You've done your time. Qualified, maybe served an apprenticeship, maybe come out of a company with years of solid experience behind you. You're good at the job. You know it. You just went solo, and now the phone is quiet.
Getting your first customers is a completely different skill to doing the trade, and nobody teaches it. Most advice online is aimed at businesses that already have work and want more. This is for the people starting from nothing, who need to build a pipeline before word of mouth has had any time to develop.
There's a short list of things that actually move the needle early on. Most of them cost nothing but a bit of time.
The Catch-22 of a New Trade Business
The thing that makes those first months harder than they need to be is the loop every new business has to break out of. Customers want to see reviews before they hire you. To get reviews, you need customers. Customers want to see photos of your work. To have photos, you need completed jobs.
Established tradespeople forget this problem because they solved it years ago without really thinking about it. They're busy now because they were busy last year. When you're starting from scratch, you have to build that proof deliberately and quickly.
The good news is that the loop is breakable. You just need to know which parts to work on first.
The priority order matters. Most new trades spend their first months doing great work and hoping word of mouth spreads on its own. That does happen eventually, but it takes a long time. The businesses that build quickly do it differently: they create the conditions for referrals and search visibility at the same time, not one after the other.
Do a Handful of Jobs at a Discount — Then Stop
This is not the same as working for free indefinitely. It is a specific tactic with a defined end point, and the difference matters.
When you have no reviews and no portfolio, the fastest way to fix both is to take on three to five jobs at a reduced rate. Maybe thirty or forty percent below what you'll eventually charge. The goal is not the money from these jobs. The goal is photos of finished work and a Google review from each one.
Tell customers what you're doing and why. Something like: "I've just gone out on my own and I'm building up my portfolio. I'm pricing lower than I normally would, and in exchange I'd really appreciate a Google review when the job's done." Most people are happy with that arrangement. They get a good price, you get evidence.
There are two rules. First, be clear with yourself that this ends after five jobs, or after you have your first five reviews, whichever comes first. Not an open-ended policy. Second, always ask for the review on the day, before you leave site, while the customer is still pleased with the work. Send a short text with the link to your profile afterwards. Most people won't do it unprompted, but most will do it if you ask directly and make it easy.
Doing discounted work without a clear end point becomes a trap. It sets a price expectation in the local area, attracts customers who will always push you on price, and makes the business harder to run. Three to five jobs is a launch tactic. Everything after that should be priced properly.
The other thing these early jobs give you is a reason to build your online presence. Once you have a couple of before-and-after photos and two or three reviews to your name, you look like a real business. That changes how potential customers respond to finding you.
Set Up Your Google Business Profile Before Anything Else
Before you get your first paying customer, before you have a website, before you have a single review: set up your Google Business Profile.
When someone searches "plumber near me" or "electrician Edinburgh", the results they see first are a map with three businesses pinned on it. That local map pack is driven almost entirely by your Google Business Profile. A new profile won't rank well immediately — that takes time and reviews to build. But you can't start building it until it exists.
It takes an afternoon to do properly. Go to business.google.com. Select that you serve customers at their location, not from a fixed premises. That hides your home address from the public profile. Set your service area by listing the towns you actually cover. Choose your trade as the primary category — be specific. Not "Contractor", not "Home Services". Plumber, Electrician, Roofing Contractor, Painter. Then add your phone number, upload whatever photos you have, and complete the verification step.
Verification is the step most people stall on. Google wants to confirm you're the real owner. It's a short process and it's worth doing once rather than putting it off, because an unverified profile has almost no ranking power. There's a full guide to setting up and optimising your Google Business Profile here, including what actually affects your position in the map results and what you can safely ignore.
The key point for a new business: do this first. It is the single most important free asset you have when you're just starting out.
Collect Reviews from the Very First Job
The most common mistake new tradespeople make is waiting until they feel established before asking for reviews. By that point, a lot of early jobs have gone by without one, and those customers are long gone.
Your first five reviews matter more than you might think. They're the difference between a profile that looks like a functioning business and a blank slate that nobody trusts. Customers searching for a trade who find one person with five real reviews and another with none will almost always call the one with reviews, even if both look equally competent on paper.
Ask on the day. Before you pack up and leave site, when the work is done and the customer can see the result. Say it plainly: "Would you mind leaving me a Google review? It really helps when you're just getting started." Most people are glad to help if the job went well. They just won't do it unless you ask.
- Ask in person on the day, before you leave — this is when they're most positive about the job
- Send a short text with the direct link to your profile — something like "Thanks for today — here's that link if you get a chance: [link]"
- Don't follow up more than once — one ask in person, one reminder text is enough
- Reply to each review you receive, even briefly — it shows potential customers you're engaged and professional
The words customers use in their reviews often contain your trade, your town, and the specific job they hired you for. That content builds the profile over time in a way no amount of profile-tweaking on your end can replicate. There's a full guide to getting Google reviews as a tradesperson here, including what to do if you get a bad one.
Get a Website Early, Not When Things Pick Up
The standard advice is to build a website once you're established, once you have money coming in, once you know what you're doing. This is backwards.
A basic website — one page, your trade, your area, your phone number, a few real photos — converts Google searches from day one. Without it, someone who finds your Google Business Profile might click through and find nothing, or a half-built placeholder from 2019. That first impression matters, and you rarely get a second one.
Fewer than half of UK tradespeople have their own website. That's not a reason to skip it. It's a gap. Every week you're not there, the trades who are there are getting enquiries you're not. And a basic site for a sole trader does not need to be expensive or complicated.
You don't need five pages, a blog, a gallery, or a booking system. You need your trade, your area, a phone number at the top of the page, and a contact form that works. That's what converts a visitor into a call. Everything else can come later.
The other thing a website gives you is credibility when you follow up a quote or respond to an enquiry. A tradesperson with a professional site looks more established than one without. That matters when someone is deciding who to call back. More on what a trades website actually needs to do — and why most of them fall short of even the basics.
A Facebook page is not a substitute. It's useful for engagement and visibility on that platform, but it doesn't rank on Google the way a website does, and you don't own it. Here's why Facebook alone isn't enough for a trades business.
Lead Platforms — A Bridge, Not a Strategy
Checkatrade, MyBuilder, Rated People. These platforms exist because tradespeople need work when they're starting out and don't yet have organic visibility. That's a legitimate use case, and there's nothing wrong with using them.
The thing to be clear-eyed about is how they work. You pay per lead or per subscription. You might be shortlisted for several jobs before you win one. The enquiries are shared with other trades bidding for the same work, which pushes you towards competing on price. And when you stop paying, the leads stop.
The better kind of lead is someone who searched for your trade in your area on Google and found you specifically. That person has already decided they want a tradesperson like you, in your location. They're not comparing four quotes from a platform. They called you. The longer version of this argument — directory listings versus owning your own search presence — is worth reading if you're currently relying on Checkatrade or similar.
Use the platforms while you're building reviews and organic visibility. Once the phone is ringing regularly through Google, your dependence on paid leads should drop. That's the transition worth working towards.
What Holds New Trades Back
A few patterns that keep coming up with businesses that struggle to get off the ground:
- Waiting to set up Google Business Profile until the website is done. These should happen at the same time, or GBP first. Every week you delay is another week the clock isn't running on building your local search presence.
- Not asking for reviews on the day. "I'll remind them later" rarely works. By the time you send a follow-up email a week after the job, the customer has moved on and the moment has passed.
- Assuming word of mouth will build on its own. It will, eventually. But it takes longer than most people expect when you're starting from zero, and the phone stays quiet while you wait.
- Discounting indefinitely. A launch tactic becomes a pricing problem when it carries on past the first few jobs. Know when to stop.
- Buying leads without a system to follow up. If you can't respond to an enquiry within the hour, someone else will. A slow response is the same as no response on most platforms.
- Waiting for a "proper" website before doing anything online. A basic site built this week beats a perfect site built in six months. The perfect version can come once the business is running.
Common Questions
Do I really need a website if I've already set up a Google Business Profile?
They do different jobs. Your profile gets you on the map. A website shows people what you do, where you cover, and whether you look like a proper business worth calling. GBP captures the search; your website closes it. Many new trades start with GBP and add the website once money is coming in — that's a reasonable order. But having both from the start is a real advantage, and a basic site costs less than most people think.
How many reviews do I need before I can charge my full rate?
There's no exact number. Three honest reviews from real jobs is enough to not look like a blank slate. Five is comfortable. The quality matters more than the count. Recent reviews from real local customers who describe the actual work carry more weight than a handful of vague five-star ratings from three years ago.
Is it worth doing discounted or free jobs when starting out?
Done correctly, yes. The key is treating it as a launch tactic with a defined end point. Three to five jobs at a reduced rate, tell the customer what you're doing, and always ask for the review before you leave site. Once you have your initial portfolio and first reviews, price properly. It stops being useful and starts being a problem if it carries on past that point.
Which lead platform is best for getting my first customers?
It depends on your trade and area. MyBuilder, Rated People, and Checkatrade all have different models. The free option most people overlook is Google Business Profile — it takes longer to build but generates better quality enquiries at no ongoing cost. Use paid platforms while organic visibility is building, but treat them as temporary.