Making $0 in Sales in 31 Days

https://medium.com/@florianlaurent/making-0-in-sales-in-31-days-433b1622d0d1

by MasterScrat • 9 years ago

66 56 9 years ago

I am working on a long-term project (an app for collaborative voice translation). Since I will be running out of funding for this project by the end of the month I tried spinning up an "easier" side business: selling websites to veterinary clinics.

The idea is that I know well about webdev, and my gf is a vet, so together we could provide a good quality service to vets.

Turned out, there was nothing "easy" about that!

We discovered about the danger of trying to sell what you are able to build instead of what people wants. We discovered the pains of cold calling.

It was a quite formative experience so I did a quick write up yesterday.

Feedback is very welcome since we still intend to keep pushing a bit in that direction before we give up!

sharemywin• 9 years ago

You need to sell the sizzle not the steak. Nobody needs a website. some business need new business. some need ways for existing customers to more easily schedule appointments, etc...

Also, the more risk you can absorb the better. don't sell websites sell appointments. or take a commission.

timwaagh• 9 years ago

i will remember that one about risk. makes good sense.

saimiam• 9 years ago

You need to sell the sizzle not the steak.
the more risk you can absorb the better.

Wow..I needed these reminders.

flarg• 9 years ago

To add, look at where you can add business process automation and self service and if or how that could optimise work throughput and reduce overheads. A lot of that has been commodotised in large enterprises but in smaller ones there may be some gains to be had.

amelius2• 9 years ago

don't sell websites sell appointments. or take a commission.

But like the article says, they are often already overbooked.

I think you can make a case if your software can replace the assistant who picks up the phone. But that's probably going to be extremely difficult.

bdibs• 9 years ago

Fantastic point, I can't remember where, but I read somewhere people don't want to buy a drill, they want a hole.

pryelluw• 9 years ago

1. Check if they have a facebook page before pitching a website. If they do have one then dont waste your time.

2. A website is a bad stand alone product to sell these days. Can you combine it with something else?

sotojuan• 9 years ago

You just needed a bit more research. With a FB page or Google Maps/Yelp profile, why is a website needed? A vet isn't the kind of business where you need to read info and be sold on it. You just find the nearest good one and go when you need to.

Jeema101• 9 years ago

Yep. For them it's not immediately obvious if the cost of a website will help in generating more business.

They might be interested in help with online advertising combined with a basic website landing page, though...

leesalminen• 9 years ago

There are all kinds of little SaaS products veterinarians need that their traditional PMS (practice management systems) either don't provide or would require a $5-digit upgrade to get it. Some thoughts:

- vaccination expiration reminder emails over SMS

- appointment reminders (and follow ups) over SMS

- ability for pet parents to fetch their own vaccination records via web portal

I work in the pet services niche and the girlfriend is a Vet Tech. There are all kinds of opportunity in this market. My contact info is in my profile. Feel free to reach out if you want to chat!

mistermann2• 9 years ago

an app for collaborative voice translation

Tangential, but an idea I've always thought the world needs but I've never seen: an "app" for near-realtime announcements in international airports. You "always" hear announcements for (presumably, but you never know) international persons in countries where the local tongue is not spoken by the intended recipient (is English used as a standard in international airports?) Regardless, it seems to me it would be useful to instead TYPE the text into an app, send it to a translator, and get a properly pronounced audio recording in the person's native tongue to put over the speakers instead of English.

Of course, a missing piece of data is the person's native tongue - presumably the world can't get it's shit together enough to attach that to a person's profile (passport)?, so perhaps make the 1st announcement in English, and if a second one is made then do that as a translated version (or english and translated).

Then again, a likely better (in some cases but not foolproof due to roaming issues) or supplemental approach is sending a text message.

Just curious if you've ever heard of someone trying to do this.

MasterScrat7• 9 years ago

Mmh, interesting idea.

One solution now that I think about it would be to display the message at the bottom of all the screens around the airport, like some kind of subtitles for the audio message.

Or just to use good text to speech to say the messages, in a lot of cases the result would be better -_-

martinald• 9 years ago

One option instead of making them a website (which they probably don't care about) is selling them leads (which they probably do).

Instead of them saying they don't like technology, you just say that you'll send them leads for $x per go.

You then build the sites and bill them for each contact that goes through (or phone call - bit more work).

ssharp• 9 years ago

This is a very smart way to do things in certain industries. This scales fairly well with local businesses because what you did for one homebuilder in Topeka, you can do for another homebuilder in Billings and not run into too many conflicts of interest.

The vet space is a bit different though. Vets are often times well-booked but would like to see more revenue per booking.

forgottenacc572• 9 years ago

Yeah but there's lots of cat owners who want to read about cats and (speculating) cat health diet and behavior and maybe show cat photos and talk cat.

Build a website for them and do the cold calls to cat food suppliers to sell ads.

Or sell websites to cat owners for their cat - every cat needs a website.

Or make "hot or not" for cats.

Or combine all these into one site.

The internet was mostly made for porn and cats so you should be able to get the cat thing to work.

devgutt2• 9 years ago

Come on, internet is not made for cats.

onorton• 9 years ago

On the internet, nobody knows you're a cat.

_jal• 9 years ago

True! The internet is made of cats[0].

[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zi8VTeDHjcM

MasterScrat7• 9 years ago

Ahah, nice ideas!

Another concept in that vein would be to build websites for vets completely for free, BUT have it branded by Royal Canin or another food supplier like that.

forgottenacc572• 9 years ago

Put all these ideas into one big system, free sites for vets, upsell vet management systems as pro services, make it fun with cat video uploads.

Your original idea of selling websites and getting vets to pay, well you can mail that one back to 1997 when that was a good idea.

haburka• 9 years ago

Cold calling might not work for the first few customers. Instead, you should find friends or friends of friends to sell to at first, because even if you have the best pitch, and they would use the product, it might be that they're very overworked and they don't have time to speak to you.

droithomme• 9 years ago

It's good to see that he analyzed the problems to see why his client base wasn't interested. The reasons had nothing to do with him, which is good data to have.

The veterinarians I've seen are booked from dawn to dusk, so "too many clients" is their issue. Why advertise when you are already booked solid.

Those retiring and those who want no tech are also valid complaints and little can be done about either.

He focuses on the fourth reason he can do something about, they want to see a portfolio of their sites done for other vets. That is a reasonable move.

glenra2• 9 years ago

The veterinarians I've seen are booked from dawn to dusk, so "too many clients" is their issue. Why advertise when you are already booked solid.

Websites aren't just advertising, though. They can also reduce support costs by providing info effectively. If people can reliably get lots of relevant info from your website (hours, directions, prices, policies) that should reduce the workload on the secretary/admin. People who can't easily find what they need online have to call and talk to someone about it, which means your phones are busy, which makes it harder to deal effectively with incoming customers.

(that said, I suppose it's conceivable yelp/google maps/whatever is already adequately providing the low-hanging fruit)

rasmus1610• 9 years ago

Interesting article. I have a similar business (websites for physicians). I was very lucky to get some introductions and leads through my personal network (being a med student myself, my parents having a lot of physician friends).

A thing a was quite successful with, was redesigning existing old websites. More building a new website than just redesigning. But most of the clients I worked with had already a website that was just ugly or outdated or both. That made sure that they at least see some value in being found on google

MasterScrat7• 9 years ago

A thing a was quite successful with, was redesigning existing old websites

Ah, that's an interesting idea. For each vet in the area we checked if they had a website or not, so you can imagine we saw a lot of such website. And indeed a lot of them are terrible. Reaching out to them could work.

Gys• 9 years ago

They want to see a portfolio. It’s tough to get off the ground because of the chicken and egg problem. Vets who were showing some interest always wanted us to “provide some references”: the problem is that no one wants to be your first client.

So why not give one away for free ? In exchange for a good reference (if they are happy).

devgutt2• 9 years ago

We have to use pen and paper for everything.

The doctor probably is saving himself a lot of headaches. I work with programming for many years, but computers are not made for regular people. This is a myth. Many times I have to save my wife about something strange happening in her computer, a WiFi printer not connecting, some virus suck in and showing popups, screen freezing, internet is not connecting, and this goes on and on, almost every day. Man I hate Windows. At least when I solve the problem I can come back to my solid Ubuntu. Wait, one update arrived. Oh god now my keyboard is not working anymore. I hate computing.

icebraining2• 9 years ago

https://www.stilldrinking.org/programming-sucks

The only reason coders' computers work better than non-coders' computers is coders know computers are schizophrenic little children with auto-immune diseases and we don't beat them when they're bad.

christophilus• 9 years ago

Using pen and paper for everything may be a competitive advantage. I know so many medical professionals who say the worst part of their job is the computer system. The programs are poorly designed, take forever to do basic inputs, etc.

A friend of mine spends literally hours per day-- every day-- doing data entry after hours because the software is so bad and so complicated that he can't properly do data entry while helping his patients.

It's pretty easy to train people with a notepad and a pen and a really basic form. Paper doesn't have connectivity issues. It doesn't fail to work due to bugs. It works during power outages....

I don't actually think paper is superior in all things... It's harder to share between locations, for instance. But I think the best medical system would be very paper-like. Maybe it would even just be paper. You jot things down, then scan them in to associate them as documents against a patient's account. Dunno. But the current state of medical systems is terrible.

tixocloud• 9 years ago

The key to success is to follow-up on cold calls. The first call is to establish the relationship and let them know who you are as well as you learning more about them. Figure out how you can help them (potentially for free) to build that trust. It's our human nature to be skeptical about being approached and we immediately go into self-defense mode.

gottlos2• 9 years ago

Consider a simple online booking system, backed with google calendar or speaks ical. Importantly, something that lets their customers pick a time slot, send reminders, etc.

A number of healthcare providers locally do something similar; benefit to the vet is lower admin costs (answering phone etc), potential of online payment to secure the consult, and easy ways to reach their customers for follow up (vaccination reminders for example could be triggered by adding people into a mailing list package, email details gained at time of original booking).

Those are harder to build, but offer clear value and ongoing revenue ($1/booking fee x 5 vets x a year starts to make it look attractive!)

icebraining2• 9 years ago

You mean, like patio11's Appointment Reminder?

patio11• 9 years ago

We didn't do online booking at all (for reasons that I'd go into except that I don't own the business anymore). It's a different category than reminders, although many booking systems have a (cough suboptimal cough) reminder feature.

MasterScrat7• 9 years ago

But then there are two options:

- We have to integrate with the system they are currently using. This is a lot of work that may not be reusable for other vets, if they don't use the same system.

- OR We have to change the system they are using day to day, which I expect means fighting some strong inertia

Both are doable but will require a lot of mental bandwidth, which makes me uncomfortable for a side project.

gottlos2• 9 years ago

Thus the 'spits out ical' - if you can offer them calendars on phones, outlook, etc that's a compelling use case; and the is a chance the existing system can consume it

seiferteric• 9 years ago

I am in a weird situation with a few friends that we made an appointment scheduling application for a client who tried several others and found nothing they liked and kept reverting to using google calendar. Now we built them this perfect app that they love, but we can't seem to sell it to anyone else. It's looking more and more like we spent six months developing an app for essentially one client (technically we have three, one client has two shops, and one employee that left started his own and uses it).

almostarockstar• 9 years ago

I've had the same issue. I built a web based cash register / stock tracking app for a customer a few years ago with the belief that there were hundreds of business operating in her niche in a small, easily accessible area.

She loves it - but nobody else has the time of day for it. Learned a hard lesson about market validation there.

j-c-hewitt2• 9 years ago

There are a good number of specialized SEO and marketing firms that just focus on vets, dentists, or other broad medical specialties like dermatologists.

One thing you may not realize is that many small businesses -- vets included -- get spam (charitably called 'outreach') emails from agencies from all over the world on a nearly daily basis. Because of this, most cold calls and cold emails will be met with an even colder reception.

100 people is also a tiny list to cold call. I am not really sure that this was the right strategy for you to get clients. Selling marketing services to medical professionals is also harder than it is for many other kinds of businesses because getting more customers is not their biggest problem: it's often something else that a digital marketing company cannot fix for them as you noted in your article.

For a portfolio, you should just have a mockup website that you can use to swap out their information quickly to show them what you can do. It's also not clear to me that most vets really need a custom website. They would probably be better served by a Wix/Wordpress/Squarespace setup that has cheap customer service and would just need help for content, design, and some customization.

To sum up, you will get more projects much faster if:

* You respond to RFPs or job postings instead of cold calling * You build a portfolio or mock portfolio that you can show to vets * You focus your sales pitch on the anticipated results that the vets are going to have rather than just giving them a new website which they might not need all that much * You look at cheaper off the shelf solutions to provide to buyers who aren't ready to get into custom web development project

Finally, it's much easier to sell to people who already want what you are selling.

rco8786• 9 years ago

It's also not clear to me that most vets really need a custom website.

I know next to nothing about this space, but that was my first inclination as well. What value is that really adding, unless the practice offers some particularly unique ("custom") service?

MasterScrat7• 9 years ago

Thanks for all these good ideas.

One thing you may not realize is that many small businesses -- vets included -- get spam (charitably called 'outreach') emails from agencies from all over the world on a nearly daily basis. Because of this, most cold calls and cold emails will be met with an even colder reception.

Indeed, multiple clinics told me they are getting up to 3 calls per week regarding such offers.

100 people is also a tiny list to cold call. I am not really sure that this was the right strategy for you to get clients.

Do you mean there would be a better strategy to approach clients when they are so few? Should we try approaching them in person (ie just show up at the clinic)?

They would probably be better served by a Wix/Wordpress/Squarespace setup that has cheap customer service and would just need help for content, design, and some customization.

The big plus we can provide is that by having a vet onboard (my gf) we can write out the content for them. So they can tell us "we have a behaviorist and we provide this and that service" and from that we can explain and illustrate what this means, with no additional work on their side.

I fully agree about the mock portfolio and focusing on results, we'll definitely do that.

j-c-hewitt2• 9 years ago

For people who rely on cold outreach, you'd expect something like maybe a 1% response rate, and only a portion of those would close. So if you want to stick with cold outreach, you should be contacting lists of 1,000 or more people.

If you can offer to show up in person, it can improve your close rate, but I would not go door to door for the initial contact.

FWIW I don't think 100% cold outreach is going to be an efficient use of your time at this point. Responding to job ads or going on Upwork to send in proposals will be more efficient if you just want projects or things to put in your portfolio.

The big plus we can provide is that by having a vet onboard (my gf) we can write out the content for them. So they can tell us "we have a behaviorist and we provide this and that service" and from that we can explain and illustrate what this means, with no additional work on their side.

The other thing to think about might be how you can provide value to their existing patients and get them to come in more often for appointments and to get highly profitable treatments like flea/tick stuff, fungus creams, and regular shots. It's not just new customers but getting more from their existing customers with less administrative overhead.

TheRealmccoy• 9 years ago

hello Master,

one issue with pitch is that, for doctors who are not versed with web technology, your offer is more of a paid liability, than a solution.

who would maintain the website, when you have sold them?

the vets, probably neither have the time nor the inclination to maintain it, and so far they have been doing without it.

Why dont you offer them, website and with just a marginal yearly cost, free maintenance also, with which they can always keep their website updated, by just sending you text and photographs by email?

this is like a complete peace of mind offer.

in fact, you can make it one offer, website with free maintenance (hosting, domain, updating content etc) at a flat yearly free.

You have a SAAS product in offering now...

moron4hire• 9 years ago

I think you should have driven out to them, rather than trying todo everything "efficiently": waiting for emails, calling on the phone. If there were 100 veterinarians in a 200km radius, you could have visited them all.

Yes, it would have been hard work. But that's kind of the reason why nobody else has done it. Easy money is a lottery game. You want success on your schedule you have to pound pavement and do the hard work that other people are too lazy to do.

The value of talking to people in person is that you learn significantly more about their problems and what they want. You can see whether or not they are lying about their interest in the product. You can see their environment and infer new information. It's also a lot harder for people to say no to your face, or to stop a conversation in person. So you're likely to just plain have a longer conversation, which usually means you're getting more information.

Case in point: my wife writes sci-fi novels. We sell them on Amazon, and they do okay there. But we do significantly better at book fairs. At a book fair, if you see a nerdy girl wearing a Dr. Who t-shirt carrying a tote bag that is already half-full of books, you've got a pretty good idea that she'd probably be interested in your time-travel book about a strong female character and you can be pretty sure she's willing to buy. All without any tracking cookies. All without any alignment analysis algorithms. No freely handing over monetizable data to Facebook, et al.

Being in the Amazon bookstore, you have to compete against literally millions of books. At the book fair, it's probably less than 100. You can't catch people's attention as they go by online, but you can call out to people at the fair. And you can't be sure the people you're contacting online are even in the market--they likely are not. But people go to book fairs because they specifically want to browse and buy something new and unique.

Physically put yourself in the places where people are willing to take chances on new products.

paulcole• 9 years ago

Vets are like doctors that don't make any money. Most vets in the US just don't have the marketing budget for this kind of thing. There are better niches out there.

notjustanymike• 9 years ago

If you're making vet appointment software, please considering pivoting to the petcare appointment business. Our dog walking company uses an absolutely craptacular app called Leashtime, and any replacement would be welcomed.

zebraflask• 9 years ago

The problem here is that you're trying to sell a website that vet clients will generally only look up when their pets are sick, and probably not in the right frame of mind to appreciate your web design skills. The idea has inherently unpleasant connotations right from the start.

You'd get a lot farther if you found a novel set of pet toys, or premium food, or something that the average pet owner would enjoy spending money on. Vets stock those things, people buy them, I'm sure you get the gist of the idea.

icedchai• 9 years ago

You picked the wrong niche. Accept it and move on to something else.

nthcolumn• 9 years ago

Okay it is quite unlucky that you chose that particular segment. Becoming a vet is very expensive, the setups are very, very expensive and the margins are very tight. Most vets accumulate into vet practices and would be better off financially stacking shelves at Walmart so if I were looking for rich clients these aren't the clients you were looking for - you may well have lots of pictures of cats but maybe some other segment might be more open to you. Even a charity for cats might pay better than a vets. How about pivoting into pet boarding? Plenty of scope for fun there and quite lucrative?

IanDrake• 9 years ago

Classic example of starting with a solution and looking for a problem.

Consider going to another set of potential customers with no product at all and just interview them. It's much easier to get their time if you're not selling them something.

Ask what their business problems are. These could range from annoyances to serious revenue issues. Ask them how much it would be worth to make the problem go away.

Once you've gathered this information from several potential customers, find commonality and figure out a solution.

Then, without building the solution, pitch it back to them and ask for them to sign up. If enough say yes, then you have something worth building.

Consider getting the book Four Steps to the Epiphany.

glenra2• 9 years ago

A bog-standard strategy for bootstrapping a new business is to take on your FIRST client for FREE (or nearly so). Pick a business nearby that you like - perhaps your OWN local vet? - and talk to them in person to see if they'd be willing to allow you to make them a website. Make it clear that you're doing this for two reasons:

(1) to better learn the business - you expect the experience of building their site will help you learn how to meet market needs.

(2) To build a portfolio - you want to have some real sites done and in-use to help sell to other customers later.

Do both of those things. Focus on making ONE key customer happy, learn whatever you can about their needs, and only THEN do you try to sell the same service to other customers.

luord• 9 years ago

I agree with TFA on the "making yourself sound bigger than life" thing. I always think I sound ridiculous when I do that so I prefer to focus on what I know.

Not that I've had much succeed either, though.

Making $0 in Sales in 31 Days

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