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Networking

Wil Hart on March 18, 2010

About your elevator speech – How’s it working for you?

I saw the following question on one of the forums I belong to and thought you’d find it interesting:

Q. Tell me About Your Elevator Speech… do you have one?

I live in an area where Virtual Assistant has yet to become a household word. I am interested to see what others in my field tell folks when they ask with a quizzical expression… O, what is that?

It is easy for me to come up with examples of what I do but unless it addresses the individual’s “pain points,” I am still not doing the job of educating them and properaly promoting myself – I usually turn it around and ask them how they run their business and try to find out how they might utilize a VA’s service. Either that or I just explain how using a VA can actually help them increase their income potential by allowing them more time to do what makes them money and how they can do it without the usual costs associated with hiring an employee.

I am interested to hear some ideas from this wonderful group about how you handle this issue. Continue Reading>>

Marketing Networking

Wil Hart on March 12, 2010

Business Management Time Management Transition Virtual Assistant

Wil Hart on January 27, 2010

Transition from the Corporate Office to Your Office

Aspiring entrepreneurs dream of the time when they can tell the boss “See Ya!” and start working in their PJs. Working from home is definitely a relief from the commute, stress and politics of the office. You have your freedom to call the shots and do things your own way.     Continue Reading>>

Marketing Resources Virtual Assistant

Wil Hart on January 26, 2010

How to Find Your First Ideal Client

This is the question that plagues all virtual assistants regardless of how long they’ve been in business. Clients are our lifeblood. But you don’t want to be so anxious for business that you will take on just anyone as a client. You need to have standards for what you will and won’t put up with in a client.

Virtual assistants have to be proactive about finding and acquiring these ideal new clients. Thanks to the Internet, prospecting for clients has become easier in regards to your ability to reach more people in a shorter amount of time. But the basic business practices that apply in the brick and mortar world still apply.

There are three ways to grow you business, online or offline. And they are:    Continue Reading>>

Marketing Virtual Assistant

Wil Hart on January 25, 2010

Turning Your Website Into A Client Attractive Marketing Tool

Smart virtual assistants recognize the power the Internet has to build their reputation and bring new clients to their doors. We often invest money in a beautiful site, launch it and expect to be flooded with new clients. Unfortunately, they don’t usually come. A beautiful web design and catchy business name is not enough to attract clients anymore. Continue Reading>>

Business Management

Wil Hart on January 22, 2010

Why Smart Virtual Assistants Create Systems

Virtual assistants are gifted professionals who can typically organize and run any business their clients hand to them. But when it comes to being organizing and running their own businesses, that’s more of a challenge. When you’re wearing multiple hats it is easy to put off creating our own systems.

A smart virtual assistant’s business should strive to run as smoothly as their local 5-start restaurant. At anytime you should be able to add a new client to your workload and not miss a beat in your productivity and service standards.

Creating and documenting your business procedures can be done quickly and easily if you take a few steps. And thanks to technology, we can create our systems plan in a variety of ways. Here are three steps to get you started:

  1. Gather Your Information. This step is quite challenging for many because it means collecting all of the information you have previously stored in your brain (and all over your office) into one specific document. Your goal is to record your daily business routine to paper. Be sue that it includes all passwords, resources, the web addresses, phone numbers, contact information, etc.
  2. Create a Video Record. In addition to recording your information on paper creating a video tutorial where you explain and describe exactly what you’re doing and why you are doing it. You can use Camtasia or its open source counterpart CamStudio to complete this step. The benefit of the video is that you’ll be able to share them with future contractors or employees.
  3. Monitor Your Results. This step involves paying attention to your business. For example, let’s say when you began your virtual assistance business you were using Excel to keep track of your accounting. But now you have more clients and Excel is becoming cumbersome. So you decide to try a program like FreshBooks. So you’d take a moment to compare how much time you are saving (or losing) with your newly proposed accounting system. Once you’ve examined your experience you would update your systems document.

Business systems can be broken down into three words: Plan – Do – Review.

  • Plan out how you want you business to run.
  • Do what your systems plan outlines; don’t improvise or change anything until you get to the next step which is to Review.
  • Review if the way that you’re working is the most effective way to get business done and if not, make adjustments as necessary. By repeating these steps you’re well on your way to a well-run business organization.

Time Management

Wil Hart on January 20, 2010

Achieving Goals Mindset Virtual Assistant

Wil Hart on January 18, 2010

Overcoming the Challenges Every Virtual Assistant Faces

Being a virtual assistant can trigger many fears that you may not have even known existed before. You know that you have many talents and a lot to offer your clients. Nevertheless, it’s not an easy job to keep your confidence up while dealing with the realities of marketing your services and being your own money manager. In order to reach your goals of profitability and success you have to develop the proper mindset.

One big issue that comes up in our business is the one of how to get and stay profitable. Women, especially have issues with this idea of profitability. We tend to be hard workers with a passion for what we do and deliver an excellent product to our clients. However, we don’t always “own our value” in the marketplace. What does that mean? “Owning your value” in the marketplace means charging, receiving money, and asking for money.

Another is the fear of standing out. How many of us really feel comfortable standing up in front of people and saying, “You know what? I am awesome at what I do.” For many even the thought of saying those words might make you squirm. It could be because doing so triggers a lot of old baggage that we may have picked up as we were growing up about being modest and not acknowledging our accomplishments.

As with all fears (False Evidence Appearing Real), these limiting beliefs can be conquered by taking advantage of the many resources available. Some of these include:     Continue Reading>>

Achieving Goals

Wil Hart on December 12, 2009

How To Set S.M.A.R.T. Goals For 2010

It is inevitable that come January, most entrepreneurs will begin thinking about what it is they want to accomplish in their business in 2010. They’ll plan their “New Year’s” resolutions and tell themselves they are going to do A, B and C. But savvy Virtual Assistants are thinking about this NOW, so that they can hit the ground running in January and really create results.

Whether you call them resolutions or goals, the point is the same — to clarify what you will accomplish in your business in specific, measurable terms. Perhaps you want to enroll more clients in your business, raise your rates or expand your team. Whatever the end result is that you want to achieve, you need to set a specific goal and then break that goal down into action steps that will bring the desired results to life.

Smart Virtual Assistants set S.M.A.R.T. goals, which means their goals are: Continue Reading>>

Business Management

Wil Hart on November 29, 2009

How to Ensure A Successful Relationship With Your Clients

Having a good relationship with your clients is critical if you want to have a successful Virtual Assistant business. It all begins with laying a strong foundation. You’ll need to have best practices firmly in place so that when a new client says “Yes I want to work with you” you’ll have everything in place that you need to get off to a great start.

Taking time to establish the groundwork will give you a strong foundation, which will help your business stand out. Not only will a new client continue to use your VA services, they will refer others to you as well. The following tips will help you to develop a strong relationship with your clients right from day one:

  • Put everything in writing. It’s important to have a written contract. That way you both are in agreement about the details of the partnership. Be sure to provide your client with a copy of your policies and procedures, detailing how you operate your business. This should include your hours of operation, fee structure, billing schedule and termination policy.
  • You’ll want to summarize the items you and your new client have discussed and include this summary along with the contract you send the client to sign. This will let your new client know that you have a good understanding of what the expectations are including deadlines and any special or specific tasks the project involves. It will help things to run smoothly from the beginning and avoid problems down the road.
  • Once the client has decided to work with you, forward them your contract documents as soon as possible. Include in these documents a client profile intake sheet so you can gather important details about your client’s business. Having this information at your fingertips will allow you to serve your clients better and more efficiently. Do not start working on any projects until you have a signed agreement and payment in hand. Doing so will show your new client that you really value his or her business and are ready to start working.
  • From the very beginning, it’s important to establish good communication with your clients. Tell them up front what your communication plan is. Be clear about your accessibility, how often the two of you will talk, your turnaround time for responding to emails and how each of you prefers to communicate. Strong communication is the backbone of any successful relationship, so you’ll want to be proactive about staying in regular communication with your clients. This also includes taking meticulous notes during your conversations with the client. Pay attention to what’s being said (and what’s not said) and ask the necessary questions to get clarification. You’ll want to have all of the necessary details in your notes so that you can refer to them once you start the requested task or project.
  • Further to this, make sure you understand exactly when work is to be completed. One thing you ALWAYS want to do is to meet deadlines and avoid excuses. Although unexpected delays will come up, make it a good practice to meet all deadlines. Meeting deadlines and excellent client service is critical in building a good relationship with your new client. If you find yourself in a situation where you see that you aren’t going to meet a deadline, advise your client of this right away. Be honest about the situation and present solutions that will solve the problem. DON’T wait until the deadline has passed and then tell the client you weren’t able to complete the job. Being forthright about the matter will increase the trust and respect your client has for you.
  • Give your clients more than they ask for by having a policy of under promising and over delivering. If they need something by a certain date and time always try to get the task completed before that time. If you can take some extra time to make certain a presentation is even better than they asked for or expected that’s even better. Do not over promise by setting unrealistic deadlines for yourself.
  • Make it a point to back up your work on a consistent basis. Your clients are depending on you to protect their work so make certain that it is protected. Back up to an outside source (such as Mozy, Syncplicity or iBackup) as well as to an external hard drive in your office. In addition, have the habit of proofreading ALL of your work and then reproofing it by reading it at a later time to avoid mistakes. You want to deliver high quality services at all time.

Enrolling a new client into your practice is the beginning of an exciting adventure! By following the steps noted above, you’ll build a strong foundation for a long-term, successful and profitable relationship.

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