How We Hit £107,600 In Sales In Our First 48 Days In Business [Build In Public Update 2]
Background
This is not to brag or flex. It’s actually very uncomfortable to share this level of detail about our numbers, but I think it’s valuable to pull back the curtain, and it also shows what is possible in a short space of time with very limited resources.
When I committed to “building in public” I did not expect the first few weeks to go as well as they have.
This is not a typical result.
Things we have in our favour:
I spent the last 3-6 months speaking with customers and the marketplace to find resonance. We took on a handful of beta customers and tested the offering. So, this was not a standing start.
I have gone through this process several times now so can move very quickly, which makes a huge difference. This is one of the keys to our growth protocol that we are now sharing with other businesses. Knowing what is/isn’t important really helps.
Things to note:
It’s only myself and one part-time virtual assistant working in this company right now - you do not need a massive marketing/sales team to grow quickly.
We still don't have a real website!!! This is not necessary.
So far I have spent about ~£8-10k (mostly ad spend) on marketing. Huge budgets are not required.
| Lead Source | Consultations | Deals Closed | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| LinkedIn (Inbound) | 6 | 1 | • Mostly people who knew me already and were curious to learn more. • I expect these to be slower sales cycles overall and the calls were more “exploratory” |
| LinkedIn (Outbound) | 4 | 0 | • Not a fan of how this turned out • The message is resonating but the problem is you get put into an “I’ll help you with lead generation” bucket when you’re a marketer doing LinkedIn outreach • The quality of meeting was not very high |
| LinkedIn Ads | 8 | 4 | • Spent £8,586 and returned £61,800 • 7.2x ROAS on an audience that started cold • This was a sign to me that our message is really resonating with our audience |
| Existing Client Or Email List | 4 | 1 | • We’ve seen quite a bit of interest from our existing clients at Teranga, one of these has signed up already, and expecting a few more soon • Also sent out one mail blast when we launched • Probably should include an email marketing strategy as we scale |
| Referrals | 1 | 0 | • I expect referrals to be a source of leads moving forward but this takes time |
| Total | 23 | 6 |
Notes:
There were 2 “no shows” - one from ads bookings and one from LinkedIn outbound. So the closing rate on actual consultations is 28.5%. I suspect this is skewed by the LinkedIn inbound and outbound consultations (for ads the closing rate was 50%).
The 6 deals are worth a total of £87,800.
This is a snapshot from our CRM dated 22.03.23 (there was £19,800 in “closed” prior to public launch):
How We Actually Did It
Positioning & Minimum Viable Marketing Content (A Video Sales Letter) - 3-6 months of “thinking” went into this. It’s on our website, my LinkedIn profile, and used in our ads.
Drove traffic to the content - outreach, inbound, ads - people underestimate how much energy/money is required here.
This generated consultations AND sales - a great sign that we have something that our marketplace is resonating with. If we had not achieved resonance, we would have reiterated our positioning and created new marketing content.
The next stages of the process are:
Optimise our sales process - will watch back recordings to see if there is room for improvement. Hone the pitch. Look for ways to increase efficiency. I have already decided to increase the price.
Scale up marketing - pick the channels we will use and double down on them. At the moment, I suspect this will be LinkedIn ads and content.
Hires - who do we need to continue the growth?
What I Am Going To Do Now
We are sensing positive momentum and want to capitalise on it. We will double down on the LinkedIn ecosystem (ads + inbound) since these are the most efficient acquisition channel and seems to produce the highest quality prospects.
I’ve also increased the price point because it’s clear I was undervaluing the service.
The goal is to hit £100k per month.
