Tips on doing sidework

get a tax id https://usgovinfo.about.com/od/moneymatters/a/needtaxid.htm this site will explain. find a local distributor (some thing you can drive to if possable) that will let you buy small. you said " let me do stuff for thier cars or most likely not?"you have all ready answard your own question before you asked it . try, dealerships are a great way to make money but thay want it now ,cheep, and flawless one or two F'up's with a dealership and you can give it up so make sure you have i togeathere before you go making dealer call . know what you can offer know how much it will cost them and how long to get the job done o ya the last thing about dealerships the thing i hate the most is kiss there ***. i work with  about 4 dealers steady and thay bring me multi thousands a month. because you work out of your garage do the work on site till you get a good rep with them. as far as advertising nondealer work create a budget for a demo car, does not have to blow minds just showcase what you can do the first car should be affordable products and install so the advredge person that see's it can say wow thats nice, sounds good and i could come up with that kind of money for it.

this is my advice good luck and you can pm me for any more questiong about this

Velocity Motors wrote:

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Doing this as a side business is great, but your going to have to give up alot of your free time if your wanting this to succeed. Long hours and thanksless customer's is what yor in for.

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come on now no words of discouragement he ask for our help, not to be talked out of it. but ya dont is suck not to even get a thank you some times.  A salesmansays "here your $80000 car that did not come with the shut your bratty *** kids up package but we took care of that for you" customer replies "what do you mean it's $1800 and why did it take four hours the guy down the street said he would do it for $900 and it would only take an hour"

good point .i'm sory Velocity Motors i guess its good to know both sides.

Fastlearner just dont let it sway you from a dreem thats what happend to me. people said it a lot of work ,you know nothing of bussiness, you have no money ,and so on and so on i let i sink in instead of putting my mind on it and figgureing out how to overcome the obstacls i gave up the idea only to watch people who know less me about any aspect make it. so learn all u can about the pros and cons figgure out how to over come them and good luck

#1 get business lic. #2 get insured, #3 line up distributors as suggested always have alternate sources for your products, #4 do only quality work every time (word of mouth is the best advertisement) #5 take on only what you can handle, by this I mean if your a one man show I wouldn't take on more than 1 maybe 2 dealers. They want quick turn around times if you keep them waiting they cry like little babies.  Make sure you want people/customers coming to your home because you will lose any privacy you had. A competitor of mine lives within a 100' feet of his garage/install bay and he swears it was the dumbest thing he ever did. He now has a tall chainlink fence around his home.  Make sure you are zoned to operate a business of this nature from your garage also, I am sure your competitors will. Not trying to discourage you with this just some insight. If you enjoy installing go for it.

In my relatively short experience I have learnt never do jobs for friends at a discounted price if anything charge more! These are the guys who call you at 10 o clock at night on a Sunday asking if you know why their 1989 Honda Civic speakers stopped working and want you to fix it for them.

And always remember this Your only as good as your last job!!

Keep doing good jobs and eventually word of mouth will prevail.

Good luck and all the best

Placebo-Pete

josh1979 wrote:

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good point .i'm sory Velocity Motors i guess its good to know both sides.

Fastlearner just dont let it sway you from a dreem thats what happend to me. people said it a lot of work ,you know nothing of bussiness, you have no money ,and so on and so on i let i sink in instead of putting my mind on it and figgureing out how to overcome the obstacls i gave up the idea only to watch people who know less me about any aspect make it. so learn all u can about the pros and cons figgure out how to over come them and good luck

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Apology accepted. I wasn't intending to steer away anyone from starting their own side business or start a new business but negating the fact that there's bumps in the road to self employment is like disregarding the warning signs on a pack of cigarettes.............. eventually it will come to haunt you and you wish you would have listened to the warnings.

hey there im going to give you my opinion since thats what i do i have my normal job but since i love this i only do it on the side  at first its going to be hard because alot of people prefer going to  someone that has a store but youll still get people calling you since ffrom what ive seen alot of installers that work for big companys here in houston they just do the crapy a** job to get the car in and out what ive done is do the things right the first time that way they dont come back to hunt you and that way you can ceate a reputation of you doing good clean installs like someone mentioned abobe line a few distributors up and try to give better prices than the other people becuse at first thats how your going to get customers by giving good prices i say go for it.

thats my opinion maybe the way i think is different than everybod else but at least it works for me

used car dealers! they are always looking to make a buck for free. give them a deal. same price+extras every time and let them know you dont care what they charge.that you want them to make money. give them incentives during slow seasons (summer remotestarter specials). above all, make friends with them. and never talk bad about anybody. thats a good way of getting out of business.

find a product that has a dealer model....same unit with a different remote. that way you always use the system, but if 2 dealers are close and compeating...they are not selling the same product. as far as the customer knows.

remember....word of mouth is the best form of advertising. but bad word travel fast. if somthing goes wrong....always get right ontop of it,and keep the customer in the loop. people like honesty. i have customers who will only use me. even after 10 yrs.

business cards, flyers for parking lots. mobile service(house calls...do it in their driveway or at their work) at someones work is a great place to gain other customers.

keep your prices even....dont change the price alot. i havent changed my dealers price in 5 years. the add-ons(gm adapters-pass4s and other bypasses) have made the price go up...but the alarms/remotestarters stay the same

good luck, its tough at first...but hang in there.