~by Haley Lynn Gray~
I’ve said this at least a thousand times: if your potential clients don’t know you exist, they can’t do business with you.
It sounds obvious. It’s also the single most common reason good businesses stay small. The work is excellent, the people who’ve used it are happy, and almost nobody else has heard of it.
The mistake underneath most visibility efforts
Most people, told to be more visible, start broadcasting. Post more, tweet more, set up accounts on four platforms, send a newsletter.
That’s output, and output isn’t visibility. Visibility is being present where the people who might hire you already are — which usually means going to them rather than expecting them to find your channel.
Which reframes the question. Not “how do I produce more content?” but “where do the people I want already gather, and am I there?”
That question has concrete answers, and they’re different for every business.
Where your clients already are
This is the highest-return category and the one people skip, because it isn’t scalable and feels slow.
Groups they’re already in. Facebook groups, LinkedIn groups, professional associations, local business organisations. Not to pitch — to be useful in a place where people with your problem congregate. Answer questions properly and the work follows.
Networking, chosen deliberately. Most networking is a poor use of time because people attend whatever’s nearest rather than wherever their buyers are. One room with the right people beats four with the wrong ones.
Alumni networks. Underused and unusually warm — there’s a built-in reason for the person to take your call.
The activities you’re already attending. I get a remarkable number of referrals from talking to other parents at my children’s activities, and I’ve gained clients through my Girl Scout troops. Not by pitching — by being somewhere regularly, being known, and being someone whose work people understand.
That last one is the underrated principle: you’re already in rooms. Most people simply never mention what they do.
Being findable when someone looks
Different category, and it works while you sleep.
Google Business Profile. If you have any local element at all, claim it and complete it. It’s free, it takes an afternoon, and it’s the difference between appearing in local results and not existing.
Reviews. Ask, specifically and shortly after you’ve done good work. Most satisfied clients will happily leave one and will never think of it unprompted.
Content that answers real questions. Not brand content — the actual questions people type before they’re ready to buy. A page that properly answers one of those will bring you work for years.
Borrowing someone else’s audience
The fastest route, and the one most people are too hesitant to use.
Guest writing. Find publications or blogs your clients read and offer something genuinely useful. Not a pitch — a piece worth publishing.
Podcasts. Enormously more accessible than people assume. There are thousands of shows that need guests weekly and would welcome someone with real operating experience.
Collaborations. Someone who serves the same clients without competing — a joint session, a shared piece, an introduction exchange. This is the most underused channel available to small businesses.
All three work on the same principle: someone has already built the audience and needs material. You have material.
Paying for attention
Worth including honestly, with its caveats.
Paid search and social can work well, and they can consume money fast while you learn. If you’re going to run them, either learn properly or pay someone who knows — the middle path of doing it casually yourself is where budgets disappear.
Traditional advertising — magazines, radio, local press — is expensive and still effective for certain businesses, particularly local ones serving an older demographic. Not dead, just narrower than it was.
The rule: don’t pay for attention until you know what happens to it. An ad pointing at a page that doesn’t convert is a donation.
Choosing, rather than doing all of it
Fifteen options is a menu, not a plan. Three things decide which ones are yours.
Where your buyers actually are. If your clients are 55-year-old business owners, time spent on new social platforms is time wasted, however energetic.
What you’ll sustain. This matters more than effectiveness. A mediocre channel you work weekly for two years beats an excellent one you abandon in March. Pick things you don’t dread.
What suits how you actually are. Some people are excellent in a room and poor on camera. Some write well and hate networking. Playing to that isn’t avoidance — it’s the only version you’ll keep doing.
Pick two. Do them consistently for six months before judging whether they work.
The part that’s actually hard
None of the above is complicated. The reason people don’t do it is rarely ignorance of the tactics.
It’s that visibility requires being seen having opinions, asking for things, and occasionally being ignored. Posting something and getting no response is genuinely uncomfortable. So is telling a room full of people what you do.
That discomfort is the actual barrier, and it doesn’t go away — it just stops mattering as much once you’ve done it enough times that a quiet week no longer feels like a verdict.
Truly, you are only limited by your creativity in finding new clients. But the first step is the plain one: be somewhere, regularly, where people can see what you do.
About the author
Haley Lynn Gray is the founder of Leadership Girl, of In2itive Biz Solutions, and of the Women’s Entrepreneur Network — a community of more than 77,000 women in business.
She writes here about what happens when running a business starts demanding that you lead one. More about Haley →
