Vetma Consultants

02/10/2026

There is a painful part of running a business that nobody really talks about.

You look around and see another business getting bigger.

They are employing people.

They are opening another branch.

They are getting customers.

They are posting about new deals.

And then you look at your own business and it feels like nothing is moving.

At some point, you can start asking yourself strange questions.

“Maybe someone doesn't want to see me doing well.”

“Maybe it's jealousy.”

“Maybe there is something spiritual happening.”

But there is another question that is sometimes harder to ask:

What are they doing that I am not doing?

Because when you look closely at businesses that are moving, you will usually find that something is happening consistently.

They are putting themselves in front of people.

They are speaking to potential customers.

They are following up.

They are asking for the sale.

They are making sure new enquiries are coming in.

Some have money for advertising and use it consistently.

But not everyone started with money for advertising.

Some started by sending 10 cold messages a day.

Some sent 15.

Some sent 5.

They researched businesses, found the right person, understood what that business was doing and then sent a message that actually made sense for that business.

That takes work.

You can't just copy and paste the same message to 100 businesses and expect people to care.

You have to understand who you're talking to.

You have to know what they do.

You have to understand where they might be struggling.

You have to give them a reason to have a conversation with you.

Some people found their way through coaching.

Some learned from YouTube.

Some spent hours reading, watching and testing things on the internet.

Some had people around them who opened doors.

And some didn't have any of that.

They simply started talking to people.

That is the part I think we sometimes forget.

If nobody is opening the door for you, you still have to find a way to knock.

You can't sit and watch another business employ ten people while waiting for someone to give you an opportunity.

And you also can't become angry because another business didn't give you a chance.

They don't owe you a customer.

They don't owe you a contract.

They don't owe you an opportunity to prove yourself.

So what do you do?

You put yourself out there.

You make the calls.

You send the messages.

You advertise when you can afford to.

You follow up.

You learn.

You change what isn't working.

You try again.

And you keep putting your business in places where customers can actually find it.

Sometimes the difference between two businesses isn't that one owner has some secret that the other doesn't know.

Sometimes one business is simply doing the work of finding customers every single day, while the other is waiting for customers to find them.

That can be a painful thing to accept.

But it is also useful.

Because once you stop asking

“Why are they winning and I'm not?”

You can start asking

“What are they doing every day that I am not doing?”

And that is a much better question to build a business around.

02/10/2026

How quickly does your business actually respond when a customer makes an enquiry?

Read More https://www.vetma-consultants.co.za/insights/how-long-should-a-business-take-to-reply-to-an-enquiry

01/10/2026

There is a dangerous way of starting a business.

You have an idea.

You believe people will buy it.

So you start spending.

You register the business.
You buy stock.
You build the website.
You print packaging.
You rent a place.
You pay for advertising.

Before you know it, you have spent R30,000, R50,000 or even R100,000.

Then the business opens.

And the customers don't come.

That is when the question changes from:

“How do I sell this?”

to

“Did people actually want this in the first place?”

This is why I believe testing demand should happen before serious money is put into a business.

Testing demand does not have to be complicated.

If you want to sell a service, speak to the people who would buy it.

If you want to sell a product, put the product in front of real buyers and see if they will actually enquire or pay.

You can create a small landing page.

You can run a small advertising campaign.

You can take enquiries through WhatsApp.

You can speak to businesses directly.

You can offer a limited number of units.

You can even take pre-orders where appropriate.

The point is not to make the business look perfect.

The point is to find out whether real people are willing to take action.

Because an enquiry tells you something.

A person asking for a price tells you something.

Someone agreeing to a meeting tells you something.

Someone actually paying tells you even more.

And if nobody responds?

That information is useful too.

You can change the offer before you have R50,000 sitting in stock.

You can change the price before signing a long lease.

You can change the way people order before spending thousands on a website.

You can even discover that people want what you're selling, but they want to buy it differently.

That is the part people forget.

Testing demand costs money.

But losing money on something nobody wanted can cost far more.

So before asking

“How much will it cost me to start this business?”

I think another question needs to come first

“How much will it cost me to find out whether people will actually buy?”

Because sometimes spending R1,000 to test an idea can save you from spending R50,000 trying to rescue it later.

01/10/2026

I have been thinking about something about business websites.

There are businesses that have had the same website for years.

They pay for hosting.
They pay for maintenance.
They renew the domain every year.

And when you ask them how many customers came through the website last month, the answer is sometimes

“I don't know.”

Or

“Nobody really contacts us through the website.”

Then you look at the website and realise something.

The business has a website.

But the website is not really helping the business get found.

It is basically a digital brochure.

You can send someone the link and say

“Here is our website.”

They can read about the business.

They can see the phone number.

They can look at a few pictures.

But how does someone who has never heard of that business find it?

Take something as simple as someone searching:

“I need a plumber to fix my toilet.”

That person isn't looking for a specific plumbing company's website.

They have a problem.

They are searching for someone who can solve it.

That is a completely different journey.

And if the website isn't built around the things people actually search for, the business can have a beautiful website sitting online for three years and still be invisible to the person who needs the service.

That is where I think businesses need to change the way they think about websites.

A website should not automatically be the first thing you spend money on.

Before building a full website, I would rather test the market.

Put up a focused landing page.

Talk about one service.

Give people a clear way to enquire.

Then watch what happens.

Do they fill in the form?

Do they call?

Do they WhatsApp?

Do they ask for a quotation?

Do they leave?

That information tells you something.

Because sometimes the problem isn't that the business needs a website.

The problem is that nobody has established how its customers actually want to contact it.

And there is no point spending money building something before understanding that.

Technology should have a job.

If a website is supposed to bring enquiries, then we should be able to look at the journey and ask

Where are the people coming from?

What are they searching for?

What page are they landing on?

What are they doing when they get there?

And how many actually contact the business?

Otherwise, what exactly is the website doing for the business?

Because having a website and having a website that helps you get customers are two very different things.

A link is not a customer acquisition process.

And maybe before businesses ask, “How much does a website cost?”

The better question is

“What do I need this website to do for my business?”

01/10/2026

There is a conversation happening about why some whites law firms seem to be doing better financially than black law firms.

From the outside, it is easy to look at the numbers and start searching for one explanation. But while working with businesses, another part of the picture keeps appearing how the business is being found in the first place.

A few months ago,we searched law firms around Thohoyandou.

Roughly 50 to 60 firms came up.

What stood out was how difficult it was to find some of these firms beyond their basic listings. No proper website. Very few or no reviews. Little content. Little activity that would allow a person searching for a lawyer to understand who the firm is, what it handles and why they should make contact.

Then came Makhado.

There are a number of white-owned law firms operating around that area, and the online picture looked different. Websites were there. Reviews were there. pages were active. There was regular information about the firms and the work they handle. They have ads accounts.

That raised a simple question

What happens when someone is looking for a lawyer online?

A firm with a strong referral network may continue receiving work without thinking much about this.

But the person who has never heard of the firm is going to search.

They will compare.

They will look at reviews.

They will look at the website.

They will look at the firm's areas of practice.

And if they cannot find enough information, they can simply move to the next firm.

The experience became even clearer when we approached around 20 law firms pwith proposals and demonstration links showing what their online presence could look like, including how a potential client could find the firm, understand its services and make an enquiry.

The surprising part was that the proposals were rejected without even getting to the question of price.

That is where the gap became difficult to ignore.

This does not mean traditional ways of getting clients are wrong. Referrals, relationships, contracts, court work and personal networks remain important.

But there is another pool of clients sitting on the other side of a Google search and social media.

And if a firm is not there when those people are searching, the firm may never know what it lost.

Perhaps the real question is not why one group of lawyers is doing better than another.

Perhaps part of the question is

How many potential clients are looking for these firms online, and how many firms are actually ready to be found?

28/09/2026

A product page should answer the questions a customer has before they buy.

What is the product, what does it do, and is it right for them?

Missing information can leave customers unsure about what to do next.

Read the full article:

Vetma Consultants builds client acquisition and revenue systems for service businesses. Generate enquiries, capture opportunities, book appointments and track your customer journey.

28/09/2026

A manufacturer needs more than just a website.
We worked with Leposh across its online presence and customer handling.

From products and enquiries to quotes, orders and business information.

We put together what we learned from the work.

Read the full article:

Vetma Consultants builds client acquisition and revenue systems for service businesses. Generate enquiries, capture opportunities, book appointments and track your customer journey.

11/08/2026

You have a business.

You have something you sell.

But you may still be asking yourself

“Will people actually buy this?”

You can spend R5,000 on ads and still not know.

You can change your website.

You can post every day.

You can keep guessing.

We'd rather test it.

Give us one product or service.

For 14 days, we'll put it in front of people and watch what happens.

Do they click?

Do they ask?

Do they book?

Do they buy?

At the end, we'll sit down with you and go through what happened.

Then you can decide what to do next.

14-Days Revenue Validation

If you want to talk about your business, Send “My Business” on our WhatsApp

No long forms. Just tell us what you sell and we'll take it from there.

24/06/2026

Where do your customers disappear?

Before you spend more money on marketing, find out where opportunities may be getting lost.

Take the free Business Movement Assessment:

https://www.vetma-consultants.co.za/assessment

22/06/2026

Your business may not have a lead problem.

It may have a movement problem.

People visit your website.

They send WhatsApps.

They ask for quotes.

Then something happens.

They disappear.

The question is:

Where?

We built the Business Movement Assessment™ to help business owners identify where customer movement slows down, stops, or gets lost.

Take the assessment:

https://www.vetma-consultants.co.za/assessment

Vetma Consultants

061 282 7975

WhatsApp: 067 210 1145