Five Easy Steps To Jump Start Your Deck (Or Other) Business

Joe,

The game is to get out high numbers of flyers and not worry too much about percentage of response. You've got to get the numbers out there (and in the right neighborhoods) to see if there's a market for your service. If there is, you WILL get business.

When I used this flyer to start my business, I hired a flyer delivery service and had them put out 10,000 flyers in an fairly affluent area of the San Fernando Valley (Los Angeles). The service cost me $450.00 plus the cost of printing the flyers. (Way, way cheaper than mailing letters or post cards.) My "note" was delivered directly to the homeowner's door step, along with 3 or 4 other flyers (which were all typical "advertisement-type" flyers --- guess which one stood out of the crowd!)

Before a week was out, I had 90 some calls and I stopped counting. That was only about .9%, but I was totally overwhelmed with business. My occupation line on the flyers was "I clean, repair and install rain gutters and downspouts."

I actually knew very little about the rain gutter business at the time, but I was in dire need of getting an income quick! The entire extent of my experience was spending two weeks hanging around with my brother-in-law, who was in the business.

This is going to sound amazing, but it's true: I put out these flyers just twice, 10,000 each time, spaced about 4 months apart. That was 12 years ago, and I never had to spend one more cent on advertising, and I've been busy ever since! (All of my business since then has been referrals and repeat customers.)

In other words, this little flyer totally jumped started my business!

Over the years, I've shared this "jump start" flyer technique with many others. All I can say is this: If you have something to offer that homeowners want, "It works".

By the way, I had to borrow the money to get started. Glad I did!

--- Hugh