Watch me reinvent my business

[SnikPlosskin]

Woof, it’s been a busy two months. I’m going to talk money in this thread so if you have a problem with that, I’m certain there are better threads for you.

We went into last year with zero revenue coming in. Typically we have 3-5 clients at any given time some on retainer, some doing projects. Because of the COVID shut down, one by one our clients split in 2020.

We weren’t very worried. We have been here before. We have long had the challenge of keeping up a selling function consistently. Instead we would sell, get bogged down doing the work and not selling, to selling and repeat until broke.

We put our heads down and got to work. We didn’t know that it would take eight months of work to close our first client. Then we closed another. Then the holiday season set in and everything went dead.

We enter this year with zero revenue. But with a major change.

We are going to go back to our roots as a full service B2B marketing firm. However, our new model is a next gen agency that is scalable.

My wife and I will be the only employees. We have five partner companies who will do the work. Our job is to market and sell, provide creative direction and strategy and manage projects. We will also service accounts.

But the actual work Design, web dev, Digital marketing, etc will be done by partners.

Everything is different about this agency. Except the name. We are going back to our original name and logo from 1990. It still is timeless and works.

Another big change is that this will allow me to sell full time. We have to hunt, kill and eat our prey. The days of the phone ringing are over.

This is the website draft (not proofed or tested - needs another week of work)

Https://claritydev3.wpengine.com

I will use this thread to share our progress.

We are targeting companies that are investing a min. Of $500k a year on marketing focusing on professional services, healthcare, insurance, education, tech, industrial manufacturing and entertainment industries.

We do marketing plans, build websites, run marketing programs, provide creative services, produce media, advertising, social media, data analytics, etc.

We will also be rolling out a money back guarantee. This is unheard of in our industry.

We believe our knowledge of the business outweighs the challenges of the over saturated market. Literally 90% of our competitors are half our age and are clueless about what clients really want. (Hint: it ain’t pretty pictures)

It starts to tomorrow.

[Shrike6]

Good luck!

[DAB]

the "see how we do it" link needs some text added/replaced

[snide]

Best wishes, Pete! You got this!

[Vegas]

I believe y'all got this

[markids77]

Have you been a "general contractor" before?
I ask because allowing critical functions to become subcontracted creates a special hell of its own as your entire business becomes dependent on "others" meeting deadlines and fulfilling contracts. One of you will likely have no other responsibility than riding herd on your subs.

[JRD77VET]

You did it before, you'll do it again but even better this time.

[BayouCountry]

As a retired website designer and software developer, I can say the Website looks good. Not too cluttered and easy on the eyes. Good luck to you.

Of course, Datawiz is the final authority

[Vandelay Industries]

Originally Posted by DAB

the "see how we do it" link needs some text added/replaced

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipisicing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna

[ratflinger]

Yeah, links to some company in the UK, Sevitt??


Anyway, good luck Pete - I hope this all turns around for you.

[VITE1]

Best of luck.

[SnikPlosskin]

Originally Posted by DAB

the "see how we do it" link needs some text added/replaced

It is undergoing extensive proofing and testing now.

Originally Posted by markids77

Have you been a "general contractor" before?
I ask because allowing critical functions to become subcontracted creates a special hell of its own as your entire business becomes dependent on "others" meeting deadlines and fulfilling contracts. One of you will likely have no other responsibility than riding herd on your subs.

Yes. For years. This time, however we have only a few subs. Each sub provides an array of services. Instead of shopping and gambling on every new project, we have proven, reliable, single source partners.

The benefit to them is they get all the work. Our entire job is guiding strategy, managing vendors and implementing the marketing plan. We don’t get in the weeds.

Originally Posted by BayouCountry

As a retired website designer and software developer, I can say the Website looks good. Not too cluttered and easy on the eyes. Good luck to you.

Of course, Datawiz is the final authority

Thanks. It started with a template and I have pretty much redesigned it from scratch.

Originally Posted by ratflinger

Yeah, links to some company in the UK, Sevitt??

Anyway, good luck Pete - I hope this all turns around for you.

Sevitt is a fictional company (I think) that was part of the template we started with. Can you tell me where the link is, so we can fix it?

It has to turn around. No other choice exists.

Today was the first day back. Lots of technology and sales infrastructure work. I’m burned out. Taking a nap and will hit it later.

The website will be launched with the old brand by end of week. The , we will go right to work updating with the new brand.

Only because my existing site is 8 years out of date in terms of tech stack.

Moving forward we will be focusing on building more secure web sites. We have some tricks up our sleeves to harden business websites. Our strengths there are great, functional design and content plus security.

However we are set up to do almost everything a B2B company might need to go to market. In fact, we have done so much work, it’s overwhelming deciding what to show.

[SnikPlosskin]

Good day today. Following up with people who stalled out last year. Uncovered five potential deals ranging from $6k to $20k.

Possibly one is a long term retainer candidate.

Got the website ironed out and proofed, on track for launch over the weekend. Wife is almost done with an incredible computer illustration of her, me and Shadow sitting on the couch.

We will use it for our “about page” to show some skills and not have the typical shit there.

Also got the company email set up on Protonmail. Our email provider has been terrible. Now e start the long process of changing. I’ve had the same email for over twelve years. I get huge SPAM.

We are going to keep our personal emails off the internet and have company emails like support@, finance@, etc.

[snide]

Originally Posted by SnikPlosskin

Good day today. Following up with people who stalled out last year. Uncovered five potential deals ranging from $6k to $20k.

Possibly one is a long term retainer candidate.

Got the website ironed out and proofed, on track for launch over the weekend. Wife is almost done with an incredible computer illustration of her, me and Shadow sitting on the couch.

We will use it for our “about page” to show some skills and not have the typical shit there.

Also got the company email set up on Protonmail. Our email provider has been terrible. Now e start the long process of changing. I’ve had the same email for over twelve years. I get huge SPAM.

We are going to keep our personal emails off the internet and have company emails like support@, finance@, etc.

I use Ionos for my email and web hosting.

[DJ_Critterus]

Snik, I wish you the best and hope everthing works out for you.

[Bill]

Originally Posted by DJ_Critterus

Snik, I wish you the best and hope everthing works out for you.

So say we all......except that one guy, of course.

[tjfontaine]

Good luck - gotta love a guy who is willing to work hard and not roll over. I hope you make a million ...

[SnikPlosskin]

Yesterday I found out I may have prostate cancer. Which means biopsies, scans, distraction and they stopped my hormone replacement therapy. I’ve been injecting testosterone for 12 years to combat low blood count from my blood disease. For me it’s not a lifestyle issue, without it I get anemic and start passing out and landing in the ER.

It also helped a lot for chronic fatigue. After almost two months without it, I am really dragging.

Yet I still have to get the company off the ground. I’m starting to wonder what the point is. If it’s cancer, I’m not treating it. I’ll let it take it’s course. I’ve had enough.

Let’s hope it’s a false alarm. My real complaint is my job just got 10x more difficult.

[snide]

Originally Posted by SnikPlosskin

Yesterday I found out I may have prostate cancer.

Hope it's just a false positive.

[SteelCityBlue]

This an abnormal PSA or something more substantial?