When Building a Website Is Financially Out Of Reach
Recently a friend reached out to me asking for some advice.
Her physiotherapist suddenly found herself out of work. The resort that she’d worked at for years was looking to hire some fresh faces.
“I want to hire you to build her a website and then I’ll give her the website in exchange for her services,” my friend asked, “She helped heal my shoulder and I just really want to help her out.”
I agreed to the initial arrangement but later I had a thought - building a website is probably not the most cost-effective option. Instead, I recommended setting her up with some kind of newsletter management system and then providing a digital marketing strategy instead.
Here is the advice I offered:
Sign up for a newsletter management service. I like FloDesk, but there is a cost involved. Other services, like Mailchimp, are free up until a certain amount of subscribers. There are plenty more out there.
Work on getting people on your newsletter list. If you can, ask past clients for their emails. Another quick way to increase newsletter subscribers includes hosting or co-hosting a community event either online or in person and instead of charging a fee, ask for people to submit their emails. If you don’t want to host an event yourself you can also piggyback off another community member’s event. For example, if someone in your network is hosting a virtual meditation, offer to provide a short movement practice during the session in exchange for access to all the attendee’s email addresses.
Create a newsletter outreach strategy. Aim to send at least one newsletter per month to your subscribers. When thinking about what to include, ask yourself, “What would make me want to open this newsletter every month?” Here are a few ideas to get you started:
New insights you’ve gained,
Media clips (podcasts, Youtube videos, infographics, articles, etc.) you found particularly helpful or interesting,
Relevant books you are reading,
Tips or methods that might help solve their problems
Links to any upcoming events you are hosting or are looking forward to attending
Special offers you want to introduce.
Now the above newsletter outreach option still requires a certain level of maintenance and technological savviness. It can also take time to get an audience and get into the flow of creating content.
If that still feels out of reach for you or if you don’t think maintaining a monthly newsletter is something you’ll end up doing, consider setting up a Telegram or WhatsApp group instead. I belong to several Telegram groups here in Berlin where admins hold space for discussions, advertise upcoming events or promotions, and ask for feedback. It’s a great way to build community quickly and doesn’t take much more effort than sending a text message.
That’s it - hopefully, that gives you some more affordable options when it comes to building a community and putting yourself out there. A website is helpful, sure, and a content marketing strategy can work wonders for building an organic reach - but they also take time, money, and some technical skills to get started - which can be barriers to a lot of folks. Instead, consider starting a newsletter or Telegram group to build community and share your offerings.