Getting Started Success!

[Geoffrey]

Verbal agreements for my first two official gigs...being brand new at doing this stuff for other people, this is "kind of a big deal"!

Doing a Local Directory listing package for one guy...google, yahoo, bing, ubl, etc., and charging him $300 for this one off. He didn't even blink, and I told him he can't tell anybody that he might refer to me how much I charged, because the price is going up to $500 for this one off service after I finish his. He already has somebody doing work for him on a series of websites highly geo targeted at micro niches in his specific field, so he really doesn't need any other stuff from me right now, though I will keep up to date on his progress with this web campaign he has going. Even if I don't help with it, I can watch and learn how it's rolled out. He's working with someone who is doing the same type of thing with 200+ similar professionals around the country.

Second client is the design/roll out of a simple wordpress site. 5 main pages, then another 6 pages under a services menu. I explained to him that he wanted all of those services to have individual pages instead of just one big services page (which is what he initially wanted), so he can build backlinks and rank those pages individually. He has actually given me all the content, so it's a pretty easy gig. I'm getting $450 for this first one, and plan to charge at least $750 for the next site. I've also planted the seed with him about ongoing backlink strategies and such, but haven't really pushed that...let's just get this site done and move on.

Anyway, two clients, no marketing other than me opening my mouth and talking to people I already knew. These guys were talking about marketing stuff for their businesses, I heard the conversation, jumped in, and now I'm doing some work for both. Both of these are people I know, and see on a regular basis through other stuff. And, they both know a LOT of other business folks.

This is already more fun than I've had in the last 12 years of being an appraiser!

[Lisa]

Great job taking action and getting your clients! I'm sure you'll get lots of referrals from your happy clients too.