Start Getting Customers Today

Don’t waste precious time and money on non-essentials.

Few of us need $2000 stationery and we certainly don’t need to spend weeks agonizing over the 57 different ways to skew our initials for a logo. Believe it or not, you don’t need an office supply store annex in your closet to start your business.

All you need is a customer.

And to get one of those you’ll need a minimum of three pieces of information:

1. What service or product will you provide?
2. What kinds of people or businesses will use those services?
3. Where will you find them?

Do this exercise right this minute

Get out a single piece of paper and a pencil and write down the answers to those questions. Don’t spend more than 1 minute on each question. If you can’t come up with an answer for each of them, do more research. Give yourself 24 hours, then do the exercise again.

The essential business tools you’ll need

Here are the basic physical tools you’ll need, in my opinion:

• Your name—You can file a fictitious name statement later. If you need to make money now, just use your real name to start.
• Telephone—Your own phone will work just fine at first. No, you don’t need a new iPhone.
• Address—You already live somewhere, right?
• Computer—I’m assuming you have one or access to one, or you wouldn’t be reading this.
• E-mail account—You must have one of these already.
• Business cards—Get something simple at first, black on white with all of the requisite information. You can get them from a variety of online sources (VistaPrint, PSPrint) but don’t go for the freebies with the printer’s name on the back. If you already have an idea for business cards, go for it. Just don’t obsess over them and lose precious time.
• Simple letterhead—Given what’s possible with laser printers these days, you can probably get away with a self-designed letterhead at first. If you plan on blanketing the world with paper direct mail letters, consider getting a batch of letterhead printed up. It’s cheaper than laser printing. If you can get a package deal with the business cards, that might be the way to go. But, in over 5 small businesses I’ve started, I’m sure I’ve never used up my first ream of printed letterhead.

Business tools you don’t need right away, with one caveat

You’ll notice a few things I didn’t mention:

• Website—If you’re a web designer, it’s absolutely critical to have one, of course. Otherwise, it’s a nice-to-have item. Realistically, most non-design freelancers can get away without a website for a while.
• Bluetooth headset—If you don’t have any customers yet, you’re probably not busy enough to need to talk and drive, eat, get dressed, and surf the web at the same time.
• Blackberry, Palm Pilot, or other overpriced PDA—Do you really need to check your email every 20 seconds?
• $50,000 Visconti fountain pen—Ok, if you can afford it, go ahead, but I’m not sure why you’re reading this post.

The official paperwork

As for all the legal stuff, sure, go ahead, if you can take care of it in a day or two. Again, don’t obsess. I’ve never had anybody ask me if I had a business license. I’m not saying you shouldn’t get one if your municipality requires it, and if you plan on doing business under a name other than your own, you’ll need to file a fictitious name statement with the county clerk. But don’t let the paperwork get in the way of going after paying clients.

Obviously, if you’re in a trade or a licensed profession, you need your licenses before you can start work.

If you can afford the time and money to work out the details before you bring in your first customer, by all means, do so. Getting everything out of the way first takes a lot of pressure off. But, whenever I’ve gone back to freelancing it seems the money always runs out faster than I thought it would, it always takes longer than I expected to get new clients, and they seem to pay slower all the time.