If you have vetted your business idea, that it to say that you (1) told someone (in some way) what you were willing to do in exchange for money, (2) someone actually did give you money for your service, (3) you performed your service to some degree of satisfaction, and (4) you received in written form (or another form of testimony) a positive review from one or more clients, you are ready to ramp up your offer.
Now you can add energy to your offering to see what happens next. You are ready to experiment with communicating your offer to others to see if you can get other people to pay you for what you are offering.
Be cautious. Do not go crazy trying to advertise your offer. This is the testing phase. Where you invest small amounts of advertising in different ways and evaluating your response. After you have run this test, you will have a good idea of how to promote your business. Even though advertising is not an exacting science, you will have data on which you can somewhat predict what your results will be.
Also, remember that you don’t have to do it all. Find other people that you can rely on to help you do all the things that you need to do and outsource everything that you can, especially the tasks that you would rather not do if you can. For instance, if you need a logo for your advertising, outsource it, get someone on fiverr.com to do one u for you for five dollars.
ROI
Keep in mind that the results you are looking for is your rate of ROI (Return On Investment). If you pay $25 in advertising in the newspaper, how many calls do you get? Same with Facebook, or the radio. Make sure to track everything separately.
If you find an advertising vehicle that seems to work, increase your dollar amount, and track those results. If your results go up commensurate with your increased investment. This method of getting the word out about your business is effective.
Keep testing and tracking, then tweaking your offer.
Hopefully, you can find joy in the tweaking process. I enjoy making changes in offers and graphics to get an increased response rate. If you can wrap your mind around your marketing in a positive way, making it a game, or scientific experiment, you can have fun while you are adjusting your business offering(s).
The goal is to accumulate enough data so that you know that for every dollar you spend in a particular marketplace, you will receive back a determinable rate of response. Therefore, if you increase the dollar amount, the responses increase accordingly. Sometimes, they increase exponentially, and not how the response rate may change at certain times of the year.
Diversification
In times of the year where your potential clients are less responsive to your advertising, it might be better to take time off and understand that your business has a cyclical lifestyle. If that proves to be true, relax your business efforts during these times and think about diversifying.
Look for another business that is cyclical, but up when your business in turning down. This is the perfect synergistic relationship between two businesses, that will keep your efforts rock-solid throughout the year.