How to get your first clients as a founder?

The first clients are the hardest ones you will ever win. Your first clients have to take a chance on you with no case studies, no logos and no one to ask what you're like to work with. So the channel you pick matters less than one simple question: how does a stranger get to trust you fast enough to say yes?

Why does every channel feel wrong at the start?

Because each one asks for something you don't have yet. Ads want a budget and a message that's already proven. Cold email wants a big list and a thick skin. LinkedIn wants a profile that looks the part. Word of mouth wants a network that knows what you do now, rather than what you did in your last job.

A founder told me on a call that his whole career had run on referrals and his business card. Take the card away, he said, and you start from scratch. Another, a few months into his own start-up, told me every dollar was precious and he wanted to be slow to spend.

And over the top of all of it sits the Noise Machine. Bots, spam DMs, impression-sellers and pay-per-appointment vendors, all promising a new founder a full diary by Friday. A new business with a thin budget is exactly who they target. If someone offers to fill your diary for a fee per slot, read whether paying per appointment ever makes sense before you sign.

Here's a confession for the sceptics. In 2012 I said, "LinkedIn is stupid. It's like Facebook but Facebook is more fun. LinkedIn is only for people looking for work, and I wasn't looking for work." I held that view until COVID came, with a team to feed and a business to protect. Then I paid serious attention to LinkedIn and went "from nought to sixty instantly. It just made sense." The cost was every year I spent dismissing it. The platform I wrote off became the one that fed my business. So test a channel properly before you rule it out.

How do the four channels compare for a new founder?

Word of mouth converts best and costs nothing but time, though you can't switch it on. Hand-sent LinkedIn reaches one step beyond your network and lets buyers check you first. Cold email reaches big lists cheaply but starts trust from zero. Ads are fast once you know what works, and expensive while you're still learning.

Here's the case for each, and the catch.

• Word of mouth. Costs nothing but your time and a bit of nerve. Converts best, because someone the buyer trusts has vouched for you. The catch: it's slow, you can't switch it on, and it only reaches people one step from you.
• LinkedIn, done by hand. Costs time, or Sales Navigator Core at $119.99 a month from LinkedIn if you want a better list. Reaches people one step beyond your network, and they can check your profile before they reply. The catch: a dormant or CV-style profile kills it before you start.
• Cold email. Reaches big lists cheaply. Works best for a simple offer with a clear, tested message. The catch: no profile, no face and no shared connections, so trust is starting from zero, and the set-up has to be right before a single email lands in an inbox.
• Ads. Fast and measurable once you know what works. The catch: you pay for every click while you're still learning what to say, and a stranger who clicks an ad still has to trust a business with no track record.

When is cold email or ads the better choice?

Cold email wins when you sell something low-priced to a big, well-defined market, where buyers don't need to trust you personally. Ads win when you already have a few clients, know exactly which message they responded to and have money to test. Then ads can grow what's working faster than any hand-sent method.

What I wouldn't do is use either to find out what you sell. That's what your first ten conversations are for. They are cheaper than any campaign, and the buyer tells you in their own words what the problem is.

What order should you use them in?

Use them in this order: the people who already trust you, then hand-sent conversations on LinkedIn, then a weekly post, and only then cold email or ads. The early steps cost time rather than money, and they teach you the words buyers use. Here's the plan for your first ten clients, starting this week.

1. Monday: write your offer in one sentence. Use the words a buyer would say out loud. If you can't, stop here and fix this first, because no channel can sell what you can't describe.
2. Tuesday: tell 20 people who already trust you. Former colleagues, old clients, people you've helped. Send them the sentence and ask one question: who do you know with this problem? That's word of mouth on purpose.
3. Wednesday: fix your LinkedIn profile. Your headline says who you help and with what. Your About section talks about the buyer, not you. Showing up on LinkedIn with a bad profile is going to a networking event in slippers.
4. From Thursday: send 100 connection requests a week by hand. Send them with no note to people who fit your buyer and have posted in the last 30 days. Thank everyone who accepts with one genuine question. No pitch.
5. Every week: post once. Something useful, so people who check you out find someone real. I've explained how posting and outreach fit together in is cold outreach or posting content the better way to find clients on LinkedIn.
6. Only then test cold email or ads, using the exact words your first clients used to describe their problem.

Give the plan four weeks before you judge it, then count the conversations it started and who they came from.

What does it look like when we do it for you?

Bronze exists for founders who are new to LinkedIn or coming back to a dormant account. It is hand-sent network growth: our operators send 100 requests a week by hand through your own Sales Navigator, thank everyone who accepts and hand you the people who reply. Nothing goes out that you haven't approved.

It's $550 a month, month to month with no contract, and we aim for 3 to 5 conversations a week. If you're comparing us with other firms, I've written a fair round-up of the best LinkedIn outreach services for founders, and the tools you'd need to run it yourself are in the best LinkedIn tools for small business owners.

Who is this not for?

If you can't yet say what you sell in one sentence, don't pay us or anyone else. Spend the money on time with your first buyers instead. If your referrals are already pouring in, what you need is capacity, and a new channel won't give you that.

And if you're thinking of hiring someone to do the prospecting from day one, read should I hire an SDR or outsource LinkedIn outreach first, because a hire before the message is proven is an expensive experiment.

So which channel should a founder start with?

Start with the people who already know you, then add hand-sent conversations on LinkedIn, and keep cold email and ads for when you know what sells. Trust is the thing a new business is short of, and conversations build it faster than any budget. That's how the first clients arrive, through word of mouth and real conversations, long before any ad pays its way.