I've started a 1-person freelance marketing business and feel overwhelmed offering so many services
I've started a marketing service offering everything to everyone who will pay.
Only working with a few small clients so far and already starting to dread going into work. They need everything from Facebook ads, Instagram, to SEO, to Twitter, Pinterest, Google Local, article writing, press releases, email newsletters.
I feel overwhelmed offering too much.
If I just picked one service would that be better in the long run? Or do marketing services need to offer many different services in order to survive?
Im afraid if I offered only say Pinterest Marketing, then I wouldn't be a success because Im so limited.
I'm not interested in creating a mega-marketing agency, I just want a nice small service helping customers and working for myself, but in a happy way.
Hello! Thank you for reaching out to us here, I launched a consulting business almost 10 years ago to leverage my Masters in Strategy and experience with several successful startups. I merged business coaching with marketing and for the past 9 years have been helping small-large organizations globally. All clients are acquired through zero cold calling.
I have learned through the years to ask, what is your experience level? Did you take a course on marketing and are now launching a business or do you have a degree or relevant networks that can boost your launch? - This is important for you to answer honestly because the digital marketing industry has become really crowded, marketing has become jargon for anything that has to do with sales, advertising, networking and marketing. So don't get fooled by the word marketing, make a plan on how you advertise your clients' services, but you can also use that yourself.
I think the experience question is relevant for you because as an SEO expert as you mentioned you were since you offer the service, I would expect you have a decent traffic to your website from the right prospects, and if you are an experienced or actual marketer - you would know just how to create a funnel system for your website so that you are capturing leads as much as possible - telling you just what services are being requested the most by your prospect audience. If this sounds brisk, I apologize; I just want to make sure my thoughts are clear on the how you can approach and where your level of value might be which could lead you to offer a limited number of services that you are also 100% awesome at, because your initial clients can be a great source of validation and the last thing you want is to not deliver and delight.
As a marketer and strategist, I can guarantee you that having a niche is more beneficial than offering many services.
I wrote an answer to a similar question here on clarity, find it here: https://clarity.fm/questions/4661/hi-i-am-new-here-i-am-expert-on-social-media-marketing-and-traffic-my-question
Also, here is a related article that could help you:
http://blog.unthink.me/what-is-inbound-marketing-and-can-it-really-help-my-business
If you want a call, I can give you a VIP link for a free consultation. Best of luck!
Niche down. It's fine to offer this huge range of services when you have the people to help you do them. By yourself, it's exhausting as you've discovered.
Good for you for actually doing something, and getting some experience. Your situation is common, you're not alone in feeling overwhelmed in your business.
From what you've written--and thank you for writing more than one sentence, so we have some 'meat' to work with--I think you would benefit most from developing a customer avatar.
Right now you're trying to do all things for everyone, which means you're trying to appeal to everyone. Instead, shift your focus to standing out and appealing ONLY to the most profitable and fun type of customer you can help. So a customer avatar is a description of that exact kind of person and their situation who you can best help.
Watch the video in this post: http://www.jasonkanigan.org/what-to-do-if-you-are-a-commodity/
When I started my business, there were a hundred things I could do. Copywriting, sales training, operations improvement, and a whole lot more. I tested my target market and discovered sales training was the thing they needed most...so I concentrated on that. Things took off.
Recently I was approached by a friend to be a partner in a new business focusing only on sales. The last seven years of experience I have in conversion of all kinds needed to be blocked out: the focus needed to be on the one service this business offers. Surprise, surprise: we've made more money than I did alone.
Focus is power. But you have to know who you are trying to attract and work with. Filter for those who you can help best and most profitably, and say No to the rest.
I know the idea of turning business down can seem terrifying at the start. But you have limited time like everyone else, and if you tie that time up with loser projects that exhaust and disempower and don't reward you, then you don't have the ability to take good projects.
Now if you get a great client, and you do well with the thing you focus on, and a month or two later they come back with, "Hey, we have this other thing over here and can you do something about that, too?" then yes, you can...and at a profitable rate.
As you continue in your business, you'll discover that the most important thing is not the money but your experience working on the project. Miserable project experiences aren't worth any amount of money. But the unusual thing is that the projects you have the most fun on are typically those you earn the most from, too, because it's the right fit and the customer really values you.
So filter for the type of person and their situation that you can help best, use that for your marketing speak, and then grow from there with the right kind of customer.
If you want help developing your avatar and marketing message, I'm available.
I've gone thru this experience myself, going from an SEO expert into a Digital Marketing expert. I would agree this space is full and now I would have preferred to still be a great expert in Search rather than being known for anything digital marketing related.
I agree with everyone here, focus on a single niche. Just make sure you focus on a growing niche (ie. Facebook ads) rather than SEO which has had it moment. Unless you are an amazing SEO and want to stay within Search and develop yourself as a thought leader. It's always best to double down on one thing, otherwise, you have little value in differentiating yourself from others offering a similar lineup.
It is best to first analyze why you are doing this business... what so you want to achieve.... where do you see yourself 10 years from now, and what do you have to do to get there.
If you can achieve your goal easily by scaling back, then follow that route and try creating expertise in a single niche.
But if your goal seems too far, you may consider reorganising your business, so that you can create revenue through multiple streams.
Since you mentioned you want to be nice and small in a happy way, then maybe looking at creating a niche is better.
It is still suggested, you add more clarity to your long term goal. Describe what you exactly want, and proceed from there.
All the best!
I like to think of those 'Donuts and Chinese Food Restaurant' hybrids. Can you promote yourself as just a mainstream social media expert? that would be perfect. You can still take other work-- just don't promote it.... I prefer my Chinese food sans donut grease.
