This blog post is for all of you girl bosses / solopreneurs out there who are struggling to be found online and land clients.

First of all, congratulations on taking a different route and starting this new journey of entrepreneurship! We are fist pumping and cheering you on here at Azalea Design Co.

So, self employment can have some ups and downs. The ups being that you are now able to follow your passions in life and you have the freedom and flexibility that you may have never had before. However, getting started can definitely be overwhelming and finding clients can be tough!

Some days you may feel empowered and on top of the world, and the next, defeated and doubtful – worrying about where your next pay cheque is coming from.

Don’t worry girl, I have definitely been there! Luckily for me the first couple of months were the busiest, what with my first client and still setting up the foundations of my business. But my 3rd & 4th month were quiet and there were some times when I would be sitting at my desk on a Wednesday afternoon thinking to myself… Now what do I do?

Do you know the feeling?

It happens 🤷 but that doesn’t mean you can’t be productive!

I knew that I should be getting out there are tackling some more marketing strategies that I hadn’t implemented yet, but I didn’t really know where to begin and started to feel a little deflated.

But the idea of taking some time off felt like committing a crime. And to be honest, I was a bit lost and overwhelmed. I was scratching my head and going round in circles trying to find something to do that would be beneficial for my business. I needed to find something that really inspired me. Because as a designer, my work fuels off of inspiration (and coffee).

So my idea was to build an Etsy shop and start selling planner printables (which I had already designed for my business planner). I thought that by having an online store, I could continue to design/create things that I am passionate about and it might be a way of getting a passive income which would help calm the financial stress mindset that I had seemed to adopted.

I knew that opening an Etsy shop wasn’t going to solve my financial/business problems but it was fun for me and was what I wanted to do – isn’t that the whole point of being a girl boss?

However, I worked on this little side project for a little while until I figured out my next move.

Flash forward to my 5th & 6th month of business and I have endless amounts of work to do. And to be honest, it’s even a little bit difficult to stay on top of it all.

 

So, what changed?

My overambitious ‘I have to do everything now’ mindset is unfortunately still the same, however I changed my strategies and decided on the ones that I love to do.

My best piece of advice for owners of a startup company is to spend this ‘client down time’ creating and sharing valuable content consistently.

This is your time to fully focus on the content you are putting out there. Adding valuable content on your social media platforms, your freebies or your blog, is really what your ideal clients want and are looking for. If you can provide content that can’t be found anywhere else and use a few long-term marketing strategies – then you’ll be booking in the clients in no time!

The idea is that you create batch loads of valuable content in your ‘down time’, so that when you have a booked out calendar full of client projects, you can simply continue to market the content which will keep bringing potential clients to your website.

 

ACTION STEPS:

Choose 2-3 ways of creating your valuable content.

(written text, images, graphics, audio, video)

 

Choose 2-3 platforms to share your content.

(Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Pinterest, Website, Blog, Email Campaigns)

 

Create content that your target audience what & need

 

Stay Consistent

create, post & share on a consistent schedule.

 

There are honestly so many different ways that you can create and format your content. For example:

• Blog Posts

• Articles

• Video

• Webinars

• Infographics

• Images/Photography

• Ebooks

• Podcasts

• Email campaigns

• Downloadable PDFs

 

By choosing different formats for your content, you will appeal to a wider audience as some people may prefer to read blogs whilst others may prefer to watch videos.

This strategy will not only help you attract and land clients now, but will also help you land clients years down the line while you’re busy working on client projects.

Tip: Create downloadable content on your website for your audience to get for FREE. This will not only build interest and traffic on your website, but you will also build your email list which may come in super handy with all of the content you are creating! Besides, who can say no to freebies?