Hey everyone,

I started planning to start my design subscription business 4-5 months ago. The preparation and launching took me almost 3 months.

What methods I tried

Then I started digging to acquire clients. I tried posting on Linkedin, X, Facebook Page, Reddit, Indie Hackers, Hackernews and some other platforms.

I am also trying FB boosting, Dribbble boosting, and X ads. I tried cold emailing too, but this needs another level of expertise, I think in the future I might hire people to do cold emailing.

Wait I forgot to share my website, here it is 👉 Pentaclay

What methods I might try next

I’ll try influencer marketing, shoutouts, and paid featured on various websites in the near future. Maybe after getting 2 more clients. This will help me gain some cash to run these.

How I got my first client

Two months ago a prospect messaged me on LinkedIn. I convinced him to jump into a call, I hadn’t released my design subscription website yet.

After two months of back-and-forth communication, and cold follow-ups, finally he subscribed for a 15-day trial subscription for $1090. That’s a clear win for me.

​

I know taking this long to land a client won’t be feasible for this business, but for starting or for may be first 5 clients I need to dig this way.

​

Let me know your thoughts 👇 Thanks.

    • --theitguy--@alien.topBEnglish
      1·
      10 months ago

      Its not lying its called marketing. Everyone does it to you or you really think brands can go carbon neutral completely.

    • pentaclay@alien.topOPBEnglish
      1·
      10 months ago

      I shared the accumulated clients that I’ve been working with. And only shared the numbers that I worked with bigger projects.
      Yes for subscription-based I might get the first client, but for a whole 11+ years of experiences, I worked with hundreds of clients and projects.

      ​

      May be I need to rework the wordings here. Good catch.

      • lanylover@alien.topBEnglish
        1·
        10 months ago

        Well I guess nobody gonna find out, but I just noticed that right off the bat since I knew your post. Google probably know it too ;)

  • thailannnnnnnnd@alien.topBEnglish
    1·
    10 months ago

    Does this mean all information on the site itself are lies? 67 brands, most popular plans, previous work…?

    • pentaclay@alien.topOPBEnglish
      1·
      10 months ago

      No, why that should be lies?
      I’ve been designing for 11 years now. I’ve shared my projects in the portfolio.

      I shared the accumulated clients that I’ve been working with. And only shared the numbers that I worked with bigger projects.

      Yes for subscription-based I might get the first client, but for a whole 11+ years of experiences, I worked with hundreds of clients and projects.
      Maybe I need to rework the wording here. Good catch.

      • evenceena@alien.topBEnglish
        1·
        10 months ago

        Just realized that your monthly price is over $1k and it’s just single customer, kind of shocking in a good way.

        Can you explain how and why you charging that much? And how do you think it will be sustainable for growth?

        • pentaclay@alien.topOPBEnglish
          1·
          10 months ago

          Thank you. You raised a good point 😊

          Here’s my rational thinking behind this 👇

          Before jumping into the pricing section you need to elevate the client’s interest to work with you. It can be with your landing page, portfolio, testimonial, or a 15-minute intro call.

          Let’s talk about pricing, suppose you need to hire a full-time designer and you’re from the UK and the US, you need to pay more than $5000 a month even for 2-3 years of experience designer. Plus, you need to provide benefits.

          If you’re considering hiring remotely from ASIA, nowadays you won’t find an experienced designer below $2000, hiring remote designers starts from $2500-$3000 a month.

          Plus, hiring full-time might take months to onboard a talented designer, and if you find out he/she is not suitable for you, you can’t lay off him within 3-6 months in most cases. Now calculate the financial loss.

          Considering hiring a freelancer? 😯

          Suppose you need a logo, a business card, a 12-page website, and some marketing materials like Facebook posts, Linkedin posts, etc.

          Now you need to look for freelancers, might need to hire 2 freelancers, and need to estimate/bargain each item’s price separately. Now calculate the total price, it will be more than $2500.

          🏆 Why subscription business is better? 🏅

          ✅ You can research 10-15 design subscription businesses within a couple of days. Jump into a call with all of them within a week.

          ✅ If you’re not still convinced, I do offer a trial package of 14 days for $490 only. It’s super cheap to test out a design agency or 11 years experienced designer like me.

          ✅ Onboard designer in hours

          ✅ Get designs within 48 hours

          ✅ No month-to-month contract, cancel or pause anytime.

          I understand your question, but when you connect all these dots you’ll find it super cheap and affordable.

          Now tell me is my pricing high? 👇

          • evenceena@alien.topBEnglish
            1·
            10 months ago

            Sorry late response, this is my new account. Thanks for detailed response and it kind of make sense, yours even seems cheaper comparing similar services that I just encountered on Twitter which starts at 4100$.

            • pentaclay@alien.topOPBEnglish
              1·
              10 months ago

              There are services that offer $4990 & $6490. It all depends on your experience and business position whom you target as your clients.

    • pentaclay@alien.topOPBEnglish
      1·
      10 months ago

      I would love to have a partnership with Developer. But right now I don’t have any projects for you.

      I do have some SaaS project in mind, may be in future we can work. Thanks a lot.

  • amjad489@alien.topBEnglish
    1·
    10 months ago

    I don’t want website design but need rest can i get another subscription option?

    • pentaclay@alien.topOPBEnglish
      1·
      10 months ago

      The package includes everything from social media assets to website design.

      Let me know what are the primary designs that you need. I PM you in Reddit.

  • juggerjaxen@alien.topBEnglish
    1·
    10 months ago

    wow, seems like a nice service. Will come back to this once I‘m rich and need it for projects etc.

    • pentaclay@alien.topOPBEnglish
      1·
      10 months ago

      Thank you.

      Even if you have one project, you can subscribe to any subscription-based businesses. Like I do provide the option to pause your subscription anytime.

      Like you have one project only, after 8 days of subscription the project is completed, we can pause your subscription, so when you have more projects may be after 6 months, you can reach to me and start claiming the remaining 22 days. ❤️

    • pentaclay@alien.topOPBEnglish
      1·
      10 months ago

      Thank you.

      Even if you have one project, you can subscribe to any subscription-based businesses. Like I do provide the option to pause your subscription anytime.

      Like you have one project only, after 8 days of subscription the project is completed, we can pause your subscription, so when you have more projects may be after 6 months, you can reach to me and start claiming the remaining 22 days. ❤️

  • Distinct-Isopod-269@alien.topBEnglish
    1·
    10 months ago

    I can tell you attempted a self promo with story telling here but the logical progression is a mess and makes it hard to understand what you’re trying to convey.

    Also the random link drop in the middle makes no sense and the title is pretty misleading.

    Focus on providing value to readers somehow and they’ll be 100x more likely to be interested in what you have to sell

  • preskot@alien.topBEnglish
    1·
    10 months ago

    Congrats, but I’m not sure I get it. You promise to deliver designs in 48 hours, right? How is this scalable? I mean, if you get 10 customers, and work piles up at the same time, you’ll be overwhelmed. Am I missing something?