This quote made me think of my life and my business future, if I really wanted my business to succeed I had to venture into new and scary territory.

Part of working in the public sector world meant that I didn’t have to think business, I didn’t have to sell but I did have to perform and deliver.

Running your own business, performing and delivering isn’t enough, I have to sell and I have to make connections with people and sell what I have to offer, especially in my line of work where 99% of the time you don’t meet your clients, your clients put 100% trust into what you can do purely by what others say about you, and what they read on Twitter, Facebook and other online profiles.

I have always been honest with people, I am a rubbish sales person, I couldn’t sell sweets to a child (OK maybe I could)… which is why I love Twitter! I can be myself, I don’t have to sell myself, I participate in conversations, share my knowledge, have a giggle and offer support. If followers choose to look at my profile and link through to my website that’s fine, if they don’t they don’t.

I joined Twitter on the 24th November 2008, and I didn’t truly ‘get it’ until a year later when I tried it for about the 3rd time. Since then I have built up some solid friendships, business clients and associates. I have built  up really amazing friendships with a group of fellow Virtual Assistants and as a result became a member of the Virtual Assistant Support Group (VASG) where we share and collaborate ideas, successes and stories.

Because of this, I recently attended the National Virtual Assistant Conference where I was privileged enough to meet and listen to a range of amazing guest speakers talk about sales, Twitter, inspiration and transformation and networking.

These included Mark Shaw, Steve Clarke, Nick Williams, Sarah-Jayne Hewitt, Brad Burton, and Paul Fuggle

Those of you who know me, you will know that I don’t enjoy networking, my worst nightmare is walking into a room full of people and having to tell everyone what I do and how good I am at it. Not good if you want to succeed in business, but I’m working on it ;o)

So, if it wasn’t for Twitter and the amazing friends I’ve made I never would have gone, and I would never had met the people I talk to every day some include clients and also amazing associates.

Most of all I wouldn’t have had the pleasure of listening to the amazing advice given by the aforementioned guest speakers.

Because of what I learned at the conference, I have since implemented some of the techniques and advice and also the attitude that was shared.

I have also attended a wonderful webinar (my first one! seriously) – ‘change your clients, or change your clients’ which is offered by Paul Fuggle of Transformational Adventures (go and check it out, if you haven’t already, go!)

I have amended my website slightly, I am more organised, focused and also more aware of my wonderful Twitter friends.

As a result, in one week, I have doubled my client enquires, doubled the traffic to my website and tomorrow (being Monday) taking on a freelance assistant to help me in my office. I honestly don’t know if it’s because of the changes I’ve made or if it’s just coincidence, but it’s working!

So my advice to you is this, if you are truly serious about your business, you have to step out of your comfort zone, make valuable connections, keep relationships and truly love what you do!

Some days are easy, some days are a struggle, but I love the things I do and most of all the clients I work with.

And remember, Twitter, and social media as a rule isn’t a quick fix, like ‘real life’ relationships need love and attention, if you treat it like you would with your ‘real life friends’ it will do amazing things for you.

Being a Virtual Assistant Rocks!

I’ve put together a quick overview on Social Media. I probably haven’t covered most of it, but hopefully it will provide you with a valuable resource for the tools available to enable you to maximise your efforts in Social Media Marketing.

Social Media, a Clients Guide – Click here to view!

P.s did you see the snake logo? I did that!

What do I use for what?

Profile – a Facebook profile is an individual profile for yourself. Some people use it for business but I amongst others use mine for personal use to engage with friends and family.

Fan Page – To create a presence for your business or a brand

Group – to gather a group of people who have a common issue or interest

When you’re thinking of creating a group or a page, you need to first think about why you are setting it up. If you’re setting it up as an extension to your marketing plan, then I would always encourage you to set up a fan page.

As previously mentioned, fan pages are indexed in major search engines, and therefore an excellent way to improve SEO for your business. Once you reach 25 fans, you can also change the URL of your fan page. Instead of having the long ugly URL you can choose one that best represents your business or brand. For example, mine is www.facebook.com/kcvirtualsolutions To change your URL go here http://www.facebook.com/username/ think carefully before you change it though, as this can only be done once!

The key feature of a fan page, that I think it particularly useful, is that you can have multiple administrators, but when posting, the admin is anonymous and the post will appear as the business/brand maintaining a corporate voice, especially useful if you are managing a page on behalf of a client, or if you don’t want to be personally linked with that page.

A group however, is much more useful if it’s informal, or a hobby, think of it more as a forum where people come together to discuss common interests. Administrators appear as themselves and not the ‘brand’. You can’t change the URL of a group and groups are not indexed in search engines, and therefore would never recommend setting up a group for promoting a business or brand.

Fan pages are visible to unregistered people and are insexed via search engines – this helps improve SEO and also reputation management – Groups don’t have this facility.

So to conclude:

• * Pages are generally better for a long-term relationships with your fans, readers or customers;
• * Groups are generally better for hosting a (quick) active discussion and attracting quick attention.

I’m not going to stand on my soap box and shout WE CAN BE TRUSTED, trust and understanding, whether it being a personal relationship or a professional relationship, comes with time.

Of course, us VAs don’t expect you to trust us with your Credit Card details or have full access to your personal emails from the very first day, this kind of relationship needs to be built up over time.

So how can you develop your relationship with the VA that best fits your business into a trusting long lasting partnership?

• Treat the selection process as you would with any normal interview, interview multiple VAs until your gut instinct kicks in and tells you ‘yes this is the VA I want’
• Be sure to check out testimonials from clients before you sign on the dotted line
• Talk to other business owners who use VAs and ask them for their thoughts and experiences
• Before you hand over your deepest secrets, take baby steps, delegate one task at a time until you build solid foundations for a trusting relationship
• When you have worked together for a length of time, and only when you are 100% satisfied with the outcome,  delegate some more

One final note,Virtual Assistants are business owners just like you, their entire business is built around trust, ethics, loyalty, and delivering high standard of work, without this we won’t succeed.