- Welcome to The Journey.
Today we're gonna talk about how
to start your service business.
Let's go.
Hey, I'm Emma, your GoDaddy Guide
and today I'm super excited to be joined
with my co-host Justin Nealey.
Hey Justin, what's up?
- What up?
How are you?
- What are we gonna talk about today?
Starting a service business?
- Exactly.
We're talking about starting your service business.
- I'm already dying to know, where do you begin?
'Cause there's a lot of things that I'm sure you have to do
but what's first and foremost?
- Right, and you have to take that first step of really
figuring out what you want you want your business to be.
Right?
You can't just go, I want to be a service-based business.
Well, what do you want to do?
If you want it to be something
that you're actually passionate about
because you're gonna get a lot of the things
that you don't want to do
like the admin or just the run-around,
and if it's not something you're really passionate about,
it's not gonna last.
- I love the passion component.
To me, if you're doing something
that you're passionate about,
you're gonna give it your all, your 110%.
- Right, absolutely.
- You're gonna do the best work.
- Right, it's your why.
It's why you do what you do.
- Yeah, so what do you need?
Where do you start?
- So probably step one,
just to make sure that you're productive,
is to buy a computer if you don't have one.
If you watch this on a computer,
then just disregard this.
Move on to step two but that's gonna be step one.
- What about a smartphone though?
I feel like I do everything on my smartphone.
- You can do a lot, absolutely,
but it's all about being productive.
You can flip to different tabs,
go to different screens,
do a bunch of stuff that you potentially couldn't do,
or if you have to go and type everything
out on a smartphone,
it's gonna take you a lot longer than on a computer.
It's good to have both though.
- That's a good point.
Okay, so you have a computer, got it.
Then what's next?
I'm thinking social media
but that's just 'cause I'm obsessed with it, domain,
where do you go from there?
- So probably the next step is to figure out
what your name is and buy a domain name
and get your social media handles.
We've got a couple of videos that we talked about really
diving into Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook
in the links or descriptions below.
As soon as you have that domain then you need a website.
Social media is great
but you can't always control social media.
Do you remember Vine?
- (laughs) Yeah.
- Yeah, it was a super popular platform.
Right?
- What happened to Vine? - Everyone invested
all their time and it's gone.
So all those followers went with it.
And with your website,
it's there to help you generate leads and you control it,
and it's there for as long as you want it.
And then you piggyback into social.
- Another thing,
I'm so just wrapped up in the digital world--
- Absolutely.
- But I was at a trade show recently,
walking the floor, networking,
and I forgot my business cards.
And it's easy to do
'cause I do so much in the digital world.
- Right.
- But I got by but I just am curious
as a small business owner
and the local heroes listening in,
are business cards still an important thing?
- Absolutely, it's absolutely relevant.
In fact, I got a business card today
and it blew my mind, the quality of it.
Right?
Look at that.
Super cool. - There's even a texture
with the font. - It's something tactile
and if you're on the go,
sometimes you may not remember the domain name
or the handle or things like that
but that business card is just something
to really make yourself stand out.
Especially if you got a cool one like that
that's different. - It's a cool one.
- It helps you out. - Did you want it back?
- I mean, I might.
(laughter)
We'll get it later.
I didn't even notice you put it in your pocket.
- Yeah, thanks.
- Some place you can get business cards,
there's places like moo.com that's pretty cool.
There's Vista Print, they've been around forever.
We talk about Canva a lot.
You can create your own business card on there.
They can print it off for you.
- What do you use?
- I use Canva 'cause I like to really
design every part of it
and there's a couple of templates
but to each their own.
- Now when it comes to getting your actual work done,
I imagine you need to have what?
An office space, work space?
Space in your home?
- It's gonna vary, right?
- Is that important?
- It's somewhat important.
It depends on what type of service you provide.
If you don't ever really talk to someone face-to-face,
you don't need an office
but if you want to be able to have meetings with people,
things like that,
you don't have to invest in an office space.
There are a ton of just co-working spaces
popping up all over the country.
Some are free, some are freemiums, some are paid.
It just depends on what the budget is
but with those co-working spaces,
what I love about it is it's not only a place to work
but it's a place to--
- Free coffee.
- There's free coffee too.
(laughter)
There's coffee and Kick Flips
but it's a great place to network.
And you get all these like-minded people around you
that you can just piggyback ideas off of
or find just complimentary businesses.
That maybe I'm a web designer, right?
And you're working there and you're a graphic designer.
You start sending me web design leads.
I start sending you graphic design leads
and your service just builds and builds and builds.
Or work at home.
Have a little office space, something that's just yours,
free of distractions.
I know I'm like a squirrel.
I just get distracted all day.
Just I'm working and then Netflix will pop on
and my dog runs by and I get distracted
so what I like to do is go to a coffee shop
and drink coffee (laughs).
- I love the working at home.
It's not for everybody but--
- Not for everyone.
It is if you like to work in your PJs.
- That's how I do my webinars.
(laughter)
Okay, so one more question for you.
- All right.
- How do you stay productive doing this?
- Oh, that's tough.
It really depends on the type
of service business you provide.
There's not one answer fits all
but I'll go over some of the things that helps most people.
First off, you need some type of productivity suite.
Most popular out there are Google Suite
with all their Google Docs, Sheets, all that good stuff
and then Microsoft Office.
I would almost caution people to have,
basically get a second number.
And what I mean by that is not going
and getting another phone.
Right?
There's lots of digital services
where you can basically have another number on your phone
so that way people aren't calling you on your mobile line
and you're like is this personal?
Is this business?
And then it gets confusing.
- Separate the two.
- Absolutely, and then you don't answer like a weirdo
like hey this is Nealey's Web Design
and it's your mom, right?
You want to make it professional
so you have that difference.
- She'll be happy to hear that you're always working
and working hard (laughs).
- She's so proud.
(laughter)
And just separate your personal life from your business
'cause otherwise it's gonna start getting overwhelming.
- I say the same for social media.
If you have a business, go and get a business page.
Don't use your personal page.
Yeah. - Absolutely.
All right and then, let's talk about getting paid.
You're a service business, right?
- Oh right, yeah. - You want to get paid.
You're not doing this-- - That's an important
part of all this. - This is not just a hobby.
- Not just a hobby.
- We all got bills.
- Yeah, passion that pays.
- Yes, lots of tools out there.
If you're going in person,
probably Square or something like that
so you got that little dongle
and you can swipe that credit card.
Venmo's probably my favorite,
just to read the comments personally that people talk about,
but quick and easy way to get paid
otherwise there's PayPal and Stripe
for your website and things like that.
- Sounds like a lot of options.
- We got options.
- All right, that's a wrap.
I want to thank my co-host, Justin, for being here.
- It's been awesome.
- You're the expert and we learned a lot
about how to start your service business
but I'm sure you have questions
so go ahead and drop them below
and be sure to subscribe to our channel
for more videos like this.
See ya.
- Bye.