The process to me about a year before I got my first customers. I needed to understand prospecting, email marketing, and providing a service to customers.
Prospecting
Everyone thinks getting customers is easy, but it is hard as hell. I started reading books on sales and prospecting. This is a must unless you come from a sales background.
Grab any book about prospecting and you will be fine.
Email Marketing
You can learn MailChimp & Co, their email partner program: Click Here
I believe the program is free and you can take the email foundation course. The certification would look good if you are apply for a job. This does take some time to complete. I didn’t take the certification, but the material did help me learn email marketing.
Target an industry
My background is a PC technician before I got into email development. I started going to meetups for PC technicians who ran business. I started doing presentations on email marketing and how it can help your business.
I did the presentations after I was in the meetup for a few months.
Business owners started to ask me if I could work with them to do some email marketing.
Work for free
I worked with 2 business owners for free for 2 months. I built their email list in MailChimp. They started to see more customers. Once the business owners saw profit, I charged them my rate. I eventually added 2 more customers.
I rejected several business owners because they wanted things done instantly. Email marketing does not work that way.
Charge accordingly
I have knowledge of what PC techs charge, so I was able to charge the rate I mentioned in the video. You may have to charge less, depending on the industry you choose to work with.
I mention industry and not companies. You want to establish your name in a particular industry, this way your name will be known throughout that industry. You will be the email developer, everyone in that industry wants to hire.
Final Thoughts
This process took about 6 to 8 months of learning sales. The next few months is establishing your credibility.
If you don’t have knowledge of a particular industry, choose one you that you might be interested in. Learn that industry pain points and little tidbits about that industry.
Find business owners in the industry who need help with marketing and aren’t cheap. Finding business owners who will spend money is the biggest challenge.
Let people in that industry know what you do by doing presentations. This will get your name in that industry.
Do not be afraid to turn down a client who you think will be an asshole to work with. This is why I only had 4 clients.
I hope this gives you an overall idea of how I did it.
Email me if you need any help along the way.
Sincerely,
Ivan Hurt
