Number of Customers: 7

First Out-Of-State Customer

I’m happy to report that minutes after I posted last week’s report (which was actually last Saturday instead of Friday), I called my Florida 30-day-trialer and he happily gave me his credit card number. The significance of this event is that he is my first out-of-state customer, all my other 6 customers being in West Michigan where I live.

The significance of having an out-of-state customer is that it proves my online marketing system can work. This is the first time a salon has ever found me online, signed up for a trial, and then become an actual paying customer. Before that, for all I knew, I had some gaping hole in my sales funnel through which 100% of my prospects would fall 100% of the time. My conversion rate was 0%. Now my conversion rate is something like 2%. (I’ve had about 50 trial sign-ups since the ability to sign up online has existed.)

Local Leads

I also have two good local leads, both referrals. I’ve met with them both in person and they both seem interested. If I get both of them, I will be at 9 customers which would put me at $400/mo in revenue.

New Goal

In September 2013 I set a goal of getting one new customer for each month in 2014. Here’s how that’s gone so far: no, yes, yes, no, yes.

I’ve been thinking lately that 12 new customers for the whole year is probably a pretty wimpy goal.

I think I’d need about $5000/mo to be able to live reasonably comfortably off of Snip without having to have any other income (i.e. freelance/consulting income). Just for ease of measurement, let’s say $5000/mo in revenue, since expenses will probably change and not go up much.

So when I thought about that, I thought, “Let’s set a date for when to get there. When?” I decided to be a little more aggressive and say let’s get to $5000/mo in revenue by December 31, 2014.

So that’s my new goal: $5000/mo in revenue by December 31, 2014.

That goal would require 100 customers at $50/mo.

Business Cards

I might have mentioned last time that I’m finally, after three and a half years in business, getting business cards. I’m also having a logo made. Part of the reason I’m doing this is because I plan to do a lot more personal networking in the beauty industry and I’ll have to have business cards to pass out or else I’ll look like a dummy.