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My partner and I started a website development company a few years ago which specializes in making high quality (great graphics, functionality, and SEO) websites/applications for small-medium businesses. We have been getting a few clients here and there over this period, but mainly have been focusing on setting up all of our in house tools which will make our jobs easier in the future.

Now that we are at a point where we believe we can efficiently take care of as many customers that come our way, we want to start focusing on sales. The problem is that neither of us are sales/marketing people, so we are having a hard time deciding what the cheapest, most effective way to sell website/web applications is.

If we can get over this initial hump, I believe that word of mouth will be more than enough to keep the ball rolling.

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I edited the title a bit since 'best' is kind of subjective. Feel free to change it again, but stay away from 'What is the best way...' Hope that helps! – Michael Pryor Feb 9 '11 at 0:17

6 Answers

up vote 8 down vote accepted

The small company I work for does almost no marketing directly to the clients that we service. The method we use is to form partnerships with other agencies that are bringing in clients and offer them a service they do not already provide. So if you do the back-end programming really well maybe consider reaching out to design only agencies and offer your services as a developer.

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My partner is actually our designer, so we kind of have that covered already. – Metropolis Feb 9 '11 at 14:20
This is something that I have started looking into and I believe it probably is the best way to get clients. Just recently we saw a company that was trying to hire a graphic designer, and we thought "maybe we should call them and offer our services instead of them needing to hire a full time employee". It all depends on their needs, but things like these seem like a great way to get an in. – Metropolis Mar 4 '11 at 14:49
up vote 5 down vote

How did you get your current clients? Can you repeat that process? Is it scalable, at least in the short term?

Why do clients choose you over other companies that provide an equivalent service?

What do you do better than other companies?

Are you selling to local companies nearby that you can have a personal relationship with, or are you trying to sell randomly to the internet world+dog?

It sounds to me like you have a consulting company that is built upon relationships and a consultative selling process - walking your clients through the right way to do things, even if that means occasionally sending them elsewhere for some things. Does that sound about right?

Assuming that your market is local to you, I'd look for every single possible networking event in your area that you can go to. Business groups to join. Networking, networking, networking. Along with a lot of cold calls - are there company websites that you feel you could greatly improve? Call them. Other businesses you could help? Call them.

Marketing is all about recognizing who might be interested in what you have to offer. That only gets you so far. The bigger challenge is selling. And selling is hard, especially for tech people. A lot of dead ends, a lot of rejection, a lot of failed attempts.

But in the long run, it'll make you a much better entrepreneur, and make your business a lot stronger.

Good luck!

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up vote 3 down vote

"We hate Facebook and Twitter"

I don't think you are in the position to hate some of the most effective marketing tools. Social Media sites aren't just that anymore, they are tools... if you really wanna make something out of your bussiness make an effort and embrace them.

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Do you have evidence that FB and twitter have value as effective marketing tools to people who have no audience? Granted they are great for people who already have fans, but are they useful for a newcomer/unknown? I remain skeptical. – TimJ♦ Feb 11 '11 at 19:34
That's why you create promotions to gain followers -- I just saw a wedding photography company do a promotion to photograph a wedding for free to the person who got them the most "likes" in a week (judged by people posting the person's name on their wall). The winner had contributed about 1400 likes, and the #2 and #3 people contributed over 500-700 each (so the company gave them a 50% off offer)... – Jeffrey Berthiaume Feb 12 '11 at 5:53
up vote 2 down vote

I think the best thing you have to do is to collaborate with other companies and also you need to ask your clients to refer you guys to other potential clients and linkedin and twitter and elance and odesk there are many other sites and also many consulting companies do not contribute to web so they have to look for clients and companies which contribute to web are getting clients easily and also people trust them .

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up vote 1 down vote

Put some value in self-development in this area too. Recently I found a guy that gives a lot of free stuff(and have paid course too) just about situations like this. I hate those scammers that want your money and do not provide value with their courses. An the person I'm mentioning really gives a great ideas and real world situations.

So my suggestion is go and google for online classes, courses in this area. You do not need to be an marketing guru but it is crucial for your success to have the main idea how to communicate your business with the clients. No other company can provide this for you. They can connect you with clients but it is up to you to keep them and we like developers we are not good with this :). The course should not take more than a week or two (evening time, online what ever), just enough for the basics.

My guy is Ramit Sethi, but if don't like him, you can find a person that gives value to you and speaks your language. If you invest in you it will return greatly in the future not just on the start of your business.

I hope this helps you!

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up vote 0 down vote

You are techie. Then you can use Facebook as a marketing tool. Create a Page for your company and let your friends know what you are doing. You are sure to get some good response.

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We have a LinkedIn account, but we both hate Facebook and Twitter, so those would be out of the question. Also, if we are not willing to update them all the time and spend lots of hours on them, then they wont help anyway. – Metropolis Feb 11 '11 at 3:30
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You don't have to spend lots of hours on fb or Twitter. Just one post a week or two might end up being enough. After all most people you know should only need to be reminded about your work. – QH7 Feb 11 '11 at 6:49
Also, it's a good way to promote projects that have been completed/launched. Posting in a blog format (with an RSS feed) as well as a Twitter/Facebook post helps a lot -- and if the blog posts allow someone to automatically "like" it on Facebook, the more the better. – Jeffrey Berthiaume Feb 12 '11 at 5:54

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