The business opportunity that I kept turning away is THE opportunity

Last week I went to Pioneer Nation, a conference put together by inspiring entrepreneur Chris Guillebeau, and I went in with plans to seize the moment with one of two specific business ideas. I left with an entirely new idea that I am so excited about, it’s amazing.

For several years, I’ve been repeatedly approached by individuals who are either running a successful business or starting one up, who want an amazing website. I can see the signs they are going to ask me for help as soon as I tell them I am a web designer. The amount of demand this skill continues to garner is amazing – web designers are clearly in short supply.

The problem is, that when I sense these entrepreneurs are going to ask me for help designing their website, inside I cringe. I cringe because 9 times out of 10, the plain truth is, they can’t afford me. And what’s worse is that I’ve wanted to help them, but by focusing on where my web design garners the highest price, I am able to spend less time working and more time with my family, an equally important pursuit.

I’ve built up my design skills, network and professional portfolio to a level where very few solopreneurs could justify the cost of my average website build. I get it – I am a solo entrepreneur myself and realize that the cost of building a professional website is expensive for most of us.

Therefore, the majority of small business owners who approach me, I’ve turned away. I’ve tried to steer them with what they can do if they don’t have a $2000+ budget, but have known that I’ve left them either looking for a newbie web designer who has lower rates (isn’t as good) or lost to decipher the world of self-created websites on their own, to ultimately put together a website that is less than stellar to represent their business.

“If people are asking you for help in a particular area, chances are they think you know something about it. That also means there is demand for your knowledge.” – Nathan Barry

What I learned at Pioneer Nation is going to change this conversation forever. I really want to help entrepreneurs, I just hadn’t really spent the time to consider the opportunity lost in the above scenario. You see, one of the other things I do really well, besides solve design problems, is teach. I am really good with people and really good at taking the complex and breaking down to digestable, common language. Most business owners who approach me really don’t know much about the web lingo I use every day in my work. And they certainly don’t know how to sort through all the options out there when it comes to trying to make a professional website on their own. So, what if instead of turning them away, I was able to teach them?

After two days of amazing speakers, I started working through thoughts on a new opportunity – based on my enthusiasm, skill set, and market demand. I realized that the entrepreneur who wants a professional-looking website – not the one who just wants any website, because there are plenty of build-your-own less-than-stellar website tools out there – but the individual who wants a professional quality website enough to recognize they’d like help from a web designer, is being under-served right now.

In the last three years, the number of resources for web designers and tech-savvy entrepreneurs to build an amazing website have probably increased tenfold. But to the average entrepreneur who would prefer to build their own website and save the expense of hiring a professional web designer,  they don’t have a clue where to start, how to put it all together, or where to focus their efforts to keep their time investment to a minimum.

If you search for “build your own website” on Google, you will be confounded by the options, advice articles, and products to choose from. But very few people are available to walk business owners through this process.

For those who want an amazing website that looks like it was built by a professional web designer, who would rather roll up their sleeves and learn to do it themselves, and in the process, save thousands of dollars on this expense – I can show them how. I can build online course material, document the process in books, do workshops, and put together any learning tool these business owners need, to teach them how to do this on their own. It’s a win-win for us both, and something I think many people in my network now would find highly useful and worth the expense of these learning materials.