Bringing on board new clients

[antropy]

To give you some background Antropy are a UK based web development and hosting company. Having been set up for the good part of 10 years going from a one man band to now having 6 full time members of staff. We are doing well and could quite easily stay as we are but feel we have the structure to take the business to the next level. We have a good client base of people who keep coming back to us and have had plenty of recommendations highlighting we are doing a sterling job but we know we can do more work with them and undertake work with clients we haven't even contacted. We wanted to reach out to see how other small business's have taken their company to the next level.

 

[fisicx]

I've gone the other way. I reduced the number of clients and now just chase the more lucrative jobs. I'm now more productive and have a lot more free time to do the fun things.

Getting a good passive income source makes like a lot simpler as well. Giving away free stuff with an option to upgrade brings in a steady income.

 

[antropy]

I've gone the other way. I reduced the number of clients and now just chase the more lucrative jobs. I'm now more productive and have a lot more free time to do the fun things.

Double your rates, halve your clients, and make the same money for half the work - great strategy!

Getting a good passive income source makes like a lot simpler as well. Giving away free stuff with an option to upgrade brings in a steady income.

We build and sell OpenCart extensions through their marketplace which is a good "passive" income but in reality support requests make it fairly active.

We're keen to increase our clients and will need to increase our rates eventually which are currently as low as a good freelance IT contractor despite us being a UK agency with offices and staff etc.

I think you mostly work with WordPress @fisicx ?

Paul

 

[antropy]

Also now could be a good chance to introduce Alex who will also be here on the forum:
https://www.antropy.co.uk/blog/always-on-hand-when-you-need-us/

We'll sign off our posts with our names to avoid confusion!

Paul

 

[fisicx]

I think you mostly work with WordPress @fisicx ?

I do and it's a very good source of income. The free stuff I offer often leads to bespoke work. One plugin earns $40/day in upgrades and around $2000/month in custom work. Add in the other other plugins upgrades and custom themes/install and I've got my working week down to 2 days.

If I want more work, spending a bit on adwords gets me new clients.

 

[antropy]

I've got my working week down to 2 days.

That's pretty impressive!

If I want more work, spending a bit on adwords gets me new clients.

We use AdWords and it works well

Paul

 

[EnhanceAccountancy]

Hi Paul. It sounds like things are going well.
Can I ask, what is stopping you from taking on the new work that is available to you?
Can't you take on more staff/subcontractors? Or is there a bottleneck in the organisation stopping the growth?

Have the management delegated all of the admin/mundane work that they can to other members of your team? Are they afraid to lose control (common issue)?

Have you systemised all of the main business processes (and then all of the other business processes) that make your business work so well on a smaller scale. This is key in scaling up and growing your business. It will also hold particular staff members accountable for particular tasks.
When a task is delegated, with a documented system for that task in place, the new person doing the task won't have to invent the wheel - potentially at a sub-standard level of quality.

The sooner that the business owner can take themselves out of the day to day nitty-gritty operations, the faster the business will scale- leaving them with the time needed to deal with the high end stuff like business direction.

We've been doing a lot of work like this with our clients recently.

Gareth

 

[antropy]

Have you systemised all of the main business processes (and then all of the other business processes) that make your business work so well on a smaller scale. This is key in scaling up and growing your business. It will also hold particular staff members accountable for particular tasks.
When a task is delegated, with a documented system for that task in place, the new person doing the task won't have to invent the wheel - potentially at a sub-standard level of quality.

Indeed, I too have read the e-myth and we are implementing it.

Do you help small businesses do that?

Paul

 

[EnhanceAccountancy]

Ideal.
Yes. We are Chartered Accountants that take care of the tax and accounts compliance side of things, but we also provide a systematic business advisory service. The details are on "The Numbers That Matter" page of our website (link in my signature).

 

[ViktorijaS]

Build a trusted team so that they can do most of the work and you can manage the team. If you do not want to manage and prefer development, hire someone who can manage the business expansion for you.
Decide on the strategy and try to get more clients for your team. You can use Lead generation plug ins to find out what businesses visits your website and you can approach them directly to offer your services.

 

[ViktorijaS]

That's pretty impressive!


We use AdWords and it works well

Paul

Does it pay back for small businesses as well? It is quite pricy.

 

[fisicx]

Does it pay back for small businesses as well? It is quite pricy.

It doesn't have to be pricey. It all depends on your skill at managing the account, adverts and landing pages.