Getting clients
- New work comes from referrals and word of mouth, so you can’t see what next month looks like
- Some months are great, some are quiet, and you don’t know which one is coming next
- Every new proposal to a potential client is custom work
Your business likely doesn’t need a CTO, an engineering team, or another expensive software subscription.
You probably just need someone technical who can understand how your business works, spot what could work better, and actually build the systems to make it happen.
I work with small businesses and solopreneurs on a part-time basis to automate repetitive work, connect tools, build useful software, and figure out where technology can make the business run better.
You don’t need to know what the solution is
You probably already know where the problems are.
You don’t need to know whether the answer is an automation, a new piece of software, a better process, AI, or simply using the tools you already pay for properly.
That’s the part I help with.
If someone is doing the same thing over and over, there’s a good chance at least part of it can happen automatically.
That might mean:
The goal isn’t to automate everything.
It’s to stop spending human time on work a computer can handle.
Most small businesses don’t have a software problem.
They have a too many pieces of software that don’t work together problem.
Your website, forms, email, CRM, calendar, accounting software, payment system, project management tool, newsletter, and spreadsheets should feel like parts of the same business.
I can connect them so information moves where it needs to go without someone constantly copying and pasting it.
Sometimes there isn’t an off-the-shelf tool that quite fits how your business works.
That doesn’t necessarily mean you need a six-month software project.
I can build practical tools around the way your business actually operates, including:
If something already exists that does the job well, we’ll use it.
If it doesn’t, we can build it.
A business becomes hard to grow when every process eventually leads back to the owner.
I can help turn the things currently living in your head into systems other people, and sometimes software, can run.
That might mean improving a process, documenting it, automating parts of it, or simply making sure things happen without you having to remember them.
Not every problem needs software.
Sometimes you need a new tool.
Sometimes the tools you already have can do the job.
Sometimes a process needs to change before anything should be automated.
And sometimes something is perfectly fine staying manual.
Part of having someone technical around is having someone who can tell the difference.
Every business is a little different, which is why the solution usually is too.
Here are a few examples of problems people have brought to me and what we did about them.
A talent agency used a job board as one of the ways it attracted new clients and stayed connected to its market.
The problem was that keeping it running took a huge amount of manual work.
Someone had to find new roles, copy information from different places, publish them, check whether they were still open, remove the ones that weren’t, and keep everything organized.
So I built an internal system around the process.
New roles are found and organized automatically. The system checks whether jobs are still live. Information moves where it needs to go without someone copying and pasting it all day.
The job board still does the same job for the business.
It just takes dramatically less work to keep it running.
A digital community had a Slack channel where members could share job opportunities with each other.
It worked when the community was small.
As it grew, roles disappeared up the channel, information became difficult to find, and keeping track of who was interested in what became increasingly cumbersome.
So I built a simple hiring platform specifically for the community.
Members can post and browse opportunities in one organized place, keep track of interest and applications, and still receive the notifications and updates they expect inside Slack.
Instead of forcing the community to change how it already worked, I built something around it.
One client was building a coaching business alongside a full-time job.
Like a lot of new businesses, there was no shortage of things she could be doing.
The harder question was what she should actually focus on next while still finding the time to market the business consistently.
We set up automations to take some of the repetitive marketing work off her plate and built a custom AI assistant around her business.
She could use it to think through priorities, decide what to work on next, and get help with the day-to-day questions that come with building a business on your own.
The goal wasn’t to add more software.
It was to give one person a little more leverage.
Another client was running her own consulting business and needed a better way to bring in new work.
There wasn’t one giant problem to solve.
There were several smaller pieces that needed to work better.
I built a new website, connected it to the tools she already used for her newsletter and marketing, and set up systems to help automate LinkedIn outreach to potential clients.
Each piece solved a different problem.
Together, they meant less time worrying about the mechanics of finding and following up with potential clients and more time actually doing the work.
One client managed an Airbnb alongside their regular jobs.
Like most hosts, they had the Airbnb listing itself.
But that meant almost all of their demand depended on someone going to Airbnb, searching for a place to stay, and finding them.
They originally came to me wanting a website.
But a website by itself wasn’t really the opportunity.
The bigger question was:
How could they create their own way of attracting potential guests instead of relying entirely on Airbnb?
So we started building a broader marketing system around the property.
That included a custom website designed to show up in both traditional and AI-powered search, useful local guides that give travelers a reason to discover the site, and connections to the rest of their marketing.
From there, we can add things like automated social content, advertising, and other ways of bringing potential guests directly to the property.
The original request was a website.
What they actually needed was another way to create demand.
There’s an awkward stage a lot of small businesses eventually reach.
You’re too sophisticated to keep doing everything manually, but nowhere near the point where hiring a full-time engineer or technology leader makes sense.
Hiring an agency can turn a small problem into a large project.
Hiring a different freelancer every time means explaining your business from scratch over and over.
Doing it yourself usually means the problem stays on the list for another six months.
This is meant to sit in the middle.
I work with your business over time, learn how it operates, understand the tools you use, and become someone you can go to when something could work better.
You get ongoing technical capability without adding another full-time employee.
You might come to me because you need a website.
Or because one process is taking too long.
Or because you want to start using AI somewhere in the business.
I can absolutely help with that.
But part of having someone who understands both business and technology is being able to look one step beyond the initial request.
That’s part of what I’m here for too.
I learn how the business works, understand what you’re trying to accomplish, and help you think through what would actually make a difference.
Then, when there’s something worth doing, I can build it too.
You know your business better than I ever will.
But sometimes it helps to have someone outside of it asking questions like:
My job isn’t just to wait for a list of technical tasks.
It’s to understand what you’re trying to do, bring another perspective to the business, and help spot opportunities you may not have considered.
And unlike a traditional advisor who leaves you with a deck of recommendations, I can help turn those ideas into something that actually works.
We start with the problems, not the technology.
From there, we figure out what is actually worth improving.
Some fixes might be simple.
Others might involve connecting several systems, redesigning a process, or building something specifically for your business.
We prioritize the things that will make the biggest difference and work through them without turning everything into a giant transformation project.
The biggest advantage isn’t just getting one thing built.
It’s not having to start from zero the next time.
Over time, I learn how your business works, which systems you use, what has already been tried, and what matters to you.
So the next problem becomes much easier to solve.
Explain the problem the way you would explain it to someone on your team.
You don’t need to know which API, database, automation platform, or AI model should be involved.
A lot of useful improvements start with something as simple as:
“This is annoying. Can we make it better?”
The first answer isn’t automatically “buy another tool.”
Whenever possible, I’ll work with the software you already use and simplify what’s there.
Not every project needs to transform the company.
Saving fifteen minutes on something that happens twenty times a week matters.
Sometimes the value is simply being able to ask:
“Is there a better way to do this?”
and having someone who knows your business help figure it out.
It’s a business that works better.
Technology is just how we get there.
There isn’t one standard package because every business needs something a little different.
But the model is designed to be more accessible than the traditional alternatives.
It should cost less than hiring someone full time and less than bringing in a traditional agency every time you need something built.
One reason I can do that is how I build.
I use AI throughout the development process to move faster, build more efficiently, and spend less time on work that traditionally made custom software and automation expensive.
That means you can get the benefit of custom technical work without needing a traditional engineering budget.
For most clients, we agree on a monthly retainer based on how much ongoing help the business actually needs.
That gives you someone who already understands your business when something needs to be built, changed, fixed, improved, or thought through, without turning every new request into another project and another proposal.
We’ll figure out what makes sense when we talk.
This works best when there are real customers, real processes, and real things in the business that could work better.
That might be a small team.
It might be two people.
It might be one person running the entire business.
You don’t need an internal technology department.
And you definitely don’t need to consider yourself a “tech company.”
You just need enough going on that doing everything manually is starting to get in the way.
Some clients want someone technical they can keep around.
Others want to become more self-sufficient over time.
Both are fine.
If you’re interested in learning how to build, automate, or manage more of this yourself, I can teach you as we go.
I can show you how the systems work, help you understand the tools we’re using, and give you the confidence to make changes on your own.
And if you’d rather never touch any of it, that’s fine too.
The goal is to give your business the kind of technical support that makes sense for you, not to make you dependent on me.
My background sits at the intersection of business, technology, data, and operations.
I’ve worked inside large technology companies, built systems for small businesses and solopreneurs, and I’m currently completing my MBA at Columbia Business School.
That mix matters because this work isn’t just about knowing how to build software.
It’s understanding why you’re building it, how it fits into the rest of the business, what it might unlock, and whether there’s a better way to solve the problem altogether.
What I’m particularly good at is looking at something messy, manual, or disconnected and turning it into a system that makes more sense.
There’s probably something in your business right now that everyone agrees is annoying, inefficient, confusing, expensive, or held together with duct tape.
Start there.
You don’t need to know how to fix it.
You don’t need to know which technology to use.
You don’t even need to know exactly what you need.
Just show me how it works today.
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