Fourteen clients, all from referrals, and still no website. Problem or not a problem?

Cheryl Dunn· Semi-retired CPA doing bookkeeping and tax for 14 local startups· Open, Consulting & Coaching·Jul 11

I retired from a firm four years ago intending to do a couple of tax returns for friends and read more. I now keep the books for fourteen local companies and I turned down two more in the spring because I ran out of week.

My entire presence in the world is a personal email address, a phone number written on the back of other people's business cards, and a spreadsheet I use to track deadlines. No website, no logo, no listing anywhere. My business name is my own name with CPA after it, which was never a decision anyone made.

Two things pushed me to post. A younger client asked for my site so she could send it to her brother, and I had nothing to give her. And a prospect told me she'd almost not called because she couldn't find anything about me online and wondered whether I was still working.

I'm semi-retired and I don't want more volume. But I'd like the right clients rather than whoever happens to find me, and I suspect being invisible is not the same thing as being selective.

For the solo professionals here: did a simple site actually change who called you, or is it a thing we build to feel legitimate?

4 replies

Dana Kowalski· Open·Jul 11

Mine is one page. Who I work with, what I do, a photo I didn't hate, and a form. It has never generated a lead on its own and I would not take it down for anything, because it converts the referral. Somebody says 'you should talk to Dana', the person looks me up on their phone in a parking lot, and the page decides whether the call happens.

For you specifically, the prospect who almost didn't call is the whole argument. You don't need marketing. You need to exist when somebody checks.

Carla Vasquez· Open·Jul 12

I build these for a living so discount me accordingly, but honestly: do not hire someone like me for this. One page on a template builder, your own words, an afternoon.

The thing I'd spend real effort on in your position is a Google Business Profile, because for a local professional that's what shows up when somebody types your name and your town into a phone. I've watched a client get more out of filling that in properly than out of the site I built her, which was a humbling month.

Whatever you do, put the deadlines thing on it. 'I will tell you what's due before it's due' is more persuasive than anything a designer will write for you.

Andre Bellamy· Open·Jul 12

On the name, I'd keep yours. I spent real money on a firm name when I started coaching and every single client still says 'I'm working with Andre.' The name bought me nothing except one more thing to explain.

The selectivity point is where I'd push though. Right now the filter on your practice is who happens to know someone who knows you. That's not a filter, it's weather. A page that says clearly who you're good for is the cheapest way to stop getting the calls you were going to turn down anyway.

Cheryl Dunn· Open·Jul 14

'That's not a filter, it's weather' is going on an index card. You're right that I've been describing myself as selective while doing nothing whatsoever to select.

Spent Sunday morning on the Google listing rather than a site, on Carla's point, and it took forty minutes including finding a photo of me that isn't from a wedding. One page to follow. If it brings me a single client who wants the deadlines-before-they're-due thing rather than a shoebox of receipts in April, it has paid for itself.

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