If I had to start my business all over again with no audience, no testimonials, and no idea what I was doing — here’s exactly how I would get my first 10 clients.
Starting a business can feel like shouting into the void.
You have an offer. You know you’re good. But no one’s buying (yet).
Here’s the good thing –
You don’t need a website.
You don’t need 10K followers.
You don’t even need a full portfolio.
To get your first 10 clients, here’s what you actually need — based on how I did it (and how I now helped 300+ women entrepreneurs do the same):
1. A Clear Offer for a Clear Niche
Stop saying “I help people.”
Start saying:
“I help [specific person] do [specific thing] so they can [get specific result].”
You need to be findable, referable, and memorable.
Do get clear on this, here’s 2 things that you can do:
1 – focus on your future and think about how do you want to be known as a year from now. And that take that and show up like this – for example, if I want to be known as a founder of the highest converting content creation agency, then I need to introduce myself as such right now, both online and offline
2 – reflect on your past wins and experience. Go through one by one from the very first moment you received money, why somebody paid you and what problem did you solve for them. Whenever people are hiring somebody, they are hiring because they have the problem they need to figure out and you are the right “who” for that, so lean on that
2. Optimize your Instagram
Especially, if you had a private personal account and now you want to build a business.
3 things you need to do to optimize your profile for your clients:
1 – in the first line of your bio, make sure there is your name + what you do // because this is how your clients are looking for you when they are searching
2 – in your bio, you can write who you are + what you do and have a call to action (dm me CALL to book a discovery call with me / click a link below for a 30-minute strategy session)
3 – have 3 pinned posts at the top of your profile (one telling the story of who you are, another one is a breakdown of your services and the third one is either a testimonial or a case study for a client if you have it or an authority post breaking down how you solved the problem you are solving for your clients for yourself)
I talk more about building your Profitable Instagram in this checklist HERE, so make sure you get this to optimize your Instagram for sales!
3. Tell everyone you are open for business
And I mean that for both online and offline. Put together a list of 20 connections, reach out to them in a short DM and share that this is a new venture that you started and you are working on spreading the word out, so you’d appreciate a referral for your services or a like on your recent post
This is exactly what I did when I was getting my first 10 clients for The Sell Well – I dmed 20 people every single week for a month asking for referrals!
4. Create a founding client offer
When you are building out your own client base, and as you are reaching out to those 20 connections, create a founding client offer. And it’s either a completely free or at least 50% offer to your first founding clients to get the ball rolling.
5. Document your journey
Post on your Instagram and share the process and talk about your wins. Here are 10 ideas you can use for your next Instagram post to get your first 10 clients:
- Share about what you are working on this week
- Talk about your biggest goal for 2026
- Share what didn’t work out in your business and/or life last year and what you want to change in the new year
- Show the day in the life as a X [marketing agency founder, makeup artist, wedding planner]
- Talk about what you are excited about in your business
- Talk about any challenges you are trying to navigate
- Show your community what you do outside of work and what’s important to you
- Share what you struggled with when you just started the business
- Open up to your community about imposter syndrome / perfectionism and how you navigated that
- Talk about any upcoming projects in your business and how it makes you feel
Your first clients are not looking for perfect branding — they’re looking for someone who can help them solve a problem.
You don’t need 10,000 followers.
You need 10 conversations.
You don’t need a sales funnel.
You need a clear offer and the courage to tell people about it.
The sooner you start showing up imperfectly, the sooner your dream clients can actually find you.
YOU GOT THIS!!!
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