People often become charter fishing captains because they love to fish.
One client told me: “It’s the only way to pay for my $70k a year fishing habit”!
But let’s be honest, is charter fishing a side hustle or a full-time gig? In other words, is your charter operation a real business?
If not, I’m guessing there’s one key piece missing: a system
Systems Make Businesses Grow
There’s only so far you can get without a system in place. And most captains we talk to are working with a 2nd rate website and limited technology.
Heck, most don’t even have a calendar on their site or an online booking system.
And they’re all taking chances with waivers.
Doing things by texting, pen and paper limits your growth.
On the other hand, building a system means putting processes in place to help you grow, and leveraging technology to make things easier on your and your customers.
Our Charter Captain Growth System
Here is the system our founder – Captain Chris Faler – has used to build not one, but TWO successful charter fishing businesses:
1 – Build a first-class website
2 – Take your Google Business profile seriously
3 – Ask for Google reviews at every opportunity
4 – Leverage software for calendars, bookings, deposits, payments, waivers AND tips
5 – Have someone answer your calls while you’re fishing or unavailable
6 – Invest in Google Ads to book additional trips
7 – Work your past client database (a booking system makes this much easier)
8 – Have a great time on the water, no matter what you’re catching
Follow these steps and before long, you’ll be booked solid and thinking about finding captains to train and allow you to grow and scale.
Ignore them, and you’ll never escape your day job or the weeks where you have no trips booked.
Until next time – Tight lines!
