, we share similar stories. Software Engineering is a huge passion of mine but I'm incredibly over-indexed as a people-person and really need to capitalize on that.

 

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[coder_for_life22]

Will keep following this thread!

I do have one question out of pure curiosity.
How did you go about networking 'hard af'?
As I personally know that the practitionership in this area is most certainly lacking on my end...

We got to events in our city. These events are good for networking. We've realized that most business owners have no idea how to grow and do social media properly. We've gained several clients through this and the rest has been word of mouth. We've recently started some advertising that has brought in a client but this has not been our main source.

We also started our own funnel. We are building an email list and giveaway/send people in that list content. and every so often offer them to become a member.


Progress Update:

- I am currently working on building out a website for one of our latest clients this week.(Met through networking) This clients throws big fashion events in Colombia. And in July he is having a big event. He will be giving us recognition at the event, tables, rooms, party entrances, and access to his network of entrepreneurs and businesses.

- So I will be going to Colombia in July for the event. Expenses will be paid by our business. My partner pretty much lives there now. He is always there.

- Since I first posted this thread we have managed to close 4 more clients and have sealed website development deals with them to build, and manage their websites(An additional fee).

- This puts us at about $4k a month now.(All clients, website contracts, etc.)

We are growing fast. Faster than we thought, but we want to be careful we do not speed out of control and become complacent, stubborn, and unwilling to change and adapt, as lots of businesses manage to do. We will stay humble and attribute our success to having taken the time and hard-work to build great processes and systems that work.

We also have a great strategy, but strategies are easy to imitate. Strategies are easy to come by. What's not easy to imitate is the execution. So its more in our execution rather than our strategy.

 

[kubikdanon]

Do you have a website? I wanna learn more about your services.

 

[coder_for_life22]

Progress Update

- Currently investing money in advertising. We have gained three new clients so far through these. We spent $170 total and got three new clients which are valued significantly higher than the cost of acquisition.
- Starting a "Mastermind" private group. This will be a group for anyone who is on our email list to join and get tips from us, other members, connect/network with other members, etc. We want to build a community.

Nothing else really going on right now besides that. Grow, Grow, Grow

 

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[LleixG]

How are you advertising it? IG ads?

 

[coder_for_life22]

Progress Update
- Nothing major. Revamping our ads to target better. We'll see how that works out.
- Got another new client on Sunday
- Working on a clients website

I also have noticed how easy it is to let your business stagnate and growth stop. Its important to keep finding ways to move forward. Whether its investing in getting new clients, finding ways to market better, making website changes. The point is, its important to keep innovating. Not innovating in a sense of coming up with brand new ideas but looking ways to improve each and every day. Even if its just incrementally.

So every day my business partner and I talk about ways we can improve, get more clients, improve our service for our clients, etc. We also have an hour/two hour call to discuss sprints etc. To keep moving.

Bottom line is: Its very very easy to stagnate and become "lazy" thinking things will come "automatically".