Marketing for a personal business: my 2024 review

My third article of 2025, and the third review of another of my business lines.

After reviewing the blog in 2024 in the first article and my e-commerce business, Yo pongo el hielo, in the second, today I am going to explain the marketing behind my personal business.

I am not going to discuss business figures in this post. Not because I do not want to. Quite the opposite.

While writing it, I realised it was longer and denser than I like, so the figures section I am saving for next week's article.

Here I will focus exclusively on the marketing actions. That way I can go into as much detail as I like.

Context

To make everything easier to understand, I first need to set the scene:

Although I have been doing e-commerce and SEO consulting, building websites and teaching for a very long time, these projects have always been secondary.

Ever since I started working, alongside these occasional jobs I have always had one main project that took most of my attention and paid the bills. Long-time readers will know most of them: Tiendanimal, Lowi, MásMóvil, Coonic and a few others as an employee, followed by Yo pongo el hielo as an entrepreneur.

The side jobs gave me some extra income, but I never included it in my financial planning. They did not move the needle enough.

They also came to me on their own. I never had to look for any of them. That is probably why I never took this income stream seriously.

Or perhaps I was simply very comfortable in that situation. That may also be true.

Then 2023 arrived.

And, as with every new year, I started thinking about what I was doing with my life and what I wanted to do next.

That year I was also turning 40. Because of what the date symbolised, I thought about it more than usual.

That was when I began planning the transition between my income streams..

A transition that meant moving away from one main project plus occasional side work, balancing the scales and managing several important projects at the same time.

That mainly required me to get serious about three things:

1. Getting more clients for consulting and training.
2. Creating and selling more online courses..
3. Making myself better known, the means of achieving the previous two goals.

So at the start of the year I spent far more hours than advisable in front of the PC and finished the online course about how to set up an e-commerce business that I had been creating for three months.

At the end of January I started selling it through my daily email to the few subscribers on my list, and to my LinkedIn audience, which was not bad.

Then I launched more courses.

I attended more events.

And more clients arrived.

Seeing that things were working, in 2024 I continued down the same path: diversifying projects and income streams. Even more committed to the goal, if possible.

I will tell you about the results next week. For now, here are the actions I took to achieve them.

The channels I used in 2024 for my personal business

I should warn you that my “marketing plan” —if we can call it that— is quite unusual and different from that of any other business.

But that means two things:

1. You certainly will not be able to copy it exactly in your case.
2. And you will certainly find at least one idea you can reproduce in your own business.

You will also see that practically none of these actions cost money, but they do cost time.

So, if you have no time and need results, this will not work for you. Consider advertising instead..

However, if you would rather invest time, you will probably want to take a few notes.

One more point: I do not distinguish between training and consulting clients, because in my case the boundary is very blurred and they often overlap (consulting first and mentoring afterwards is a fairly common combination).

What I mean is that I use the same channels and actions to attract clients for both services, not one set for training and another for services. The same ones for everything.

And they are the following.

Daily email

Although I began 2023 full of enthusiasm, writing from Monday to Friday and maintaining that frequency for most of the year, the results showed that Friday's open rate was much lower. That makes sense given the type of subscribers I have and the content of my emails.

The thing is, Friday's email takes exactly as much time and effort to write as any other day's. So, during a period of work overload in 2023, I had to prioritise. I killed the Friday email.

In other words, when the effort is the same, I remove the action that produces the weakest results.

In 2024, when I had much more work —I will also discuss that in next week's post— I removed another email: Tuesday's.

This leaves me with a very manageable frequency of three emails a week: two sales emails and one featuring the weekly blog article..

For now, in my case, I think it is the ideal frequency. It is the point at which I always feel I have something to say and nothing feels forced. Unsubscribes are also kept to a minimum, probably because the quality of the emails shows.

Does that mean this frequency is ideal for every personal business?

No.

Not at all.

Every project is completely different. Its subscribers and content have nothing to do with anyone else's.

In my case, I reached this frequency after trying several and I feel comfortable with it. But, as you could see in the Yo pongo el hielo review, there we send customers up to eight emails a week.

The results on that project justify doing it that way.

I am absolutely certain that, if I could increase the rate at which I acquire subscribers, the return from each email would rise. The effort would therefore be more worthwhile.

But until that rate increases —a very clear goal for 2025— I will keep things as they are.

And this is the first piece of advice I offer you: a daily email is fantastic, but it is not compulsory..

In other words, it is a means of achieving something, not an end in itself..

You do not “have to” send one email a day; you “have to” sell. If one email a day achieves that, great.

If you feel —and have evidence— that the time you invest in email would be better spent elsewhere, then do that other thing.

So do not do it just because others do it or tell you that you should. If your list is small, the return on each email will probably be small too. You may be better off focusing more on acquiring new subscribers, for example.

There is the idea for you.

Talks and presentations at events

I said at the beginning that one of my three areas of action for the year was making myself better known..

One of the approaches that suits me best is speaking at events, because it positions you as an expert in front of a sizeable group of potential clients.

Because public speaking is not difficult for me, offering an hour of my time in exchange for that exposure is worthwhile in my case.

In 2024 I gave quite a few, mainly about applying AI to e-commerce.

I started talking about it in February in Córdoba at the 4th Piensa en Amarillo conference, organised by the delightful people at Amarillo Limón.

I repeated the talk a month later here in Málaga at the PrestaShop Tour organised by the equally brilliant Grupo Trevenque and Jorge Marcos from PrestaShop.

In June I was invited to discuss the topic on the Product Hackers podcast, which was the talk with the greatest reach. Shortly afterwards, in September, I covered the same subject twice at San Telmo, the executive business school, once at its Málaga campus and once in Seville.

In addition, I spoke at another six events about digital businesses and e-commerce.

In fact, because I delivered some of them twice, and to avoid repeating myself too much, I have not even added them to the media appearances section of the website.

The point is that after each event, my subscriber list gets a healthy boost, which is the objective.

That said, although I usually enjoy them a lot, the end-of-year run —with several talks outside the city plus a two-day training course in Segovia— was tough. I finished exhausted and running on empty.

And even so, I already have two events booked for 2025.

Media appearances

Alongside the above, I also keep an eye out for possible media appearances. In exchange for helping a journalist with a digital topic, I usually get at least a high-quality organic link to my website..

On the best occasions, that link also brings a good amount of traffic and the occasional lead. Not bad..

That is why this is another format I recommend you try, because the benefit-to-cost ratio is consistently very positive for me.

SEO

And since we are talking about links, this is a good time to explain what I did with SEO in general.

This year I set myself the goal of writing one blog article a week, and it has been one of the levers that worked best for me..

In addition to content SEO, I did a little free link building, although very cautiously.

This year, however, I am going to add a substantial layer of links. I expect to see results sooner rather than later, because the combination of good content and link building usually works very well..

Another action you may want to note down.

LinkedIn

Between the daily email and the blog articles, I have been very active on LinkedIn. More active than in any previous year, without question.

The metrics on my posts are nothing special, but it is a channel that has helped me win new clients..

I know because they told me things such as:

“Yes, I read your latest article and liked the part about…”

D*mn, if you liked it, click Like. Or comment. Or share it so it reaches more people.

So I do not know whether clients genuinely liked it or were flattering me, but they hired me, so this channel does work for me.

The pity is that, inevitably, video is taking over this social network too. It is becoming less a network for professionals and more another Instagram.

I prefer text, so we will see whether I adapt in 2025 or gradually abandon it. I will try the former, but given its recent evolution, I am not at all sure.

But if video is your thing, you know what to do.

Participation in membership communities

You were not expecting this one, were you?

After all, who joins a membership community intending to find clients?

Not me, certainly. But something interesting happened with Círculo Copy.:

You see, I joined as a student to learn about AI applied to copywriting and use it in my e-commerce business, Yo pongo el hielo..

That was the original intention, but because I participated actively in the community, some members asked me for quotes for both small one-off jobs and larger consulting projects.

That is one side of it.

On the other, the two founders, Rafa Casas and Josely Medina, eventually invited me to join them in running the whole operation. Since a membership business was something I had been considering for a while, the decision to accept was easy.

Put those two things together and joining this membership has brought me:

1. More clients.
2. Greater visibility.
3. More online-course sales, because some members have bought one or more of my courses.
4. And, of course, a new income stream from which I expect a great deal.

Do the first three sound familiar?

Yes, they are the three spearheads I mentioned at the beginning —the areas I had to work on if I wanted to change my business model.

All three came from joining a membership community.

That made me make a mental note that joining other membership communities whose members are my target audience could be a good way to attract clients in future (I told you my marketing plan was not exactly normal).

The truth is that, when you think about it, it makes sense.

It is very similar to giving talks at business schools: after the session, contacts and requests for proposals arrive in my inbox that same day.

Because if you demonstrate authority before an audience that values your services… the conclusion is obvious.

Still, as I said, it is not something I am considering in the short term. The idea came to me suddenly, and I need to analyse it much more carefully to see whether it is genuinely repeatable and what real effects it could produce.

Leveraging other people's lists

This one grew out of the previous point and was completely unexpected.

In 2023 I did offer to appear in the newsletters and podcasts of several professionals I follow.

You know the arrangement: you contribute your expertise on a subject and, in exchange, that professional's audience gets to know you..

A genuine win-win arrangement. That is why I like it so much.

But in 2024 I did not have time to do it.

Even so, it came to me without my seeking it: Rafa and Josely, my partners and the founders of Círculo Copy, kindly mentioned me to their lists when I launched my courses.

And it made a huge difference: more leads and more sales.

I tried to return the favour afterwards, of course. But my list is much smaller than theirs, so I am sure the impact was nowhere near the same.

Once again, thank you both for doing that 🙂

And my advice to you is this: if you know a subject well, find professionals with compatible audiences and consider this kind of collaboration , because it is an excellent way to become better known and grow your subscriber base.

And, as a result, your sales.

The biggest mistake you can make

Well, that is the full marketing mix for my business in 2024.

Looking back over it, I can see that it is an unusual combination and one that suits me very well, which is what matters most.

And that is exactly the message I want to convey here:

I believe that, in a personal business, using channels you do not feel comfortable with is unsustainable.

No matter how fashionable they are, if you do not like writing, you do not need to send one email a day.

You can send emails from Monday to Friday.

Or one day a week.

Or not send any at all.

If writing a mediocre email takes you three hours, even if practice makes you a little faster, is that time really a better investment than another type of action?

Think about it.

The same applies to social media: if you do not like it —as I do not— do not use it. Find another acquisition method:

• Perhaps it is SEO.
• Perhaps it is SEM.
• Affiliate marketing.
• Cold calling.

I know nothing about your business, what you are good at or what you enjoy, but I can tell you that doing something every day that does not motivate you when alternatives exist seems counterproductive..

That is why my advice is to stop first and think about the client-acquisition model you enjoy.:

• Social media to capture email addresses, followed by a daily email? Great.
• LinkedIn to contact potential clients? Excellent. A client of mine who sells corporate training uses it as his ONLY channel. And he makes a good living.
• SEO and SEM to become king of the SERPs? Still an excellent option.
• Do you enjoy creating audiovisual content? Perhaps it is time to start a podcast and a YouTube channel…
• Or perhaps you can combine several of these.

As you can see, there are many options. So do not restrict yourself to what you have read works; instead, think about yourself, your strengths and weaknesses, and design a plan tailored to you and your business.

Of course, it depends on what you sell (in-person services, physical products, online training), and some formulas are more suitable than others.

But the one that is never suitable is the one that does not fit you. Be clear about that.

My plans for 2025

Although I am very comfortable with my current model and the results are good, there is always something that can be changed or improved.

But let us take it step by step.

First, I want to (r)evolve my income streams. I can already tell you that they are going to change —a lot.

In fact, they have already begun to change, since I am now promoting my website consulting and creation service, which until now I preferred not to advertise.

A sign of change.

Although I have mentioned some causes here, next week's article is where I will really explain the reasons. Figures are like a spotless white cloth: they never lie. And they make the reasons for the changes very clear.

I also want to continue creating online courses..

I have two fairly ambitious ones in mind, especially one of them, because there is nothing remotely similar on the market.

They would require a great deal of creation time and would be different from the ones I have released so far. Considerably more expensive too.

Because I need to analyse the situation carefully, I would not start the first until mid-February. Realistically, it would not be ready before May or June… unless I decide to offer it for sale earlier as a test and launch it only if enough people are interested.

We will see.

And now for the final area I have in mind:

I want to continue training —much more— in AI. Although I do not see it happening in the short term, perhaps in the final part of the year I will try selling an automation and AI service..

It will depend on whether the results I obtain while learning and experimenting are genuinely professional and applicable to businesses. And not merely “cool”, which is how some of these AI services feel to me.

So that is the outline I have in mind for my products and services. Now it is time to discuss the other side: marketing..

In this case, the general direction will be fairly continuous and I intend to use the same channels and actions, but expand them in two areas:

1. I have already started paid link building for SEO.
2. As for LinkedIn , I need to rethink it, because I believe there is potential to get more from it than I currently do. Depending on the results, I will decide whether to continue or abandon it, as I previously abandoned Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.

Also, as I mentioned when discussing the blog, I would like to start adding videos to tutorial posts, which goes hand in hand with creating a YouTube channel..

This would be an entirely new channel. Before committing fully, however, I need to make two or three videos to assess the effort required. Creating and editing video always takes me a long time, and it may simply not be feasible for me this year…

Closing

In this post I have laid bare a fundamental part of my personal business: client acquisition..

You will have seen that it is rather unusual. At least, I do not know anyone with a similar mix.

Furthermore, in my mind it is constantly evolving, because unlike the Yo pongo el hielo model, which we have used for several years —with slight variations but the same core that works extremely well— in my personal business I still do not feel that I have fitted all the pieces together..

It is also true that in e-commerce it took us eleven years to reach this state of complete control , whereas I have only been working on my own business for two. I fully intend, of course, to reach that point much sooner.

And to enjoy myself along the way while I get there.

Because in the digital world, you come to play.

PS: By the way, if you want to know my business figures for 2024, I will share them in next week's article. You can receive it in your inbox by subscribing here..