So I finally did it.
It took me almost two years.
I started by setting a goal to become location independent. I wanted to build a business that would allow me to work from anywhere and to earn enough income to support myself each month.
My personal benchmark was to match my old salary at the time I quit my job. And today, I can say I met this benchmark for the month of May.
Before I share details how I did it, let me say upfront that my business is a service-based one. If you’re looking for advice on how to make money with FBA, drop-shipping, or any kind of product-based business, this datasheet might not be for you (although the parts about SEO or behavioral tips may be useful).
FINDING THE RIGHT SERVICE OR NICHE
Your service needs meet three criteria to be a suitable location independent business:
1. Can be done online 100% of the time
2. There is demand for that service
3. You can do it better than most competitors
100% online
A business like lawn service fails the first criterion, because you need to be present at one location. Even if you delegated everything to your underlings, you still need to be there in case of emergencies.
Web development, software development, consulting, graphic design, freelance writing, accounting, internet/affiliate marketing, niche blogging, or even professional poker are examples of things that can be done from anywhere in the world.
Demand
Before investing too much time chasing leads or clients, you want to test the demand for your service first.
The market must be hungry. If the service is worth a lot of money to them, it is in high demand and they will hire you.
But if the supply of services exceeds demand, the market is saturated. This is true for product-based businesses, too. There is no worse feeling than pouring months of time and thousands of dollars into a product or service, only to learn that nobody wants it.
Unfortunately, the market does not have to be saturated for demand to be low. For example, innovative entrepreneurs are likely to be quite skilled at setting up websites. Trying to market your web development services to them is almost futile.
For example, try selling a $5,000 full-stack* development proposal to a SaaS entrepreneur who could whip up a beautiful website with WordPress and a Thrive theme for $100 or less. Good luck. Entrepreneurs like those aren’t hungry for web development. But with your average mom-and-pop shop run by a baby boomer who has never written a line of code in his life, you probably will have better luck.
*”Full-stack” development means both front-end (UX, JavaScript, HTML/CSS, etc), and backend (servers, databases, etc).
Being better than 70% of your competition
This is self explanatory. If you have some skills you accumulated through your life, and can do them better than most people -- check to see if there is real value in those skills.
But you don’t have to be the BEST -- it’s a tall order. There’s always someone better at it than you, or someone doing it much longer than you have. Instead, aim to be in the top 20-30%, which is plenty good enough to have a decent business.
The alternative is you can just learn a new skill that does have value -- this is what I did.
My suggestion is to do some pro-bono work for the first 2-3 clients, get testimonials and feedback on how to improve. Get a mentor or two to help you as well.
Note: Those of you who mentored me -- you know who you are -- I really cannot thank you enough. I am in your debt.
Also, read a few top books on that skill. But do not read more than three books, maximum. I say this because you could fall into the trap of reading, reading and reading -- and not actually taking action.
BRANDING AND POSITIONING
What is your vision?
Ask yourself -- why do you want to work?
“I want to make money” or even “I want to be location independent” don’t count as serious answers, because it cannot be about you.
It has to be about other people.
If your answer involves something other people really want, and you are the one to happily give it to them, then you’ve got something.
You need a vision.
Write a mission statement about what you do for other people and how you are uniquely positioned for that mission. Without this, you’re just wasting time spinning your wheels.
When I first started out two years ago, I had no vision except “to become location independent.” It was all about ME. I was grasping at straws that looked as if they might make me some money. One day in Bangkok last summer, I was meeting a well-repped forum member for lunch. I showed him my website. He candidly told me it looked like I “just wanted to make money.”
And guess what? I wasn’t making any money.
After his feedback really got me thinking, I decided to change course. I stopped fucking around and wrote a mission statement about what value I was going to provide other people. Then I went all-in on that one particular service.
After a few months, I started making a little money. And a few more months later, I FINALLY started hitting my income goals.
Identify your business values
Just like the mission statement, I cannot understate the importance of this step. I know this sounds like corporate-speak where HR is constantly beating “company values” over everyone’s heads during a lunch-and-learn.
But this is about how you want others to view your business. Your values will make up your “voice” -- or brand -- within your niche. In other words, you become your brand.
Think about this:
- How do you want your customers or clients to see you and your business?
- How do you want to set yourself apart from your competition?
- What character traits are you most proud of when providing a service to others?
For example, my values are transparency, integrity and reliability.
Transparency:
I am transparent in my dealings with clients. I tell them prices upfront. I also show my work and how I do it. I don’t try to upsell my customers on shit they don’t really need.
Integrity:
I would rather turn down a project no matter how lucrative it is, than to deliver sub-par work. If a customer asked me to do things I know I could not deliver in quality, I tell the truth. I’ve even straight up told a couple of clients to the effect of: “Frankly, I don’t believe I am able to complete this project to your satisfaction because I don’t possess the right skills. But I am happy to help you find someone else who would be a better fit for you and have the proper skills to deliver.”
Reliability:
I deliver when I say I would deliver. I never miss deadlines. And if you are my client, and you send me an email, you can be assured 100% that I will respond to it. Might be in 10 minutes, or I might take a day or two if it needs to be thoughtful, but you will get a response.
So I built my business around these three values -- transparency, integrity and reliability. Everything I do in my business reflects these values.
And it does not go unnoticed.
Some of my client testimonials actually use these words, or variations of, because I’ve already internalized these values and conducted my business in this way.
This tells me people want to work with you not because you’re the best and most qualified, but because they feel you are trustworthy and reliable. I, for one, would never pay someone I did not trust, even if they are perfectly capable.
BUILDING YOUR BUSINESS
Website
Of course you need a website. But don’t just cobble something together with a cheap or free theme. It’ll just look cheap and unprofessional. Your website needs to look like a million bucks. More importantly, it needs to look like you’ve been doing this for years.
If you’re not technically inclined, I suggest hiring a web developer to do it for you -- or use either SquareSpace or WIX. If you don’t mind getting a bit technical, you can use WordPress with a premium theme and its plugins.
Few more things about websites:
- Logo: Make sure you get a good logo for your business. Hire a graphic designer. Don’t cheap out by going with Fiverr or Upwork. Frankly, a $5 logo looks exactly like a $5 logo.
- Content: At minimum, make a nice Home page with About and Contact pages. If your service has sub-services or sub-niches, make a page for each. Your home page should not be too text-heavy. Keep it clean and simple, but informative enough to see what you’re all about in less than 10 seconds.
- Responsiveness: More people use mobile devices than desktop computers to browse the internet. Make sure your website is responsive enough to display correctly in all mobile devices. Luckily, this is built into WordPress and SquareSpace. At worst, you may only need to install a couple of plugins, and you’re good.
- Testimonials and Work Samples: Testimonials are important for service businesses. Rarely does a person spend thousands of dollars on an unproven service provider without any reviews. If you have testimonials, show them with pride. If it’s applicable, show work samples on your online portfolio as well.
Lastly, don’t forget about SEO -- more on this later in this datasheet.
Registering your business
While this is outside the scope of this datasheet, the time to register your business usually comes once you get more established. You’ll start out as a sole proprietor, and when you start making money, you could consider incorporating for tax or legal reasons.
I incorporated my business as a single-member LLC very early. Perhaps too soon. But I wanted to get it over with before I left the U.S.
Getting leads
Before trying to get cold leads or organic traffic, start with “warm” leads:
1. Tell your family and friends about your business.
2. Offer some free or pro bono work in exchange for a glowing testimonial (e.g. revamp a friend’s website for free).
3. After exhausting your warm leads from friends and family, repeat steps #1 and #2 with your network of professional connections you’ve built throughout your career.
Note: if you’re building your business while working a FT job, you might want to be careful that your boss doesn’t find out that you’re hitting up your network contacts about your new business. Especially if you’re trying to provide the same service as your full-time company or if you’ve signed a non-compete agreement.
By the time you’ve gone through all of your warm leads, you should have at least a few testimonials and even made a little money.
Now it’s time to go cold. That is the hard part -- and it will make or break your business.
Do not use email lists
The first thing I will tell you is do not buy email lists.
Despite what list companies tell you, lists are shit for several reasons. For one thing, people change email addresses all the time. People change jobs. They aren’t quality controlled.
The quality of a list sours faster than a carton of milk left out in the sun.
Think about it -- if these lists are for sale, that means other marketers have been buying and spamming the same email addresses.
These email recipients are likely going to be sick and tired of getting marketing emails, and will likely ignore you. Or worse, report your email as spam.
You could actually ruin your domain this way. If you mass email and enough people report you as a spammer, the email provider will blacklist your domain or even shut you down completely. At that point, you are done. Start over with a new domain and email address.
Instead, follow these steps to convert cold leads into prospects then buyers:
How to generate cold leads and convert them
1. Create landing pages with an email opt-in.
2. Write lots of content (blog articles, service pages, niche pages, gated stuff like PDF reports).
3. Use links to weave a web within your website (make it easy for people to find your stuff).
4. Optimize your content around your keywords (from your keyword research for SEO).
5. Create social media accounts and promote your content there (use Buffer or Hootsuite, do NOT use bots to grow followers).
6. Use LinkedIn to search and filter for likely qualified prospects.
7. Use an email scraper and run it on your LinkedIn searches.
8. Cold email your leads (or cold call, if you prefer) -- use a template, but you must personalize it. This means doing your homework on your individual lead, the company he works for, and what he’s likely looking for. Do not mass email, or spam with the exact same template.
9. Follow up, follow up, follow up! Set up follow up email templates for this. Most people give up after one ignored email. But if you follow up twice or three times, about a week or so apart, you get your name in people’s minds. Sure, you might annoy a few people, but I wouldn’t worry. I’ve personally never gotten an email like “stop spamming my inbox, fuck off!” Just follow up, and you might get a “yes” every now and then.
10. If you can, attend networking events like trade shows, after-work happy hours, or wherever your prospects are most likely to hang out. A contact made in person is more likely to answer your email or phone call afterward than someone you’ve never met.
TIP: Use a web-based CRM tool like Salesforce to manage your contacts, email templates and scheduling/automating follow-ups.
[Side note: I also use my CRM to keep track of my paid projects and other tasks… it is a great productivity tool]
I’ll be honest and tell you what no marketer wants to admit:
The ugly truth is most of your emails will get ignored. Most who do respond will say “we already have someone doing this for us, but thanks for offering. Good luck” or “I don’t have any need for this now, but I’ll keep your name on file.” You’ll get a few “thanks but no thanks, I’m not interested” emails as well.
I will warn you -- you will get frustrated. You will get sick of the grind. You will get demoralized.
I went through all of this. Laying wide awake in bed at night, I did have doubts whether I would be able to make it. You will, too.
But don’t give up.
Even if it feels like all your efforts are being wasted into a black hole with nothing coming back out...
Keep chugging along.
Keep writing content.
Keep developing your “voice” within your niche.
Keep promoting your content.
Keep tweaking your landing pages.
Keep an eye on search keywords.
Keep emailing or calling.
Keep following up.
One day, someone will find you… and say yes. Just like Game.
How to take advantage of SEO
This is a huge topic that deserves its own datasheet, so I will just cover the basics of what I’ve done for my own business. Basically, you have to do what Google wants. I don’t like it, but Google is running the search engine show -- unfortunately we have to kowtow to Google.
- Use a domain name that best matches the keywords of your business. This is a little hard to do because many generic domain names have been snapped up already, so you have to get creative. But don’t think too far outside of the box. You don’t want to invent new keywords, because people won’t use them to find you. For example, if you want to design logos for pet shops, you should think of a domain name like petlogodesigns or petshoplogos.
- Use a keyword research tool to see how people are searching for your service. Don’t skimp on this step. It’s worth spending money on because you can do keyword research on just about anything, not just your business idea. You can use it to test different ideas, get a feel for demand (search frequency and volume) for any number of products and services. You’ll see what specific keywords people are using to search for something.
- Make it easy for people to find your content. Sounds simple, but it’s not. When we create content, we tend to just post and pray. What you should do is weave a web within your website. Link your piece of content to other pieces of content, and vice versa. Make it such that your visitors don’t have to click the mouse more than twice to access any piece of content. If it is three or more clicks deep, fix that.
- If you use the Yoast SEO plugin, make sure the most important pages are green. Home page, landing pages, service pages, etc. Not every page has to be green, however. Your contact page doesn’t have to be. Nor does the About page. The pages you want people to find and visit -- and the ones you intend to make money off of -- make sure they are green.
- Optimize your website for mobile users with Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP). This is a new thing, as I just found out earlier this year. Google’s directive is to boost search rankings for AMP pages. So if you want higher rankings for your site, create AMP for all your pages. WordPress has an AMP plugin, so you should install that, too. Read more about it here: https://www.ampproject.org/
- Create youtube videos about your business and embed them into your website. As some of us already know, YouTube is a SEO powerhouse. Make a few videos about your business, write some meta descriptions with your keywords, and embed your videos onto your website. Pages with video content are more likely to rank higher than pages without.
- Secure your website with SSL. To appear serious and trustworthy, your site should be secured through SSL. Plus Google has a preference for secured websites. If your website’s URL begins with “https”, you’re good. If not, get an SSL certificate and install it on your website. Depending on your hosting provider, you might be able to get it for free or for a small fee. Read more here: https://www.ssl.com/how-to/get-ssl-on-website/
BEHAVIORAL TIPS
Develop a routine
Choose a routine that works best for you, and fit your work into the time of day when you are most alert and productive. This takes a little experimentation on your part, but you should find it in no time.
To give you an idea of what running a location independent business is like, here’s my daily M-F routine:
8:00 am - wake up and make coffee
8:30 am - reply to emails and do administrative tasks if needed
10:00 am - gym
11:30 am - lunch
12:00 pm - work
6:00 pm - next day’s task planning
6:30 pm - dinner
7:30 pm - do whatever (chill at home, go on dates, bang chicks, hang out with the guys, watch movies, surf the internet and post on this forum)
12:00 am - sleep
Couple things to point out --
Personally I like to get the busy work, emails and other admin tasks out of the way early in the morning, clearing the way for me to focus on the actual work between noon and 6pm.
I think it’s a good habit to spend 30 minutes planning the next day’s tasks the evening before, so I could hit the ground running the next day. It prevents me from wasting precious time screwing around as I try to decide which tasks I should start doing first.
I try to get about 8 hours of sleep a night, but it’s pretty seldom that I get the full 8 hours. Normally about 6, maybe 7 hours, so it’s something I could do better so I could work even more effectively during the day.
Don’t do busy work
Busy work keeps you busy and makes you feel good about working -- “wow I worked for 10 hours today, I finished this and that and then I did this and that…”
But it doesn’t actually make you money. Busy work is just that -- busy work. Take a hard look at what you’re doing and ask yourself if it is really going to make you money.
Limit your hours
Ideally no more than 5 or 6 hours a day. If you’re slaving away 10, 12, 14 hours a day, your health and productivity will suffer. You will actually get less work done than if you limited yourself to 5-6 hours a day. If you’re working just for the sake of working so you could tell yourself that you’ve worked so hard, you’re just doing busy work.
Outside of your time slot of maximum productivity, forget about work. Go to the gym, bang out some pussy, and spend time with your buddies.
If you limit yourself to only 5-6 hours of work a day, that forces you to focus on what’s most important.
You’d be shocked how much you’d get done and how fast you’ll make money.
Try to avoid charging by the hour
Initially I was going to say “never” charge hourly, but I didn’t want to take a hard-line position on this because hourly might actually work better for some people or some industries.
But, personally, I really prefer to charge a flat fee for each project, OR put myself on a monthly retainer. I love retainers because it provides a stable monthly income and it gives me work every month. If you want to use retainers, just be sure to outline exactly how much work you will do each month -- so clients don’t pile more work on you without paying more.
Automate or outsource administrative tasks
I use accounting and invoicing software that links to my business bank account, so I don’t have to manually enter all my transactions. It automatically scans my bank account and imports transactions as they occur, so I don’t really have to do anything -- other than watch for double counting or accounting errors due to the software’s quirks.
On taxes -- I hire a CPA to do my taxes and keep track of my filing documents, so I don’t have to worry about it at all.
For anything else you feel is menial, outsource to a VA.
Getting paid
Very important to have a reliable payment system that allows you to accept credit and debit cards -- not PayPal!
I send invoices to my clients through my accounting software. It keeps track of what services I provide and at what pricing, maintains a list of customers, and automatically sends out reminders for overdue invoices at pre-set intervals. I don’t have to chase my clients down for their payments. My software does that.
My accounting software is integrated with Stripe through its API, so when my clients pay my invoices, the money gets debited straight into my business bank account. Easy peasy.
Reduce distractions
From a time standpoint, distractions cost money. Big money. So do everything you can to reduce distractions. Here are some ways I do this:
- Find a quiet place. For me to work effectively, I need a quiet place with minimum distractions. Most coffee shops are too noisy and have too many people. I like to find nearly empty coffee shops or quiet coworking spaces with semi-comfortable chairs. Due to this, I almost never game girls at coffee shops. Okay okay, maybe once a week...
- Find a good chair. Oh, the chairs. Never underestimate the importance of a ergonomic quasi-comfortable chair that supports your back while you work. If the chairs are too uncomfortable, obviously you won’t get anything done. But if the chairs are too comfortable, you’ll fall asleep and not get much done either -- yes, that happened to me. Kdog, remember that one time we worked at that coffee shop in BKK?
- Quiet email inbox. As someone who is location independent, you’ll be spending a lot of time in your email inbox. So you need a quiet email inbox to get work done. I was worried about the timezone issue with my clients being halfway around the world, but it hasn’t been an issue so far. It actually works to my advantage because I’m working while they’re sleeping. They’re not going to bug me with emails or skype chats while I’m working.
- Unsubscribe from marketing emails. This is an extension of the point above -- I unsubscribed from about 95% of marketing emails flooding into my inbox and I never regretted it. You’re not really missing anything. This means you need to resist the temptation to subscribe to other websites, even if you really liked their content. If you really wanted to opt into email lists, create a separate email address just for that.
SUMMARY OF USEFUL TOOLS
Here are some web-based tools I use to run my business -- keyword tool, customer relations management, accounting and invoicing, and an email scraper.
- Keyword Research: Long Tail Pro, SEMRush, Google Keywords, MOZBar
- CRM: HubSpot, Salesforce, Zoho, Insightly
- Email Marketing: MailChimp, ConvertKit, Aweber
- Accounting: Freshbooks, Waveapps, Quickbooks, Zoho
- Payment Processing: Stripe, Dwolla, BlueSnap, SecurionPay (for EU)
- Email Scraper: Scrapebox, Hunter, Clearbit, etc...
… and don’t forget LinkedIn!
PUTTING IT ALL TOGETHER: THE STEP BY STEP PROCESS
There's a lot of information in this post, and starting a business is really not that complicated, so I wanted to wrap it up with a barebones step by step process for you to follow.
1. Assess your skills. What are you good at that is of value to other people?
2. Test the market. Little or no demand? Go back to Step 1. High demand? Good. Go to the next step.
3. Tell your family and friends about your new service. Offer to do it pro bono in exchange for a testimonial.
4. Start a website with WordPress. Put your testimonials and portfolio samples on it. Use keyword research tools to improve SEO.
5. Find your cold leads on LinkedIn, research them. Scrape their emails and import them into your CRM.
6. Run an inbound marketing campaign with MailChimp. Give away a free report or PDF to whoever subscribes to your site.
7. Follow up, follow up, follow up. Use your CRM to manage this.
8. When a client wants to pay you, use your accounting software to make an invoice. Hook it up with your bank account using a reliable payment processor.
9. Get paid! Repeat steps 5 through 9.
It took me almost two years.
I started by setting a goal to become location independent. I wanted to build a business that would allow me to work from anywhere and to earn enough income to support myself each month.
My personal benchmark was to match my old salary at the time I quit my job. And today, I can say I met this benchmark for the month of May.
Before I share details how I did it, let me say upfront that my business is a service-based one. If you’re looking for advice on how to make money with FBA, drop-shipping, or any kind of product-based business, this datasheet might not be for you (although the parts about SEO or behavioral tips may be useful).
FINDING THE RIGHT SERVICE OR NICHE
Your service needs meet three criteria to be a suitable location independent business:
1. Can be done online 100% of the time
2. There is demand for that service
3. You can do it better than most competitors
100% online
A business like lawn service fails the first criterion, because you need to be present at one location. Even if you delegated everything to your underlings, you still need to be there in case of emergencies.
Web development, software development, consulting, graphic design, freelance writing, accounting, internet/affiliate marketing, niche blogging, or even professional poker are examples of things that can be done from anywhere in the world.
Demand
Before investing too much time chasing leads or clients, you want to test the demand for your service first.
The market must be hungry. If the service is worth a lot of money to them, it is in high demand and they will hire you.
But if the supply of services exceeds demand, the market is saturated. This is true for product-based businesses, too. There is no worse feeling than pouring months of time and thousands of dollars into a product or service, only to learn that nobody wants it.
Unfortunately, the market does not have to be saturated for demand to be low. For example, innovative entrepreneurs are likely to be quite skilled at setting up websites. Trying to market your web development services to them is almost futile.
For example, try selling a $5,000 full-stack* development proposal to a SaaS entrepreneur who could whip up a beautiful website with WordPress and a Thrive theme for $100 or less. Good luck. Entrepreneurs like those aren’t hungry for web development. But with your average mom-and-pop shop run by a baby boomer who has never written a line of code in his life, you probably will have better luck.
*”Full-stack” development means both front-end (UX, JavaScript, HTML/CSS, etc), and backend (servers, databases, etc).
Being better than 70% of your competition
This is self explanatory. If you have some skills you accumulated through your life, and can do them better than most people -- check to see if there is real value in those skills.
But you don’t have to be the BEST -- it’s a tall order. There’s always someone better at it than you, or someone doing it much longer than you have. Instead, aim to be in the top 20-30%, which is plenty good enough to have a decent business.
The alternative is you can just learn a new skill that does have value -- this is what I did.
My suggestion is to do some pro-bono work for the first 2-3 clients, get testimonials and feedback on how to improve. Get a mentor or two to help you as well.
Note: Those of you who mentored me -- you know who you are -- I really cannot thank you enough. I am in your debt.
Also, read a few top books on that skill. But do not read more than three books, maximum. I say this because you could fall into the trap of reading, reading and reading -- and not actually taking action.
BRANDING AND POSITIONING
What is your vision?
Ask yourself -- why do you want to work?
“I want to make money” or even “I want to be location independent” don’t count as serious answers, because it cannot be about you.
It has to be about other people.
If your answer involves something other people really want, and you are the one to happily give it to them, then you’ve got something.
You need a vision.
Write a mission statement about what you do for other people and how you are uniquely positioned for that mission. Without this, you’re just wasting time spinning your wheels.
When I first started out two years ago, I had no vision except “to become location independent.” It was all about ME. I was grasping at straws that looked as if they might make me some money. One day in Bangkok last summer, I was meeting a well-repped forum member for lunch. I showed him my website. He candidly told me it looked like I “just wanted to make money.”
And guess what? I wasn’t making any money.
After his feedback really got me thinking, I decided to change course. I stopped fucking around and wrote a mission statement about what value I was going to provide other people. Then I went all-in on that one particular service.
After a few months, I started making a little money. And a few more months later, I FINALLY started hitting my income goals.
Identify your business values
Just like the mission statement, I cannot understate the importance of this step. I know this sounds like corporate-speak where HR is constantly beating “company values” over everyone’s heads during a lunch-and-learn.
But this is about how you want others to view your business. Your values will make up your “voice” -- or brand -- within your niche. In other words, you become your brand.
Think about this:
- How do you want your customers or clients to see you and your business?
- How do you want to set yourself apart from your competition?
- What character traits are you most proud of when providing a service to others?
For example, my values are transparency, integrity and reliability.
Transparency:
I am transparent in my dealings with clients. I tell them prices upfront. I also show my work and how I do it. I don’t try to upsell my customers on shit they don’t really need.
Integrity:
I would rather turn down a project no matter how lucrative it is, than to deliver sub-par work. If a customer asked me to do things I know I could not deliver in quality, I tell the truth. I’ve even straight up told a couple of clients to the effect of: “Frankly, I don’t believe I am able to complete this project to your satisfaction because I don’t possess the right skills. But I am happy to help you find someone else who would be a better fit for you and have the proper skills to deliver.”
Reliability:
I deliver when I say I would deliver. I never miss deadlines. And if you are my client, and you send me an email, you can be assured 100% that I will respond to it. Might be in 10 minutes, or I might take a day or two if it needs to be thoughtful, but you will get a response.
So I built my business around these three values -- transparency, integrity and reliability. Everything I do in my business reflects these values.
And it does not go unnoticed.
Some of my client testimonials actually use these words, or variations of, because I’ve already internalized these values and conducted my business in this way.
This tells me people want to work with you not because you’re the best and most qualified, but because they feel you are trustworthy and reliable. I, for one, would never pay someone I did not trust, even if they are perfectly capable.
BUILDING YOUR BUSINESS
Website
Of course you need a website. But don’t just cobble something together with a cheap or free theme. It’ll just look cheap and unprofessional. Your website needs to look like a million bucks. More importantly, it needs to look like you’ve been doing this for years.
If you’re not technically inclined, I suggest hiring a web developer to do it for you -- or use either SquareSpace or WIX. If you don’t mind getting a bit technical, you can use WordPress with a premium theme and its plugins.
Few more things about websites:
- Logo: Make sure you get a good logo for your business. Hire a graphic designer. Don’t cheap out by going with Fiverr or Upwork. Frankly, a $5 logo looks exactly like a $5 logo.
- Content: At minimum, make a nice Home page with About and Contact pages. If your service has sub-services or sub-niches, make a page for each. Your home page should not be too text-heavy. Keep it clean and simple, but informative enough to see what you’re all about in less than 10 seconds.
- Responsiveness: More people use mobile devices than desktop computers to browse the internet. Make sure your website is responsive enough to display correctly in all mobile devices. Luckily, this is built into WordPress and SquareSpace. At worst, you may only need to install a couple of plugins, and you’re good.
- Testimonials and Work Samples: Testimonials are important for service businesses. Rarely does a person spend thousands of dollars on an unproven service provider without any reviews. If you have testimonials, show them with pride. If it’s applicable, show work samples on your online portfolio as well.
Lastly, don’t forget about SEO -- more on this later in this datasheet.
Registering your business
While this is outside the scope of this datasheet, the time to register your business usually comes once you get more established. You’ll start out as a sole proprietor, and when you start making money, you could consider incorporating for tax or legal reasons.
I incorporated my business as a single-member LLC very early. Perhaps too soon. But I wanted to get it over with before I left the U.S.
Getting leads
Before trying to get cold leads or organic traffic, start with “warm” leads:
1. Tell your family and friends about your business.
2. Offer some free or pro bono work in exchange for a glowing testimonial (e.g. revamp a friend’s website for free).
3. After exhausting your warm leads from friends and family, repeat steps #1 and #2 with your network of professional connections you’ve built throughout your career.
Note: if you’re building your business while working a FT job, you might want to be careful that your boss doesn’t find out that you’re hitting up your network contacts about your new business. Especially if you’re trying to provide the same service as your full-time company or if you’ve signed a non-compete agreement.
By the time you’ve gone through all of your warm leads, you should have at least a few testimonials and even made a little money.
Now it’s time to go cold. That is the hard part -- and it will make or break your business.
Do not use email lists
The first thing I will tell you is do not buy email lists.
Despite what list companies tell you, lists are shit for several reasons. For one thing, people change email addresses all the time. People change jobs. They aren’t quality controlled.
The quality of a list sours faster than a carton of milk left out in the sun.
Think about it -- if these lists are for sale, that means other marketers have been buying and spamming the same email addresses.
These email recipients are likely going to be sick and tired of getting marketing emails, and will likely ignore you. Or worse, report your email as spam.
You could actually ruin your domain this way. If you mass email and enough people report you as a spammer, the email provider will blacklist your domain or even shut you down completely. At that point, you are done. Start over with a new domain and email address.
Instead, follow these steps to convert cold leads into prospects then buyers:
How to generate cold leads and convert them
1. Create landing pages with an email opt-in.
2. Write lots of content (blog articles, service pages, niche pages, gated stuff like PDF reports).
3. Use links to weave a web within your website (make it easy for people to find your stuff).
4. Optimize your content around your keywords (from your keyword research for SEO).
5. Create social media accounts and promote your content there (use Buffer or Hootsuite, do NOT use bots to grow followers).
6. Use LinkedIn to search and filter for likely qualified prospects.
7. Use an email scraper and run it on your LinkedIn searches.
8. Cold email your leads (or cold call, if you prefer) -- use a template, but you must personalize it. This means doing your homework on your individual lead, the company he works for, and what he’s likely looking for. Do not mass email, or spam with the exact same template.
9. Follow up, follow up, follow up! Set up follow up email templates for this. Most people give up after one ignored email. But if you follow up twice or three times, about a week or so apart, you get your name in people’s minds. Sure, you might annoy a few people, but I wouldn’t worry. I’ve personally never gotten an email like “stop spamming my inbox, fuck off!” Just follow up, and you might get a “yes” every now and then.
10. If you can, attend networking events like trade shows, after-work happy hours, or wherever your prospects are most likely to hang out. A contact made in person is more likely to answer your email or phone call afterward than someone you’ve never met.
TIP: Use a web-based CRM tool like Salesforce to manage your contacts, email templates and scheduling/automating follow-ups.
[Side note: I also use my CRM to keep track of my paid projects and other tasks… it is a great productivity tool]
I’ll be honest and tell you what no marketer wants to admit:
The ugly truth is most of your emails will get ignored. Most who do respond will say “we already have someone doing this for us, but thanks for offering. Good luck” or “I don’t have any need for this now, but I’ll keep your name on file.” You’ll get a few “thanks but no thanks, I’m not interested” emails as well.
I will warn you -- you will get frustrated. You will get sick of the grind. You will get demoralized.
I went through all of this. Laying wide awake in bed at night, I did have doubts whether I would be able to make it. You will, too.
But don’t give up.
Even if it feels like all your efforts are being wasted into a black hole with nothing coming back out...
Keep chugging along.
Keep writing content.
Keep developing your “voice” within your niche.
Keep promoting your content.
Keep tweaking your landing pages.
Keep an eye on search keywords.
Keep emailing or calling.
Keep following up.
One day, someone will find you… and say yes. Just like Game.
How to take advantage of SEO
This is a huge topic that deserves its own datasheet, so I will just cover the basics of what I’ve done for my own business. Basically, you have to do what Google wants. I don’t like it, but Google is running the search engine show -- unfortunately we have to kowtow to Google.
- Use a domain name that best matches the keywords of your business. This is a little hard to do because many generic domain names have been snapped up already, so you have to get creative. But don’t think too far outside of the box. You don’t want to invent new keywords, because people won’t use them to find you. For example, if you want to design logos for pet shops, you should think of a domain name like petlogodesigns or petshoplogos.
- Use a keyword research tool to see how people are searching for your service. Don’t skimp on this step. It’s worth spending money on because you can do keyword research on just about anything, not just your business idea. You can use it to test different ideas, get a feel for demand (search frequency and volume) for any number of products and services. You’ll see what specific keywords people are using to search for something.
- Make it easy for people to find your content. Sounds simple, but it’s not. When we create content, we tend to just post and pray. What you should do is weave a web within your website. Link your piece of content to other pieces of content, and vice versa. Make it such that your visitors don’t have to click the mouse more than twice to access any piece of content. If it is three or more clicks deep, fix that.
- If you use the Yoast SEO plugin, make sure the most important pages are green. Home page, landing pages, service pages, etc. Not every page has to be green, however. Your contact page doesn’t have to be. Nor does the About page. The pages you want people to find and visit -- and the ones you intend to make money off of -- make sure they are green.
- Optimize your website for mobile users with Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP). This is a new thing, as I just found out earlier this year. Google’s directive is to boost search rankings for AMP pages. So if you want higher rankings for your site, create AMP for all your pages. WordPress has an AMP plugin, so you should install that, too. Read more about it here: https://www.ampproject.org/
- Create youtube videos about your business and embed them into your website. As some of us already know, YouTube is a SEO powerhouse. Make a few videos about your business, write some meta descriptions with your keywords, and embed your videos onto your website. Pages with video content are more likely to rank higher than pages without.
- Secure your website with SSL. To appear serious and trustworthy, your site should be secured through SSL. Plus Google has a preference for secured websites. If your website’s URL begins with “https”, you’re good. If not, get an SSL certificate and install it on your website. Depending on your hosting provider, you might be able to get it for free or for a small fee. Read more here: https://www.ssl.com/how-to/get-ssl-on-website/
BEHAVIORAL TIPS
Develop a routine
Choose a routine that works best for you, and fit your work into the time of day when you are most alert and productive. This takes a little experimentation on your part, but you should find it in no time.
To give you an idea of what running a location independent business is like, here’s my daily M-F routine:
8:00 am - wake up and make coffee
8:30 am - reply to emails and do administrative tasks if needed
10:00 am - gym
11:30 am - lunch
12:00 pm - work
6:00 pm - next day’s task planning
6:30 pm - dinner
7:30 pm - do whatever (chill at home, go on dates, bang chicks, hang out with the guys, watch movies, surf the internet and post on this forum)
12:00 am - sleep
Couple things to point out --
Personally I like to get the busy work, emails and other admin tasks out of the way early in the morning, clearing the way for me to focus on the actual work between noon and 6pm.
I think it’s a good habit to spend 30 minutes planning the next day’s tasks the evening before, so I could hit the ground running the next day. It prevents me from wasting precious time screwing around as I try to decide which tasks I should start doing first.
I try to get about 8 hours of sleep a night, but it’s pretty seldom that I get the full 8 hours. Normally about 6, maybe 7 hours, so it’s something I could do better so I could work even more effectively during the day.
Don’t do busy work
Busy work keeps you busy and makes you feel good about working -- “wow I worked for 10 hours today, I finished this and that and then I did this and that…”
But it doesn’t actually make you money. Busy work is just that -- busy work. Take a hard look at what you’re doing and ask yourself if it is really going to make you money.
Limit your hours
Ideally no more than 5 or 6 hours a day. If you’re slaving away 10, 12, 14 hours a day, your health and productivity will suffer. You will actually get less work done than if you limited yourself to 5-6 hours a day. If you’re working just for the sake of working so you could tell yourself that you’ve worked so hard, you’re just doing busy work.
Outside of your time slot of maximum productivity, forget about work. Go to the gym, bang out some pussy, and spend time with your buddies.
If you limit yourself to only 5-6 hours of work a day, that forces you to focus on what’s most important.
You’d be shocked how much you’d get done and how fast you’ll make money.
Try to avoid charging by the hour
Initially I was going to say “never” charge hourly, but I didn’t want to take a hard-line position on this because hourly might actually work better for some people or some industries.
But, personally, I really prefer to charge a flat fee for each project, OR put myself on a monthly retainer. I love retainers because it provides a stable monthly income and it gives me work every month. If you want to use retainers, just be sure to outline exactly how much work you will do each month -- so clients don’t pile more work on you without paying more.
Automate or outsource administrative tasks
I use accounting and invoicing software that links to my business bank account, so I don’t have to manually enter all my transactions. It automatically scans my bank account and imports transactions as they occur, so I don’t really have to do anything -- other than watch for double counting or accounting errors due to the software’s quirks.
On taxes -- I hire a CPA to do my taxes and keep track of my filing documents, so I don’t have to worry about it at all.
For anything else you feel is menial, outsource to a VA.
Getting paid
Very important to have a reliable payment system that allows you to accept credit and debit cards -- not PayPal!
I send invoices to my clients through my accounting software. It keeps track of what services I provide and at what pricing, maintains a list of customers, and automatically sends out reminders for overdue invoices at pre-set intervals. I don’t have to chase my clients down for their payments. My software does that.
My accounting software is integrated with Stripe through its API, so when my clients pay my invoices, the money gets debited straight into my business bank account. Easy peasy.
Reduce distractions
From a time standpoint, distractions cost money. Big money. So do everything you can to reduce distractions. Here are some ways I do this:
- Find a quiet place. For me to work effectively, I need a quiet place with minimum distractions. Most coffee shops are too noisy and have too many people. I like to find nearly empty coffee shops or quiet coworking spaces with semi-comfortable chairs. Due to this, I almost never game girls at coffee shops. Okay okay, maybe once a week...
- Find a good chair. Oh, the chairs. Never underestimate the importance of a ergonomic quasi-comfortable chair that supports your back while you work. If the chairs are too uncomfortable, obviously you won’t get anything done. But if the chairs are too comfortable, you’ll fall asleep and not get much done either -- yes, that happened to me. Kdog, remember that one time we worked at that coffee shop in BKK?
- Quiet email inbox. As someone who is location independent, you’ll be spending a lot of time in your email inbox. So you need a quiet email inbox to get work done. I was worried about the timezone issue with my clients being halfway around the world, but it hasn’t been an issue so far. It actually works to my advantage because I’m working while they’re sleeping. They’re not going to bug me with emails or skype chats while I’m working.
- Unsubscribe from marketing emails. This is an extension of the point above -- I unsubscribed from about 95% of marketing emails flooding into my inbox and I never regretted it. You’re not really missing anything. This means you need to resist the temptation to subscribe to other websites, even if you really liked their content. If you really wanted to opt into email lists, create a separate email address just for that.
SUMMARY OF USEFUL TOOLS
Here are some web-based tools I use to run my business -- keyword tool, customer relations management, accounting and invoicing, and an email scraper.
- Keyword Research: Long Tail Pro, SEMRush, Google Keywords, MOZBar
- CRM: HubSpot, Salesforce, Zoho, Insightly
- Email Marketing: MailChimp, ConvertKit, Aweber
- Accounting: Freshbooks, Waveapps, Quickbooks, Zoho
- Payment Processing: Stripe, Dwolla, BlueSnap, SecurionPay (for EU)
- Email Scraper: Scrapebox, Hunter, Clearbit, etc...
… and don’t forget LinkedIn!
PUTTING IT ALL TOGETHER: THE STEP BY STEP PROCESS
There's a lot of information in this post, and starting a business is really not that complicated, so I wanted to wrap it up with a barebones step by step process for you to follow.
1. Assess your skills. What are you good at that is of value to other people?
2. Test the market. Little or no demand? Go back to Step 1. High demand? Good. Go to the next step.
3. Tell your family and friends about your new service. Offer to do it pro bono in exchange for a testimonial.
4. Start a website with WordPress. Put your testimonials and portfolio samples on it. Use keyword research tools to improve SEO.
5. Find your cold leads on LinkedIn, research them. Scrape their emails and import them into your CRM.
6. Run an inbound marketing campaign with MailChimp. Give away a free report or PDF to whoever subscribes to your site.
7. Follow up, follow up, follow up. Use your CRM to manage this.
8. When a client wants to pay you, use your accounting software to make an invoice. Hook it up with your bank account using a reliable payment processor.
9. Get paid! Repeat steps 5 through 9.