Blog Week!
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If you would like to sign up for the blog intern course (and you should if you want to learn about blogging) it will only be $119.00!
You cannot beat this anywhere. Think about how much people want to charge for a custom header! I charge more than this for a blog install!
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This deal is not going to last forever, so hurry! Click HERE!!!!
It’s been a rough couple weeks around here. I have been sick, nothing life threatening, but bad enough to require lots of couch time. I am fortunate to have clients who are understanding that I am sick and my work product might be slow. I won’t miss a deadline, but I might be slow on non deadline activities. They get it and are OKAY with it.
The reason they are okay with this is that I have pre-screened my client base to understand that I am not a corporation. I do not have a bunch of people working under me that I can outsource to. Certainly I do have some VA friends on standby just in case, women I trust whom I can turn a client over to if needed.
Some people call this the “hit by a bus plan”. I think it is fitting. So, if you are hit by a bus, what is your plan? Who will take care of your clients? Who can your clients trust? Do you have more than one person?
I was asked this question recently in email, so I thought I would answer it here. Why can’t I just do whatever the client needs me to do?
Well, for one, the more you do one task the more efficient you become, therefore the more money you will make and the happier your clients will be. If you try to be everything to everyone your business will suffer. You won’t be able to attract the clients because when they look at your website, or talk to you about what you do, you won’t be able to sufficiently tell them.
Many people who hire a Virtual Assistant are not sure what they need. When they go to your site and see a small targeted group of packages to support their business they will feel relieved to see what a VA can do for them. If they go to your site and see an unending list they will become overwhelmed and not know what to hire you to do.
Many new Virtual Assistants, myself included, accept every client that comes their way because they are afraid to lose out on the money. I mean, face it, we need money to live, and sometimes we have to do things we don’t want to do in order to make money… right?
Maybe, but if you only take clients that you want to work for, doing things that you enjoy and want to do, you will keep space in your schedule to have more of the same. If you take clients you do not like, doing projects you hate, you will be stuck all day long doing things you hate and you will burn out. You may as well take a J.O.B. for someone else and forget being an entrepreneur.
So that is why you need a niche. So what is your niche? Do you need help figuring it out?
There is some great invoicing software out there for contractors to use. I wanted to tell you about the one I am using. It is called Freshbooks ™.
I really love this software more and more each day. It’s not very expensive and you can try it free. The only draw back on this software is ME. I tend not to read directions so I just try to click my way around. However, it is very intuitive so I often figure it out without reading the directions!
Great things about Freshbooks ™:
Send invoices by email, mail, or print them out and mail yourself
Receive invoices from vendors via Freshbooks
Keep track of hours you work on projects
Keep track of contractors and vendors that work on various projects
Keep track of time via your iPhone ™ with their iPhone ™ app (!!!!)
Accept payments via paypal ™, or check!
Manage your books (yes you can!)
There are so many features that I am just learning about. I love the fact that the paper invoice that some of my clients wants can be mailed by them in very professional envelopes. The invoice is branded with my logo and it looks very professional.
Do you ever wonder how some people sleep at night? I do. I keep reading on Virtual Assistant websites that when you are on retainer it is not your job to remind your client to use up their time. Well, I disagree.
If you promise someone 20 hours a month then, in my opinion, you should give them 20 hours a month. Since you, as the VA are keeping track of the time, then it is your responsibility to keep the client up to date on the time spent and time remaining.
Now, you can word your contracts in a way that this is not necessary. Word your contract that you will spend “no more than X hours per month” and make sure that your clients know that you will not be reminding them about their unused time, and that time does not roll over. I am not sure how this will translate into happy clients and it is not something I will ever do, but I do know that some VAs successfully run their business in this manner.
Just remember that as a Virtual Assistant you should have a certain amount of ethics and responsibility for how clients view you and all Virtual Assistants. As contractors we have to stick together and promise to maintain the highest level of ethics, honesty, and legality.
Remember, just because something is technically legal does not make it ethical.
