by Brandon Reiter
Once you launch a business, in order to establish a customer base, it is essential to establish credibility. But gaining customers and credibility are akin to the chicken and the egg; without customers you can’t be credible, and without credibility you won’t get customers. So HOW are you supposed to establish credibility with minimal clients during the early stages of your business? I’m glad you asked.…
Invest in a Beautiful website
If you’re reading this article, that means you’ve obviously noticed how professional my website is! Building a website can be very inexpensive, in fact it can even be free. However, unless you are a web designer, if you make a website yourself the odds are it won’t come out looking all that professional. Although building SkyviewCFO.com was one of my larger start up expenses, it was worth every penny, because when you land on it you can feel it’s legitimacy and can afford a beautiful site. If you are trying to get people to buy into you and your business, but they find you on a website that looks like it was put together in a kindergarten computer class, you probably won’t be securing much business. They’ll feel that you probably don’t have a lot of business if you aren’t even able to afford a decent website. There are web designers in all price ranges so you can spend what you are comfortable with, but this is not an area to penny pinch as you want to focus on having the best final product, not the cheapest. If you are in the market, please contact us for recommendations on great web designers.
Ask for Testimonies
When you’re browsing for a movie to watch and you stumble upon something that catches your eye, what’s the first thing you do? I know I go straight to Rotten Tomatoes and check the reviews. Why? Because I don’t want to waste my time watching a terrible movie if people have already suffered through it and know that it sucks! Businesses are no different from movies in this regard; you’re clients are more likely to try out your product or service if they know that people have already had positive experiences. In the early stages, ask anyone you do work for to write a review for you. Don’t be shy! Most people are flattered and love to help out, especially if you did a good job for them. When you get a few solid quotes, put them on your website and other platforms (see below).
Google My Business
Google is the world’s largest search engine, therefore it is your largest lead source by default. Billions of users are at your fingertips, and you want to look legitimate when you pop up on searches. Warning: this isn’t a post about Search Engine Optimization (SEO), which I will address in an upcoming article, so for now let’s focus on how you can simply appear credible on Google.
Have you ever noticed that when you search for a specific business on Google a box on the right appears with basic information about the business? Well, that doesn’t just magically happen, you have to get in touch with Google and have them verify your business in order to do so. The process is called “Google My Business”. Here is a step-by-step process on getting your business’ Google account set up. You’ll be able to include important information such as your website, contact info, address, service are, hours of operation and much more. It’s also another spot for your customers to leave you those reviews.
Establish a Social Media Presence
Now that you have a professional website, a Google profile, and some positive testimonies, your business should be on as many forms of social media as possible, ESPECIALLLY Facebook (or whatever it’s called these days) and Instagram. Facebook owns Instagram so you can post simultaneously on both platforms via Facebook Business Suite to save yourself some time. Not sure what to post? That’s OK! You can hire very inexpensive freelancers on website’s like Fiverr and Upwork to create posts for you that are designed not only to look professional, but to increase your SEO as well. When posting, you want to have a consistent theme in your posts. This helps establish your brand and makes you appear both professional and credible. If you’re very creative, you can put yourself out there on other platforms like Twitter, Tik Tok, Snapchat, and others, but those require some more thought, effort, and creativity. It really depends on your target market, as those platforms have a younger demographic than Facebook.
Looking for more direction? We can help! Contact us.
