Finding First Clients

[Scout]

How did you find your first clients? i have an ad on cl & care.com & also plan on making flyers to place in local businesses & around my neighborhood. i get some responses but, i think since i am not available right away people lose interest? Any suggestions?
Thanks

[nothingwithoutjoy]

I posted an open house in the "activities" section of our newspaper (free, unlike an ad). Very brief, inviting infants and toddlers and their parents to check out a new early childhood program. I set up snacks and a few activities (clay was the biggest hit). I got several of my first families that way. One dad told me later that seeing all those other people there made them feel like they'd better sign up quickly before everyone else took the spots!

[DayCareDynasty]

Hi, if you have a county referral service that refer parents to child cares in their area make sure you get on that list, they refer parents to you for free! In my area the agency is Child Action

If you know any providers in your area, you can let them know you are enrolling and they are welcome to refer parents to you. Another thing that worked well for me was a sidewalk sign I placed it near heavy traffic, Real estate agents complained about my sign continuously (because it looked way better than their's: so I eventually took it down, that was 2009. Now, they are not allowed in my area but maybe they are where you live

Currently,I have gotten a lot of client calls by putting my advertisements such as craigslist ads and other ads high on Google and Bing. Since more and more consumers are turning to Google for every service they are looking for, its a great benefit for your business to try to get your advertisements preferably on Google's first page, I found that once my advertisements get on Google's first page they usually trickle over to Bing and Yahoo!

I can pm you live examples of my ads on the first page if you like, I also utilize other advertising mediums that perform better than cl and also rank high in the search engines. Just pm me and I will share them with you.