When you own an internet-based business, it might be hard to figure out all of the moving pieces and to know what to do to push your business forward. When you’re just starting out, it’s made worse by overwhelm and overload of ideas, options, etc.
As a virtual assistant, you still need to be thinking like a regular, internet- based business owner since that is exactly what you are. You may not think that you need a newsletter or ezine but the thing is, you really could benefit from it.
A newsletter does a few things for you as a virtual assistant business owner. It allows you to illustrate that you know how to do this particular task and it also allows your clients to stay in the know with your business.
You can also use it for sales, specials and other important announcements.
When a brand new entrepreneur comes to our business, Business Services, ETC, looking for advice about his or her business, the first thing I always say is start building your list. It doesn’t matter if you don’t know right now how that list will be used, just do it.
The reason is because a list helps to do two main things:
(1) Keep Your Best Customers in the Know
We all know that keeping someone’s attention can be difficult at times.
On the Internet, this is made even more difficult because there is just SO much out there. What you want to be doing is capturing the attention of people immediately and letting those people register on your site so that you can keep in touch with them in future.
The thing is, those who register for your information or your newsletter, will become your best customers. These are the people who knew, right from the beginning, that you could help them in some way. Now it’s your job to find out what they are most interested in.
(2) Provide You With a List of People to Market Your Products & Services to Over and Over and Over Again
If you think about all of the work that goes into building a website and setting up a web presence, you may not be thinking about the work that goes into marketing that site once it’s built.
Marketing is one area that a lot of people freeze up in because there are just so many options and ideas out there. The best way to market your products and services is to have a captive audience that you can deliver your message to over and over and over again.
There is a theory that people need to see your message at least three times before they’ll commit to purchasing. Combine that with the need for trust and credibility and you’ll find that marketing takes time.
How do you get people on your list?
Many people build their list by offering a newsletter or a freebie to those who register. Although some people say e-books and special reports that are given away for fr*ee to those who register, I think you should still offer something.
What I find works really well and is growing in popularity is the fr*ee e- course. On our website, www.bsetc.ca, we offer a fr*ee e-course called, ’30 Days of Delegation’, in which we illustrate thirty ways you can delegate and outsource to free up your time.
What sort of follow-up can you do with the list?
Once someone has subscribed to your list, there are a few ways you can keep in touch. If you were offering an e-course that is delivered over the course of a few days or weeks (even months or a full year) then you may only want to do that keep-in-touch strategy since it’s a lot of e-mail.
If you are offering a fr*ee report or e-book, you can setup your autoresponders to automatically send out messages at pre-planned intervals to check in with your prospect and see how they are doing. You can also cross-promote other products and services.
You can also do a newsletter (also known as an e-zine) where you can deliver your messages to your clients and promote your products and services there.
Whatever you decide, be consistent and start building your list from the get go. You’ll be glad you did!
Did you find the information in this post helpful? If so, check out our Build Your Virtual Assistance Business course! The course contains information like this to help you build, grow and manage your virtual assistance business.
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Erin Blaskie has been in the virtual assistance industry for over 6 years. Having built her multiple six figure VA practice from the ground up, she offers her support and guidance to her fellow VAs in many areas. Find Erin on Twitter at @ErinBlaskie. |
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