Lyndsay and Martin from Jammy Digital responded to my request for small business owners to showcase themselves and their businesses on my blog to provide insight, advice and inspiration for others who are starting up/thinking of starting up their own small businesses – including me!
The idea originally formed because I was fascinated by people’s stories and reasons for setting up their own businesses and I wanted to learn as much as I could in order to educate myself for the benefit of my own business.
I wanted to find a way to ask the questions I wanted the answers to but I realised that if I was interested surely others were interested in the answers too! In addition, I wanted the businesses willing to share their stories to get something in return so I devised the ‘Small Business Showcase’ blog series which will give each small business featured promotion across social media. Win-win for everyone!
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The same 10 questions were posed to all small businesses via questionnaire – here are Martin and Lyndsay’s replies:
1) How would you summarise the service(s)/product(s) your business offers?
We design WordPress websites for small business owners and personal brands, and we’re also launching a membership soon, aimed at helping personal brands build and grow their website.
2) How long have you been a small business owner?
Since January 2013 (five years now!).
3) What inspired you to set up your business?
We started out with a local web design agency, but we set up Jammy Digital as we were increasingly getting clients from across the country. It’s been amazing working with so many people from the UK and the rest of the world too!
4) What platforms/strategies do you use to promote your business?
Our website is the main platform that drives business and sales. We focus heavily on content marketing and hardly spend anything on advertising. It takes time rather than money but it works.
We’re also part of many membership groups, and these are great for forming connections with other people and word of mouth referrals. We didn’t join them for this reason. We joined so we could learn more, but it’s lovely getting business from them too!
5) What do you consider your greatest business achievement so far?
We’re proud that both of us have managed to quit our jobs and join the business. This took a long time as we needed to build something that could sustain two salaries.
In the beginning, both of us worked full-time and spent evening and weekends on the business. Martin quit his job first (being the techy guy!) and Lyndsay finished in 2017. We loved our jobs, but our goal from the very beginning was to finish and build something together. It was wonderful finally getting there.
6) What do you consider your greatest business challenges?
I think this is a challenge for all business owners: finding the time to do everything! At the moment, we spend Mon-Fri 9-5 on client work and evening and weekends on our own promotion (content marketing, podcast recording etc). However, with us starting a family we’re working out how we best spend our time and being ruthless with it – no faffing about on social media. It’s hard, but we’re getting there!
7) What resources/training have been most beneficial to your business so far?
It’s hard to mention everything! We invest heavily in our learning because the more we learn, the better we can help our clients and our own business too.
We’ve learnt so much from individuals too, such as John Espirian through his blog and coaching. He is THE relentlessly helpful copywriter!
8) What advice would you give to anyone thinking of starting their own business?
Don’t do it alone. Join communities with like-minded people. Starting a business can get lonely. You feel like it’s you vs the world sometimes. Finding other people, specifically who work within your niche, can really help.
9) What are your future plans for your business?
We’re launching our membership site soon, which aims to help personal brands build and grow a successful online presence. It’s scary as we’ve never done anything like it before, but we’re excited to get to know our members and help them as much as we can. It’s something we love to do.
10) Are there any other small businesses you would like to give a shout out to who have been an inspiration/support to you?
Col Gray from Pixels Ink. He’s our go-to guy for design and branding. We go to him for feedback and advice, and just having someone like him look at our business from his point of view is priceless. He also runs a fantastic YouTube channel, definitely check it out for branding and design advice!
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My ‘Small Business Showcase’ blog series will be published every Monday, Wednesday and Friday – previous showcases can be read here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here and here.
If you would like to feature your small business too, please email me at penningandplanning@gmail.com.
Claire
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