How to start a small web design business??

off-course, you will need software, that will cost around 拢500 for second hand ones..
your house/flat/room will be the tiny office, so that u don't pay an extra amount for rent..

but..

how to approach clients??
is it possible to buy a printer, print leaflets, hire someone to distribute them?
is it worth it to pay for web adverts???
any other ways for approaching clients??

and... how to charge them?? on what basis??

are there any other sources of funding apart from your own or partners money??

I have been working as a freelance web designer for a couple of years and have gotten all of my work through word-of-mouth and no advertising at all. I've been so busy I haven't even had a chance to get my own website built!

I wouldn't bother with web-advertising as there are so many web design companies out there, (unless you spend a lot of money) you ad will just be a drop in the ocean. If you do a good job, most customers will recommend you to other people.

Make it part of your standard service agreement that you reserve the right to include a small link to your site or email address at the bottom of each page of any site you build (but don't make it any more than 20px tall).

As for pricing, some people have a standard tariff (blah, blah pounds per page). But I tend to set myself an hourly wage and estimate how many hours the entire project will take me and base the price on that.

Another tip: Make sure your explicit about what the quoted price will include (maintenance, search engine submissions (which are pretty useless), etc) otherwise you could be working on the site for the rest of your life with no pay!

By word of mouth.

And then they a bunch of ungrateful sh*ts.

I tried myself and found that the well established developers and company's can turn out an entire site in less than 4 hours. So your going to find it is harder, I have been advertising on-line for 4 years and only had 2 clients and one of them went over to someone who said they could do better, when all they did was ruin all the hard work I put into getting this guys site listed in the top 3 returns and now no sign of the site to be found...

Anyone an expert in SEO?