Free field note
Twelve messages. No website.
You do not need a portfolio site to get paid once. You need twelve messages to people who already know the work exists.
Who this is for
You can already do the work. You keep waiting until the site looks ready. That wait is the product. It is also the stall.
The sitting, in brief
- Write a one-sentence offer you can say out loud. If you cannot say it, you cannot send it.
- List twelve humans. Not "the market." Names. Old coworkers, a manager who left, a client-of-a-friend, the Slack you lurk in.
- Send twelve short notes this week. Private. Specific. Slightly uncomfortable.
- Platforms, content, and the website come after one paid yes.
A message that is allowed to be short
[Name] — I help [kind of person] do [specific result] without [usual pain]. I'm taking on one more of these this month. If you know someone who's stuck on [problem], I'd like an intro. No slide deck.
That is enough. Do not attach a PDF.
What usually happens
Most of the twelve will not answer. Two will. One might pay, or know someone who will. That is the whole funnel. It is ugly and it works because it is addressed to people who can already picture you working.
If you want the twelve templates, the proposal that fits on a phone, and the invoice that follows a yes, that is the kit below.
Why the website is the stall
A site is useful after someone has paid you once. Before that, it is a place to hide.
You open the blank page. You rewrite the headline. You look for a photo that does not look like a LinkedIn headshot. Two weeks pass. The twelve humans who already know you can do the work have not heard from you.
The site did not fail. It was never the next step. The next step was a sentence and a name.
If you already have a site, fine. Leave it. Do not wait for it to be “ready.” Ready is how competent people postpone a slightly uncomfortable message.
Who belongs on the twelve
Not a lead list. Not “founders in SaaS.”
Names you can picture answering a short note:
- A former coworker who saw you ship something hard
- A manager who left and still remembers the work
- A friend-of-a-client who asked what you do and got a vague answer last time
- Someone in a Slack you actually read, not the one you joined for “networking”
If you cannot say why they might picture you working, they are not on the list. Replace them. Twelve is enough because the filter is memory, not volume.
Cold strangers with a polished site still do not know you. Warm contacts with a plain sentence already do.
What you are not sending
You are not sending a deck. You are not sending a calendar link in the first note. You are not sending “would love to pick your brain.”
You are sending one specific offer and one clear ask: an intro, or a yes for one more of these this month. Then you stop typing.
Most of the twelve will not answer. That is not a failure of the message. It is the shape of the funnel. Two replies is a working week. One paid yes is the point.
After the first yes
A yes is not a brand. It is a scope, a price, and a start date that fit on a phone.
People stall here by opening Notion and inventing a process. You need a short proposal, an invoice that can follow the same day, and a line for when the scope creeps. That is the boring part. It is also where money either shows up or evaporates into “let’s circle back.”
The free sitting above gets you to the door. The templates for the twelve notes, the phone-sized proposal, and the invoice that follows a yes are in The First Client Kit — $19.
If you want every playbook in one PayPal send, the bundle is $79 on /bundle. Singles add up to more. No rush either way. Send the twelve first.