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Hey guys, it’s Dean here and this is Open Source Growth. And in today’s illustrious Soul recording, shall I say, it is currently 5:17 on one of the Chilliest days in, I personally believe to be like my own history, I’m 32 years of age, but in Victorian history, I think I woke up this morning and it was about zero degrees Celsius here, which for you American folk that would.
Way, way, way, way too normal for you. Us Australians are pretty soft, especially us coming from Victoria. We do love our heating systems. We do love all that stuff that keeps us lovely warm. But look, today’s episode of Open Source Growth, I wanna talk about the ultimate source, the ultimate type of open source growth and that business growth, which costs you absolutely nothing. In fact, you don’t even need to go about developing a website, and that’s why I’ve titled this podcast, why you Don’t Need to Build a Website to Generate Leads, sales and Customers, because quite frankly, that’s what I did at the very beginning of my freelancing career.
Now, When you have a high ticket service like sales, um, coaching or marketing coaching or um, marketing services or web design or whatever, more often than not, there’s a prospect in your neighborhood. Like, don’t get me wrong. Yeah, it helps to have a Facebook profile or an Instagram profile or whatever, but more often than not, if you exist and if you have a pulse.
I’m pretty sure there’s going to be a prospect somewhere around that corner of yours. And for me, when I got started in the marketing agency world, when I kicked off my freelancing career, I remember it was about 2017 towards the end of that year, and I was working in a marketing agency. And when I was working there, I used to take my dog for walks on the beach.
And I remember thinking and pondering, Hmm, maybe I wanna start my own marketing agency. Well, maybe I want my own clients. Maybe I want a whole heap of additional money just to keep me going. Like I was only working at a marketing agency two to three days a week, and probably taking home at most as, as much as $600, um, a week.
It wasn’t huge money, but it was what it was, if you know what I’m saying. And I remember going to the beach one day and talking with a business owner and they were asking me what I do and I told ’em what I do and it’s like, ah, you are one of those guys who can do digital marketing. You’re one of those people that I see on the internet, but I can never trust and like, and that led from one thing to another. And then all of a sudden I had a web design project. And to be frank, at the time I didn’t really even know what I was doing with web design. I knew how to build a Squarespace website fairly cost effectively. I knew how to get it up and going. I knew how to turn it into a lead generation machine, which it still is to this day, and it’s been an exceptionally successful little business since I worked with them.
But, That was me without a social media profile pretending I was a digital marketing that was me without a Facebook profile and DMing everybody under the sun. That was me without a website or presence showing people that I did digital marketing, because I didn’t up until that point. But I had the belief that I could do that, you know?
So if you are out there on your journey, what do you actually need to get started? Like, do you need a website? No, you don’t. Do you need, uh, a LinkedIn profile that says that you do this? It helps, don’t get me wrong, but that’s not going to, that’s not really going to push the needle forward. What you really need is conviction and self-belief.
Like if I could. Invest every single dollar into my own personal education, and if I could split it, I would say that I would spend 85 to 90% on my self-belief and 10% on the information that would get me to where I want to go. Because at the end of the day, that self-belief enables you to do whatever you want in life, any business.
When I got started out, it was that self-belief of knowing, Hey, I can help this person. I can generate leads. Yes, I know I can help this person attract new customers with Facebook or Google Ads. Yes, I know I can help this person go from where they are to where they want to be, and I could even teach them about sales at the time.
See, by backing myself and teaching myself digital marketing whilst working at an agency, I was able to develop a skillset, but then it was also on top of that, and I want to be abundantly clear here. It was that ability to just believe in myself and go about selling myself in front of other people there. And then that’s what really enabled me to grow a business without any marketing.
It was quite literally free growth, and I think that you can do that too. I’m still a firm believer that the best place for you to get started, um, in business is your local coffee shop because it forces you to talk about you, your products and services every single morning with new people. If you are in any form of high ticket sales or any direct to consumer sales, you should never be buying coffee at home.
See, up until recently, I would always be out every single morning for coffee because I knew that every year I pick up three to five customers at cafes and that would offset my coffee bill. So realistically, you don’t need a website, you don’t need a social profile. You just need to be near the customers that you can help.
See, when you’re in marketing and agent, like when you’ve got a marketing agency like myself, or if you’ve got, if you’re a coach that helps a certain type of avatar, whatever, you know exactly where your customers are. You know the conferences they’re going to, you know, the places they’re visiting, you know the shops, they’re buying stuff.
If you’re looking for, you know, boxers to help you know that the boxers are going to the fights, you know that a boxer goes to the MMA fight store in Melbourne to buy boxing gloves, or they go to a particular supplement place to get specific boxing specific supplements. I’m not sure if that even exists, but you get the point.
You just need to be where your customers are. Not only do you need to know where your customers are, you need to know how to speak their language. So it’s a matter of targeting and their messaging. What do they say? What do they do? What keeps them up at night? All that stuff, like knowing who you’re targeting, what really drives them, knowing how they speak so you can communicate in their language and then communicate the transformation which you offer, i e your product or service in a means, which they totally understand.
See, this is the process of marketing, but it doesn’t just happen on a website. It doesn’t just happen on a Facebook ad. It happens everywhere you go. And if you understand that you’re gonna be in an incredible place, like it’s gonna be so, so good for you. , so that’s why I’m bullish on this, that if you are getting started in the marketing world, yeah.
Or if you’re wanting to get started in your own marketing agency or your own services type of business, especially when most people with an ABN or an LLC or a proprietary limited company need you and your service like you’re an accountant or a lawyer or a doctor, not a doctor, sorry, an accountant, a lawyer, a mortgage broker or whatever.
All you need to do is have a pulse and be at a cafe or just know where your customers are and communicating with them. You don’t need that website to get started. It’s only once you’ve got proof of concept, people that are actually paying you money to do the hard work that you love to do is when you start thinking about investing in marketing.
But if your offer is not converting, I’m sorry to say it and I hate to break it to you. It is not worth investing any money to build that website or start any marketing or whatever. But it’s all just about making sure that people want your services. So like this is just a short, quick 9-10 minute episode today.
I just wanna say I love you all. It’s just been something that’s been on my mind. I’m a huge believer in the best place to start selling is your local coffee shop. Um, and that’s just been me. So this is open source growth today. Um, I’m your host, Dean Denny, founder of Owen Denny Digital Geelong’s leading SaaS focused marketing agency.
We love online brands and e-comm too, but most importantly, software as a service is our shit. But again, if you liked what you heard today, if you like the candidness of this, Communications. Just hit subscribe. Let me know what you think, and if you need to get in touch with me, I used to be the digital marketing gangster on Instagram, but hit me up.
It’s Dean Owendenny, and that’s OWENDENNY, for Owendenny. So Dean, d-e-a-n. That’s where you can find me. Shoot me a message and we’ll talk soon. I love you all. God bless and stay safe. Peace out.
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