Contact Forms & Contact Info Virtual Assistant...

I was doing some research tonight to find Savvy Virtual Assistants on the web to consider for my new SVA Award (Savvy Virtual Assistant). While doing this research, I couldn’t help but notice that there were so many websites that made their contact information really hard to find.Here are a few tips I have to ensure that you aren’t losing business due to obscurely placed e-mail addresses:

• Create a page called ‘Contact’ on both your website and blog. Don’t call it anything but ‘Contact’ or ‘Contact Us’. People visit websites expecting the same thing from every site. Easy to find information and most people associate contact information with the word Contact.
• Don’t use contact forms exclusively. They can be used but make sure to at least have an e-mail address somewhere on your website that people can use. Contact forms annoy me to no end – especially if I have an attachment I want to send someone. I very well can’t do that through a contact form so either trash the contact form or add your e-mail address.
• Make sure to have a phone number visible somewhere on your site. Why? It gives people a sense of security and trust in your business. Without it, you don’t necessarily look like a legitimate business.

What else am I missing?

What do you feel are some ‘rules’ around contact information on a website? Also, check your own site. Is your contact information easily found in five seconds or less – especially to someone who has never seen your website before?

Blog Sites – Why I Love Them...

As most of you know (or can tell by reading this entry), I’ve switched my site from a basic HTML website to a blog site. I’ve done this for many reasons but the number one reason was to interact more with my clients and other virtual assistants. By having a blog site, I can provide fresh content in an easy to read format. You visit this page, you can read the blog entries or you can navigate to the other pages.

Since I have done this, I have been approached by three of my clients to create a blog site for them. Now, I’m not just talking about installing WordPress or signing them up for TypePad or Blogger so they can have a blog – I’m talking about their entire site being setup on a blog. In all three cases their blog of choice was WordPress. I am so excited to do this as I am absolutely loving every aspect of my new site.

(more…)