25 Comments

Can you successfully operate this business anonymously? Do you need sort of a face of the company/service? If so, can you use pseudo name/personality?

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For business you have to use your real name when meeting prospects, paying taxes, etc.

You can incorporate the business as an anon if you do it in a juris that allows for that (NM or WI). You can also pay someone to put the LLC in their name.

If you are running a pure Ecom, saas biz, then you don't need "the face of the company" as people purchase from your store, platform without knowing who owns it (they don't necessarily care).

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My dear Wall Street clowns, Which is better? In terms of exit and multiple/valuations?

1) $2m revenue (high end), 500k net profit (25% net profit)

2) $10m revenue (mass), 500k net profit (5% net profit)

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author

The first one not even sure how this is debatable

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author

Just realized we got trolled. There is no way this was a serious question at all

Congrats!

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Awesome writeup. On the personal comment stuff, I've personally been having big success avoiding that. I run a business who get's the personal comment stuff all the time and I hate it because I know it's fake and they just want me to hop on call.

I go with the honest and upfront "I found your email on a list" and it works like a charm. Actually getting better responses and sales rates doing this than the personal shit

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How do you go about the legal / risk reliance component of consulting contracts (thinking of starting a SME financial diligence practice)? Also have you posted any guidance about creating websites / online marketplace and how to get started?

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Thinking about the same but for a niche subset of healthcare (sterility assurance of medical devices / drugs) but unsure if this is "too niche".

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Why is a background in tech sales/software engineering/wall street a prerequisite to do this?

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I’m mostly in analytics. I feel like my niche would not allow a one person shop to work. Am I stuck in the “analytics for X” niche or have you seen more specific segmenting?

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You can become the analytics as a service shop. SMEs need BI work to get viz into their business. You don't even have to do the work, as you can outsource.

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Any pointers on how to figure out how much Lead Gen Agencies are charging per Lead within a niche? Seems to be gatekept by scheduling a call at these agencies

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Depends on the market. Try to find out how much it costs to get a real lead from marketing (for software its $500+) you can also do the average SDR salary and commission divided by their meeting quota (if the SDR makes 70k a year and is expected to deliver 10 leads a month that’s 120 leads a year, divide 70k by 120, that’s their price per lead) if you come in below that, chances are you’re gonna be effective for the company. Don’t worry too much about what other guys are charging, focus on results

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What about a crypto consulting service helping (elderly) people setup everything? I’ve personally helped a few around me and can imagine it’s something that could take off, just like during the dotcom era setting computers up for people.

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This is gold. If you tie it to a fear/risk avoidance it will make the offer stronger.

Concierge service to help older people do IT, crypto, basic cyber will work.

Your niche should be upper middle class people who have an interest in tech/crypto but don't have someone to do it for them (there's SO many boomers like that). If you target a billionaire, it won't work, target a broke middle class guy, they are too cheap.

I personally do this and it works:

-Zoom to walk them through it.

-Tools your recommend they use

-Actually set it up for them

Do it fixed fee ($1000, $3000, etc) with tiers depending on what they get. If you get creative you can set a reoccurring subscription.

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Jul 31, 2022·edited Jul 31, 2022

Thanks for providing this.

A few questions:

1) You're doing everything over zoom then? How long do your meetings last?

Your examples of a fixed fee seem pretty high for something I feel wouldn't take all the much time (I'm thinking an hour or less even)...

2) Is there a value prop/time length you offer to your clients that makes them willing to spend $1k+?

My biggest concern is they would be asking you which coins to invest in, and that becomes a risky subject in its own right that I wouldn't want to participate in...

3) If this has come up in your experience, what do you do?

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Thanks for the confirmation. How do you target & reach these people? Is it on social media or do you also do print ads? Do you have a lot of customers with such a service?

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I've been inspired by all the BowTiedBull posts on starting a WiFi business.

My niche might be too tight - Uniswap v3 pools. Otoh, it turns experienced DeFi users into v3 chads.

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I know a lot of “crypto” guys who know nothing about decentralized exchanges. Once the market turns, this could be a good business. Hell I’d pay someone to show me an easy way to acquire bitcoin in an effective non KYC way

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Yeah it's weird, isn't it? DEX's are an incredibly powerful tool.

But I'm not even so broad as to be teaching people to use DEX's for trading. This is for market making, so probably 5% of the 5% of people who use crypto.

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Are we talking about the Gartner consulting company here?

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founding

probably - not so much consulting, but their rankings / quadrants (ie. most innovative new entry to data warehousing!) / thought leadership (lets be honest: marketing) piece

they'll do some psuedo benchmarking and a compare and contrast on certain characteristics. From memory there's also paid for awards etc.

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Thank you, appreciate that!

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founding

no worries Fren

from what he's saying (we assume - not to speak for him!) if you're strong in a particular niche you can create content and product around your industry knowledge

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Fulfilment is the trickiest part when it comes to Lead Gen Agency. You basically have to 1) hire 2) train people to follow your cold outreach blueprint 3) help them understand customers product & what problems the product solves each time you get new client.

Do I get it correctly?

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