Archive for the ‘Service’ Category

Following up is often one of the most overlooked tasks with a business.  It’s easy to put  follow up on hold because, as a priority item, it tends to lose out over doing ‘work’ for an upcoming client or meeting.

Sometimes this can be a grave mistake. One phone call, email,  or contact of any method, can make or break your relationship with a client or joint venture partners. Keeping in touch keeps your name in the minds of others. When it’s time to do business again, if your name is in someone’s mind they are more likely to contact you.  If they have forgotten all about you and your service, they may not think to call you again.

I am reminded of a mortgage broker I spoke with last summer. One of her main issues was that she had no time for contact management of her clients; no time to keep in touch. She worked on current files and clients and kept up with those, the list of names to email and call kept growing. One day she had time and spent an afternoon calling clients to say  ‘Hello.  How are things?’.

What she got that afternoon was an eye opener. Read the rest of this entry »

Technorati Tags: Customer Service, Follow up, office organization, office solution, office support, Small business, virtual assistant

Last month I attended the Third Wednesday meetup in Halifax at the Foggy Goggle – people from the area interested in and using social media. It’s a group that gets together monthly to discuss and share. At this meet the group was discussing how social media is affecting print media.

There were a few first timers there, including myself,a few others and also Dan Legere  from the Halifax’s Chronicle Herald newspaper. The Herald has been in the news lately itself, due to cutbacks and a few layoffs. But it was great to see someone there listening to ideas of others.  And listen he must have.

Today, I see that the Herald is hosting a live chat on social media.  They want to hear directly from people how they can change.  How can print media translate itself into something new, innovative and cost-effective?

If you have any ideas to help them make changes that will keep print media devloping audiences, please join in.  I will be and am very interested to see how it goes and what people have to say. More importantly, what will happen in the future.

Technorati Tags: cost effective, newspaper, Nova Scotia, Social Media, twitter

The topic tonight at my regular “Starting a Business” workshop (I am enrolled in Program with CEED), was Marketing.  It was presented by Louisa Horne, who has her own consulting business as well owning the Sylvan Learning Centre here in Halifax.  I have been finalizing the business plan for my Virtual Assistant business, and had finished my marketing plan, or at least, I thought until tonight’s class.  Ms. Horne had many great ideas that I had not thought of before and I will probably go back and tweak my plan a little now.

The biggest revelation I had was when we were discussing the Product section of the four P’s of Marketing (you know those famous word – Product, Price, Placement and Promotion). I was really stumped by one of the questions she had for us, “What features and benefits of your product are better than those offered by your competitors?”

I know I addressed this in some manner in my marketing plan, but not this specifically.  It was one question needing an answer and it was hard.

My product, essentially, is me.  How are my features and benefits better than those of other Virtual Assistants.  This is much harder to answer when you are not talking about something tangible, like those widgets, we always discussed in marketing class.

Read the rest of this entry »

Technorati Tags: competitive advantage, features and benefits, how do you compare, marketing plan, virtual assistant

Sometimes I realize the titles of my posts are bizarre… but they are what they are!

My sister has an online store, Scotiamade at Etsy and keeps busy creating cards when she is not working at her day job. Etsy  (as in Betsy without the B) is a site where people handcrafting items can have a “Store” and sell their wares.  You can find almost anything here… Etsy.

My point here is about the MOO cards however… Cheryl has been telling me about these great cards for a while, and I didn’t really get it until I was helping her at a local craft show last weekend and she showed me her MOO cards.  MOO is the name of a company in England that prints business cards and more.

Wow! They are so great and what makes them memorable to me is the way they feel…. so smooth.  The printing is very clear and they come in a neat little box.  So,  off I went home and immediately did what she had been telling me for a while – and looked at their website.

I am now in the process of ordering more of my own cards. There are many neat options available such as ordering 50 cards but with several designs, or 100 mini moo cards all with a different design – they don’t all have to be the same! The things you can do at MOO!

One of these days I will have to look up why they are called MOO .

Technorati Tags: business cards, MOO, printing cards

I have been plugging away for the past few months, trying my best to learn new skills and network enough to make a difference and bring more clients to my business.  In the midst of all this, I found out yesterday, someone took the time to nominate me for an award with VA Networking, an online Virtual Assistant group to which I belong.

The VAccolade Weekly Business Entrepreneur is given out to member of VA Networking, nominated by someone who felt the person met the award qualifications. This designation means quite a bit to me, primarily because someone nominated me.  Those are the best kinds of awards; peer-nominated, it means you meant enough for someone to take the time to say so.   Whoever you are thank you!

VA Networking has been on of the main associations through which I have been getting support, knowledge, training and more for my new life as a Virtual Assistant.  They have many resources available with their free membership, and even more with the paid one – VA Insiders.  Being an Insider has given me access to so many time saving resources, I can’t help but recommend it to anyone starting out as a Virtual Assistant.

Technorati Tags: award, VA Networking, virtual assistant