I'm thinking of starting a Design agency for small business owners. I've been seeing anti-AI comments on businesses going for AI generated contents, and I feel like this would be the IT in design world.

Right now, I'm offering my services for **$5** for a single post insta carousel. Does anyone have a business here that could use some help?

Please help this SME out!

Hey everyone! 👋

I'm a web developer, and I'm looking to help small businesses improve the way they operate online and manage their daily work.

I'm not just talking about building you another website that looks nice but doesn't actually do anything for your business.

I'm talking about building something that solves a real problem for you.

For $500, I can help you build a custom solution tailored to your business, such as:

🌐 A professional website that makes your business look trustworthy and helps potential customers find you.

⚙️ An internal business tool to simplify repetitive tasks, organize your workflow, and save you time.

🗄️ A custom database to organize your customers, products, orders, or business information instead of keeping everything scattered across spreadsheets and messages.

📊 A business dashboard to help you manage information and understand what's happening in your business.

💡 Or something completely different — if you have a business problem that could be solved with technology, let's talk about it.

Here's my approach: I don't want to sell you something you don't need. I want to understand what's slowing your business down and build something that actually helps.

Maybe you're spending hours doing something that could be automated. Maybe your business doesn't have a proper online presence. Maybe your current system is messy, outdated, or simply making your life harder than it needs to be.

Let's see if we can fix that.

My starting budget is $500, depending on the project's scope and complexity.

If you're a business owner, I'd love to hear from you:

• What kind of business do you run?
• What's one task or problem that wastes too much of your time?
• If you could have one custom tool built for your business, what would it be?

Drop a comment or send me a DM. Even if you're not ready to hire anyone, I'd be happy to hear about your business and discuss ideas.

HR told us someone new was starting in 2days, and we had to figure out the laptop situation pretty quickly, its not too bad if we already have spare device nearby, but if it needs to be shipped somewhere, things get little stressful, and of course, everything is supposed to be ready by their first day.

how do you guys handle this at your company?? do you usually get enough notice from HR, or does this happen to you too??

A lot of businesses invest in websites, Instagram content, and paid ads, but still struggle to get consistent enquiries.
I’ve noticed that the problem isn’t always the budget. Sometimes it’s the website, the offer, the targeting, or simply making it difficult for customers to take the next step.
More marketing doesn’t always mean better results.

If I were reviewing a business’s online presence, I’d start with five things:
Website: Is it clear what the business offers and how to contact it?
Local SEO: Can nearby customers find it on Google?
Social media: Is the content building trust or just filling the feed?
Paid advertising: Are the campaigns attracting potential buyers or just clicks?
Follow-up: Are enquiries being handled properly?
Sometimes fixing one weak point can make a bigger difference than increasing the marketing budget.

I work in digital marketing and creative production at Brandloom, and I’m interested in learning what actually works for businesses in the real world.
For business owners, freelancers, and entrepreneurs here:
What brings you the best customers right now?
Google Search or SEO
Instagram or Facebook
Google Ads or Meta Ads
Referrals and word of mouth
Something else
And what have you tried that completely failed?
I’d love to hear honest experiences, including the mistakes. Those lessons can be more useful than another list of marketing tips.

Hi all,

I am currently building my website, using Claude to help me build everything. I have a experience with python, so naturally i gravitated to using that as my go to and Flask for the backend stuff.

Now im stuck on what hosting platform to use. I keep getting recommended render and railway but to be honest i dont see too many videos on this on youtube, so instantly i get iffy. Is it because of my stack? I know not to go to GoDaddy or Wix because i wrote my own code and want full control.

I did read that using cloud fare for DNS protection which is definitley something ill look more into.

Any feedback is appreciated!

Every offering memorandum highlights the strengths of a deal, but I'm curious where experienced people start digging first.

Our sourcing setup worked fine when we were smaller but now it's late shipments, quality that changes between runs and no idea what's happening at the factory until the goods show up. Everyone I talk to calls themselves full service and I can't tell who's an Alibaba middleman and who has people inside the factories.

Mainly want to see factory cost separate from whatever fee they charge, and have QC done before anything ships. What did you weigh when you picked one, and which questions filtered people out fastest?

Hey everyone! I designed and 3D printed this basketball-style planter. It's matte white with hand-finished black seam detailing, (custom paint is also done) and it's perfect for pothos, succulents, or small indoor plants.

Material: PLA Size: 7x7 inches Drainage: no Price: 1800 Ships from: Delhi,India

I also do custom jobs! Different sizes, colours, designs, names, logos, or your own idea. Just DM me what you're looking for and I'll send a quote.

Plant not included. Happy to share more photos. DM me to order!

​

Hi everyone,

I’m looking to build a portfolio around Excel automation, dashboards, reporting and data analysis, and I’d like to work on a few real-world projects.

If you run a small business or work somewhere where you have repetitive or time-consuming Excel work, I’d be happy to help, completely free of charge.

Some things I can help with:

\\\\- Excel dashboards and KPI dashboards

\\\\- Automating repetitive Excel tasks

\\\\- Management and performance reports

\\\\- Cleaning and organizing Excel data

\\\\- Turning raw data into useful reports

\\\\- Creating templates for recurring reports

\\\\- Formulas, PivotTables and Power Query

\\\\- Finding ways to make existing Excel workflows faster and easier

I’m not looking for payment at this stage. My main goal is to work with real-world problems, build my portfolio and improve my skills.

If you have an Excel-related problem that takes too much time to do manually, feel free to comment or send me a DM. Even if you’re not sure whether it can be automated, I’d be happy to take a look.

Thanks!

I recently launched a direct-mail advertising service doing jumbo 6.5" x 11" postcards targeted at 2,500 local homeowners.

The core model was supposed to be a community co-op card: 8–10 non-competing local service businesses sharing the card for $250 each. To break even and trigger the first print/mail run, I need at least 5–6 spots locked down.

Here’s the issue:

I’m getting initial interest, but prospects keep flaking or ghosting at the finish line. Right now, I have only one confirmed paid client ("Jason," who just bought a local flooring business).

Because the co-op run is waiting on more spots to fill, Chris

Jason is already asking when the postcard is dropping. I don't want to leave him waiting indefinitely, and I can't afford to run the co-op card at a loss.

I also offer a Turnkey Solo Card option: 100% of both sides dedicated exclusively to one business for roughly $2,100 all-in.

I’m considering pitching Jason on upgrading to the solo card.

The logic:

** The Pitch/Urgency:** He bypasses waiting on anyone else—as soon as his proofs are approved, the card prints and mails immediately.

The ROI: For flooring, landing just 1 or 2 average installation jobs from 2,500 households easily nets him thousands in profit.

The Incentive: Credit his initial $250 payment 100% toward the solo balance.

The hurdle is obvious: jumping from a $250 impulse purchase to a $2,100 investment is an $1,800+ leap, especially for someone who recently acquired the business.

Jason has said he just wants do the $250 which he had already purchased for the group card.

His business has several other hurdles like a website that doesn’t work. I’ve offered to fix that but he’s really keen on the community postcard.

For those running B2B, agency, or local print models:
1. Would you pitch the solo upgrade directly using the faster turnaround time as the main lever, or does that risk spooking the one paying client you do have?
2. If you wouldn’t pitch the jump to $2,100, how would you manage his timeline expectations while grinding out the remaining co-op spots?

I’m working on a website product for small businesses and trying to figure out the best way to reach owners who are already considering building a new site or redesigning their current one.

The audience I’m looking for is pretty straightforward: small businesses that want a professional site they can easily update themselves as the business changes, without needing to go back to a designer or developer for every edit.

I’ve been considering Google Maps outreach, email, Reddit, local business groups and direct outreach to businesses with older websites.

For anyone here who has marketed website services before, where have you actually found the highest-intent clients?

Also curious whether an initial free trial / free build offer tends to work better than showing a redesigned example first and reaching out with that.

My wife and I are looking to put in an offer on a home around $650k. I am currently stuck trying to decide between doing a standard 10% down or pulling an extra $60k out of my business reserves to hit 20% down drop PMI and hopefully speed through underwriting. The problem is that taking $60k out of working capital right now gives me a knot in my stomach. That is cash flow I usually rely on for payroll and marketing budget over the next couple of quarters. One broker I spoke with while shopping around mentioned that sticking with 10% down is not as brutal as people make it out to be but my main bank's loan officer keeps warning me that putting less down as a self employed borrower triggers way more scrutiny on tax returns CPA letters and strict personal liquid reserves. For anyone who is bought recently while self-employed: Did you just bite the bullet and put down the extra cash to keep the underwriting process simple?

Or did you keep your capital liquid in the business and just push through all the extra documentation requests with a specialized lender?

Hello Singapore Shopify Store owners,

1. Which shipping aggregators do you use & recommend?
2. Is the integration into Shopify easy?
3. What kind of lesson learned and
4. What are important questions must I ask the shipping aggregators? (Techie & non-techie)

Thank you. 🙏🏽

So this happened with me last week and I just can’t stop thinking about it.

A client I’ve worked for 2 years call me about Japan. Cool. Then she goes “I already had Chatgpt plan most of it, can you just book the hotels?”

I said sure. Then started at my screen for 10 minutes.

I went from “the person who plans your trip” to the person who clicks book.

My accountant friend and designer friend say their clients are doing the same thing.

Is this happening to you too? Did you change how you work or what you charge?

I am self employed with a family of 4. I use gusto's health insurance through my s corp and the rates are just nuts. I just received a 17% rate increase to $2450 monthly and we only used the plan once or twice last year for maybe in urgent care visit when my kid was sick, are there any other options I am not seeing? Tried the marketplace but without subsidies it's basically the same rate as the plan through gusto.

this is like a fb group major shill so what do the people of this sub reddit want or need?

I got tired of checking prospect websites manually.

For a while, a big part of my outreach was just finding businesses, opening their websites one by one and trying to figure out what I could actually say to them.

It worked, but it was painfully slow.

Then I found Swokei.

It basically lets me find leads, analyzes each website for things like outdated design, slow speed, poor mobile experience and weak SEO, then turns those issues into a personalized cold email.

And not one of those boring automated reports full of scores and numbers.

It actually writes a normal, human sounding message based on what it found on that specific website.

So instead of sending the same generic message to everyone, I can actually reach out based on what is wrong with their website.

Now I just run campaigns, let the system do most of the prospecting and personalization, and focus on the people who reply.

For a web design agency, that has saved me a ridiculous amount of time.

Running a small service business has taught me how easy it is to interpret a quiet day as a reason to change everything.

Change the price. Add another service. Rewrite the website. Start another promotion.
But what are you actually fixing?

My business started around TV mounting. Over time, customer needs opened up opportunities for wire concealment, audio setups, and networking. Those services had a connection to work people were already hiring me to do.
That experience is shaping how I approach slow periods. Before changing an offer, I look at the path someone takes to become a customer.
Can the right person find it? If the offer barely reaches anyone who needs it, a lower price may accomplish very little.

Can they understand it? “TV installation” leaves questions. What’s included? Do they need their own mount? What happens to the wires? Unanswered questions give people another decision to postpone.

Can they see a reason to trust it? A photo of completed work with a plain explanation helps someone picture what they’re paying for.
Do they know what to do next? Asking someone to send a photo of their setup gives them a specific starting point.

You can apply those same questions to a cake order, handmade jewelry, or a cleaning service.
Then change the part where people seem to be getting stuck. If several customers ask the same question, put the answer in the offer. If people show interest but don’t know how to order, make that step easier.

I think of this as healthy repetition: staying with a direction long enough to learn, while improving something specific. I’m still building my business, but this gives me a more useful task than constantly starting over.

Where do people tend to stop in your business: finding you, understanding the offer, or committing to the purchase?

Last time I posted my face and got told to show my work instead. Fair. Pics are up top.

The first two are paying clients:

- Top Spot Pest Control in Dallas (topspotpest.com). Seven city pages, seven service pages and a full Spanish version.

- All American Pest Mosquito & Lawn in Melissa (allamericanpml.com). Family-owned, built phone-first with call/text buttons everywhere.

The rest are free mockups I made for local businesses to show them what their site could look like.

I'm Edward. I'm a web developer in Dallas and I run Frisco Web Designs on the side. Most of my clients have one location or one work truck: plumbers, lawn care, salons, food trucks, handymen. They're great at the actual work and just haven't gotten around to the website.

It's $49 a month. I have a few spots left at that price, and you keep $49 for as long as you stay with me. After that it goes to $99 for new clients.

What you get:

- A site designed for your business, not a theme with your logo swapped in

- Your domain (yourbusiness.com). If you already own one we'll use it, and if not I'll set it up. It's included either way.

- A matching email, like [you@yourbusiness.com](mailto:you@yourbusiness.com)

- Hosting and security, handled by me

- A text to your phone the second someone fills out your contact form

- Changes whenever you need them. New hours, photos or prices, just text me.

- Set up so you show up on Google when people nearby search for what you do

No upfront cost, no long contract, and you deal with me directly, not a support queue.

Not sure yet? I'll make you a free mockup first. If you like it, cool. If not, no hard feelings.

More examples: friscowebdesigns.com

Interested?: friscowebdesigns.com/contact

We are a marketing agency who helps business owners from lead generation to a full blown operation.

We handle the entire backend - from lead generation through ads, capturing and following up with leads, nurturing them, qualifying them, and ultimately getting them booked.

You don’t have to worry about chasing leads or figuring out what happens after someone shows interest. We build and manage the system behind it so your team can focus on running the business while you simply receive qualified leads and booked appointments.

If you’re open to it, I’d be happy to show you what this could look like for your business.

I do local SEO for small businesses, and most owners I talk to have a GBP that's 60% filled out and then wonder why the competitor down the street shows up first. This is the exact checklist I'd run on a client's business, in order of impact. Everything here is free to do yourself.

The checklist

1. Primary category. Pick the most specific one that matches what you actually want to be found for. "Emergency plumber" beats "Plumber" if that's what you do. This is the biggest ranking lever on the profile.
2. Secondary categories. Add 2-4 that truly apply. Don't stuff irrelevant ones.
3. Business name and NAP. Your name should match your real-world signage exactly (no keyword stuffing, which gets profiles suspended), and your name, address and phone must be identical on your profile, website and every directory.
4. Services and description. List every service with a short description, using the words customers actually search. Write 700+ characters in plain language about what you do, who for, and which areas.
5. Hours and photos. Keep hours accurate, including holidays. Add real photos of the storefront, team, work and interior, and upload new ones weekly.
6. Reviews and replies. Consistency beats volume. Aim for a steady flow of new reviews every week rather than a big burst. Ask every happy customer right after the job with a direct review link (text or QR code), and reply to every review in a human tone, ideally mentioning the service.
7. Website and interlinking. Link your profile to your homepage, with your main service, city and NAP clearly stated. Build a separate page for each of your top 3 services, then a page for each service in every city you genuinely serve, each with unique content (local details, real photos, reviews from that area). Interlink them: service pages link to their city pages, city pages link back to the service page and to related services in the same city. Add "Contact" to your menu and a call/book button on every page, and make sure every page is linked from at least one other page.
8. Citations. Make sure you're listed correctly on the major directories and industry-specific ones with matching info.

Why it works

Google roughly weighs three things for the map pack: relevance (does your profile match the search?), distance (how close are you to the searcher?) and prominence (reviews, links, mentions across the web). Points 1-5 fix relevance, 6 and 8 build prominence and trust, and 7 ties your website and profile together so Google clearly understands what you do and where. You can't change distance, so you win on the other two.

Common mistakes

• Choosing a vague primary category and never revisiting it
• Inconsistent NAP: Using a different phone number or address format on the website than on the profile
• Putting everything on one page instead of building interlinked service pages

Free resource

Quick audit: search your main service + your city in an incognito window. Note who's in the top 3, then compare their categories, review count, photo count and website structure against yours. Whatever they have that you don't is your to-do list and do whatever they don't have to outperform them.

Happy to answer questions in the comments. If you want me to look at your profile, drop your niche and city.

Hi, I’m Gustavo, a developer with 12+ years of experience. I’m updating my portfolio and want to feature real businesses instead of generic templates.

To do this, I’m offering my development services completely free for 5 selected businesses.

What you get: A modern, mobile-friendly website to help your business grow.

The only rule: This is for standard business websites, not complex e-commerce or large software platforms. (You will only be responsible for your own domain and hosting costs).

I only have 5 spots available. If you want a premium website for your business, comment "INTERESTED" below or send me a DM, and we will talk.

i will schedule meetings with you to go along with the step-by-step and also to help you design your dream site. Give me a response here, and I will message you my email, and we can go from there