We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Erin DeCuir a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Erin, thanks for joining us today. Alright, let’s jump into one of the most exciting parts of starting a new venture – how did you get your first client who was not a friend or family?

While I was able to land my first client within the first two weeks of launching my business (she was a friend), it took me almost an entire year to sign my next client, who was a complete stranger!

When I first quit social media, I had no idea how I was going to make money. I had no idea where my clients were going to come from or if building a business without social media was even possible. However, I had an inkling that people would eventually find me because I did something radical in quitting social media. I was fairly confident (aka barely confident lol) that there were other people out there who felt the same way as me, that they didn’t want to be on social media for the same reasons I didn’t want to be. So, I talked about it regularly, both in person and online, and before I knew it, people I had never met before started showing up on my email list, eager and excited to hear from me!

After a year of regularly emailing my very-small list (I had made a commitment to myself that I would email my list every single week for a year, regardless of its size), I got an email from someone inquiring about my services. As it turns out, she had been on my email list for almost six months and had been regularly reading my weekly emails, and she was finally ready to work together!

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

What up! I’m Erin. I’ve been a solopreneur for almost seven years now. I’m married to my husband, Andrew, and we have two fur-kiddos, a cat named Penny and a dog named Peeve (like “pet peeve”). We spend a lot of our time puzzling, re-watching The Office, and staying active (we met at a CrossFit gym). This year will mark nine years of sobriety for both of us! Go us!

I’m currently writing my first novel (I have a master’s degree in English and creative writing), and I enjoy playing tennis (I played Division I college tennis at the University of Kansas). I also teach tennis to kids, ages 4-12!

If you’re on my email list, you’ll quickly learn how much I love chatting about mental (and physical!) health, goals, and productivity (in life and in online business).

I have been an email writer and designer for the last two years, and I chose this particular field after my fallout with social media. I had become low-key addicted to it! So, I decided to delete all of the platforms from my phone and quit cold turkey.

Because I had a genuine love for writing and a deep desire to create, I began emailing my very-small list once a week as a way to scratch the itch, so to speak.

I realized how slow and peaceful (and enjoyable!) life became when I only had one piece of content to create every week. I wanted to help others find that same peace, so I launched my email writing and design business to help other online service providers build brand awareness, establish trust with their audience, and market their businesses, all without social media. It’s been a lot of fun!

We’d love to hear about how you keep in touch with clients.

The only content I create for my business is my weekly newsletter. I’ve found that, by consistently sending out value-based emails, this is not only an effective long-game sales strategy but an effective way to build a brand and an audience full of eager-to-hear-from-you people. If you have done a good job in educating your audience on a specific topic via your emails, this is the first step to establishing that you really know what you’re talking about and that you are qualified to help the reader solve their problem. When you do this successfully, people WANT to hear more from you, which keeps open rates high and people engaged!

What’s been the best source of new clients for you?

Pinterest! I use Pinterest to promote my free email course, Simply Foundational, where I send subscribers an email a day for seven days, teaching them how to market their business WITHOUT social media. The email course is something I created once and promoted on Pinterest a handful of times (Pinterest isn’t social media; it’s a search engine, like Google, meaning the content is available forever and ever 24/7/365), and to this day, I still have people subscribing to my email list to get access to it.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.erindecuir.com/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/erindecuir/
• Other: Free course for online service providers and creative entrepreneurs who want to build a business or brand without social media: https://www.erindecuir.com/growaprofitablebiz