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Referenced Links:
- Upwork
- Premier VA Summit
- Hootsuite
- EasyWebinar
Tweetables:
When a tool doesn’t offer a trial period, consider that investment like paying for a class. #vatip 
Gotta Tweet!
You want to put value out there regardless of whether you get anything in return.
#vatipGotta Tweet!
TThere’s no way for us to know and experience everything. #vatip Gotta Tweet! There’s no way for us to know and experience everything.< #vatip[/tweetthis]
In Words:
Hi, I am so glad you’re listening to today’s episode. This is one that you don’t want to miss. We’re talking about offering services that you could talk about without blinking. This is episode number 46.
Now, you’ve got a prospect that has come to you, either they did a Google search and found you, they know about your blog, they’re on your email list, they follow you on Twitter. Maybe you’re on LinkedIn, you’re on Facebook. You submitted something through Upwork or they saw your profile on Upwork, or they attended your webinar, or you are part of the Premier VA Summit, whatever, however they found you.
In many cases, they’re going to want to hear your voice. They’re going to want to talk to you to make sure that there’s a connection and that you know your stuff. So you want to offer services that you could talk about without even thinking about it. The better you’re able to do that, the quicker they can see, hey, she knows her stuff. Hey, he knows his stuff.
I want you to take a moment and think about what you’re offering right now.
A true heart-to-heart with yourself to evaluate what you’re offering right now, today. Include the public list, the things that are publically listed on your website that you say you provide, and services that have kind of slid in because a client asked you. Those things that have slid in may be things you want to continue or things you want to x out. Looking at your list, x out the things you tried and did not enjoy, so we’re not talking about those.
Now, look at what’s left, the things that you like. This could include things you need to learn more about, or things you know about and can talk about without blinking. Those are the services that you want to lead with.
If a client schedules a call with you and you provide social media services, you want to be able to talk about the difference between Hootsuite and Sprout Social or the different between Hootsuite and SocialOomph or whatever tools are out there that are current, that are useful, that are effective in your area.
If you do blog content management, you want to be able to talk about how clients send you that blog post. What systems do you use? What do you bring? What do you offer? Do you add pictures? Do you add tags? Do you add categories? You want to have the information and the questions. You don’t want the client to say, “Well, do you add categories to blog posts?” and you have to ask, “What are categories?” because categories are standard with blog content management.
They may be using a blogging system that you’ve never used. You may be using WordPress or have done Blogger or BlogSpot or Typepad, but they may be on Squarespace and you’ve never used Squarespace. Now, that’s different because those are tools, but I mean actually talking about the nitty-gritty of the specific service.
You also want to be able to get them thinking beyond just writing their blog post. What are some things that you could give them? Maybe they’ve never used tags and categories. Why would they want to use that? Being able to talk about that stuff, just rattling it off, just talking about it, shows your comfort level with the service that you provide. It shows your expertise, your professionalism, your interest, your excitement and passion for that particular service.
As a technical virtual assistant, I work with all the techie things behind the scenes. I also work with clients that do webinars. That includes webinar sales pages, transcription, podcasts, those different things. You ask me about that, I’m able to talk about it. If a client wants to know what’s the difference between EasyWebinar and GoToMeeting? What should I use? Why do you say that? I can tell them, without referring to notes, without doing a Google search. Why, because I’ve already done that work before.
When you first are learning, you are doing research, you’re testing it out. This is all knowledge and experience that will help you down the road. If you’ve been providing a service for six months, a year, five years, you’re learning new things that you could talk about without blinking.
If you’re listening to me for the first time, you’re brand new, you’ve been thinking about becoming a virtual assistant, the thing that can help you most if there’s a service you know you want to provide, dive into it for yourself. You want to offer social media? Dive into what it’s all about. Use yourself as the model. Use yourself as the example so that you can tweak and mess up and all kinds of things on your own stuff, so by the time you get your first client, you know what to do.
If it’s scheduling, start by scheduling your own posts on Facebook or using Hootsuite or Sprout Social or SocialOomph, whatever the tool is, explore it. A lot of the tools offer 30-day free trials, Take advantage of that. Use that as your opportunity to learn it. If there’s a tool you want to learn that you have to pay for – recently, I’m learning about a new tool on creating landing pages. I’ve used OptimizePress, LeadPages, Premise. Now, I have a client that’s using something new, Profit Builder, and for me personally, I want to investigate it more because it seems like a really neat tool. I’ve got the basics down, but I want to know the nuts and bolts. They don’t have a trial, but the cost of it is worth it. It’s like paying for a training class.
When there’s software out there that doesn’t offer a trial period, consider that investment like paying for a class.
If you are one that reads, that watches different videos and you can catch on quickly, then it’ll be easy for you to learn like that, how to do these different things, and use yourself as the example.
If you are a VA that does editing and proofing, you know the easiest format for you to edit. Do you like for the information to be in a Word document? Do you like it to be in Google Drive? Do you want it to be in Evernote? Or if it’s a blog post that you’re editing and proofing, would you rather it already be in the blogging system, in WordPress, or wherever. This is information that you can talk about without blinking to help the client.
That is how you show what you know, by talking about it and being excited about it.
If you’re offering something and as I’m talking to you about the excitement and joy of what you’re providing and you’re thinking, oh, gosh, I don’t even want to talk about it for five minutes. I just want to do it. Then you might want to evaluate whether or not that’s a service that you should be offering in your virtual assistant business because you’re going to have to talk about it. The client’s going to ask you about it. They’re going to ask you questions before they commit to you and contracting with you as their VA, even if it’s just a trial project that they’re doing.
So you want something that you can talk about. You don’t have to know everything, just main components. Like I talked about with the landing page, I know how to do landing pages, get it all set up, all the nuts and bolts and things like that. But it’s a new tool over here that has come out, because you know things pop up all the time.
There’s no way for us to know everything and experience everything. But once we’re aware of it, it’s up to us to take the initiative to go the extra step. Dive into it to learn more about it so that the next client that comes that uses it, now you can speak from the standpoint of talking without blinking because you’ve already done the research and the work and gotten some experience with it. Okay.
The action step for this podcast episode is to make a list of everything that you’re offering now, that’s on your website.
So you’ll probably do a quick copy and paste of the services you’ve got on your website now. Then add to that list other things that you have done because a client asked, you were interested, and wanted to give it a shot. Add that to your list. Eliminate the things you tried and don’t want to try again. Cross those off. Don’t even think about it.
Then, look at the list. What on that list would you be ready to talk about right now if I were to call you up and say, “Hey, I see you offer XYZ, tell me about that.” Circle those things. Circle those things. Lead with those services.
There will always be things that are complimentary to the services that you lead with, so it doesn’t mean you eliminate that. But lead with them. What are your leads? That becomes your specialty. That becomes your specialty.
It’s a lot to think about. Can you tell I’m excited about this? I want to get you talking about what you do. Because when you can talk about it without blinking, guess what? You can write blog posts about it. You can do little short tidbits on social media. You can write long articles about it. You can do eBooks about it. You can do your webinars about it.
Webinars, by the way, for virtual assistants are a great way to market your service and show off what you know. Not an infomercial, but a workshop, a learning opportunity. Showing the clients what you know.
I mentioned about a client that asked what’s the difference between EasyWebinar and GoToWebinar. I can do a webinar about webinar tools, selecting the right webinar tools, selecting the right shopping cart, why you’d want this one over that one. What are the effects of choosing one over the other? Oh, just all kinds of things. See what happens when you talk about stuff without blinking? Then when I mention, oh, you can promote your business with a webinar, you already know, oh, I know exactly what I can talk about.
You always want people to leave with something they can do right now with or without you. You want to give value. Put value out there.
Whether it’s a webinar, whether it’s your blog post, whether it’s a phone call with a client, you want to put value out there regardless of whether you get anything in return. The more you put value out there, the more value comes back in to you.
Now, you’re probably excited, ready to go, and circle the services that you could talk about without blinking. Here’s the last step: I want to know how that worked out for you. I want to know did you do it. Come to my Facebook page and let me know, “Hey, Tiffany. I listened to episode number 46 and I have three services that I could talk about without blinking.” Let me know what they are.
Let me share this with you before I end this podcast episode. There are clients that come to me that need a lot of different things. I don’t provide everything. I’m a technical virtual assistant. I don’t do administrative services, so I don’t do bookkeeping and research and there’s a million things that we all provide, right. When I know what you provide, guess what I can do? Refer. Tell the client all about you.
There is an opportunity for us all to connect.
When I do the 21-day challenges, that’s a chance for us to connect, for me learn about you, learn what you do. When the Premier VA Summit and mentorship is out, an even greater opportunity for me to learn who you are and what you do. Because, see, when I refer one of my clients to another VA that I know, I’m putting my reputation on the line. Because if it doesn’t work out because the person didn’t do what they said they could do, then they’re looking at me like, well, you recommended this person and she didn’t know how to do it. It’s one thing if it’s a personality conflict, but it’s another if it’s a service offering that was said that you can do and you can’t do.
But with the challenges and the mentorship and summit, I’m able to learn more about you, what you do, and the kind of person you are. Would you be someone I would want on my own team? Those are the people I like to refer, people that I would want on my own VA team. I’m a technical virtual assistant and I need VAs to help me as well. I have a wonderful transcription VA. Shout out to Shannon. She’s listening to this and transcribing this for me. Then I’ll have another one soon to help with social media. We all need each other and this is how we can help.
But the first place to start is starting with those services that you could talk about without blinking.
Thanks so much for tuning in. If you like what you heard, stay tuned. We’ll be back. Tell me what’s going on with you. Come on over the Facebook page: facebook.com/tiffanyparsonbiz, or if you prefer a little shorter message, come on over to Twitter: @tiffanydparson.
See you next time.
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