kO′ch VAadj. 1. a highly specialized and niched virtual
assistant who is in tune with their coaching clients and customizes solutions based upon their individual needs and goals 2. differs from a general virtual assistant as they only partner with members of the coaching industry [syn: Virtual Accuracy Companies]
vur′chu-al asis′tentadj. an independent contractor and entrepreneur who assists you in taking care of the administrative and technical side of your business or life. They assist you or your business on a contractual basis from a remote location. While most VAs perform administrative tasks they are more than just a home-based secretary. Before setting up their practices, most VAs held prominent positions in the corporate world. The Virtual Assistance industry comprises former corporate trainers, publicity agents, marketing executives, paralegals, executive assistants and many more. **This particular definition of a Virtual Assistant was developed by Virtual Accuracy Companies.
These are challenging times and I really believe that your ability to handle fear is one of the most important skills you can master. This book of the best ideas of 22 amazing experts will help with exactly that whether the issue is little scary moments or the big, mind-numbing fearful events.
If you buy your copy of How the Fierce Handle Fearfrom Amazon.com within the next 24 hours you’ll also get exclusive access to the complete audio collection of the groundbreaking “Fearless Fridays Telesummit”. This was the recent event featuring over 30 amazing speakers offering their best tips on handling fear.
The proceeds from the book sales will go to Frank McKinney’s Caring House Project Fund which provides needed help to the desperately poor and homeless throughout the world.
I would love for you to share this link with your family and friends. Getting a grip on fear will help us all to move out of these challenging times and on to the better ones ahead.
Planning, writing and creating an e-book can be a labor of love. At the very least you want your efforts to result in good sales however with a few steps your labor of love can rise above good sales and achieve bestselling status. Your eBook can have great sales, here’s how:
1. Make sure your e-book provides a benefit. The very first step, and often the step that takes the longest is the research phase where you analyze your audience and potential book topics. In addition to your book needing to provide a benefit to your audience, a bestseller provides a benefit that is in high demand, even though sometimes people don’t know they want it until they see your book.
For example, “how to win friends and influence people,” was a bestseller because it provided a very clear benefit – the ability to be liked. Make sure your book topic provides a clear benefit to your target market.
2. Make sure it has an attention grabbing, benefit promising book title. Your book title needs to accomplish many things because it is the first thing people will look at when visiting your website or considering a purchase. Your headline needs to appeal to emotions, provide a benefit, and grab their attention. Chicken Soup for the Soul is an example of a book title that tapped into emotions and aroused enough curiosity to get people to look further into the book to see what it’s about.
3. Make sure you have credibility. Credibility can be on the back cover, on the inside flap, on the cover with your name. It’s demonstrated in many ways. For example, if you have a forward by someone highly respected in your industry, several positive reviews, or even a short bio explaining your knowledge and experience, they all lend to your credibility and help prospects make a decision to become customers.
4. Find the right promotion strategy for your audience. Simply publishing a book won’t make it sell. You have to promote it. Here are just a few ways to promote your eBook:
Reviews
Social networking
Advertising – including banners, text, ezines and pay per click
Affiliates
Joint Venture
Word of mouth
Selling via retail sites like ClickBank, eBay and Amazon.com
All of these marketing strategies may or may not work for you. Create a plan, set goals, and test and track your tactics for success.
5. Work hard to get some press! Press publicity are one of the best ways to grow a book’s sales into bestseller status. Submit press releases to local news outlets and online. Contact the media, get interviewed and connect with people online to help you promote your book.
When it comes to making your e-book a bestseller, putting together a great package is the first step. It has to be a book people will review well, one that looks professional and keeps its promise. Once that’s accomplished, it’s up to you to get the word out about your book. Create a marketing and promotion strategy and follow it through.
Direct mail and advertising are two extremely powerful marketing tools when they’re done correctly. And there are key steps you can take to ensure not only that you’re getting the best conversion rate, but that you’re maximizing your response. These keys rest in the design of your piece. Let’s take a look at ten design tips to improve your advertising and direct mail.
1 – Make sure any graphics you use assist the sale rather than detract from it. Graphics in your advertising piece or direct mail piece serve two main purposes, they are there to elicit an emotional response and they’re there to pull your reader into the copy. If the graphics distract, get rid of them!
2 – Make sure the fonts are easy to read. Body copy generally should be a serif font and the headlines and subheadings should be a bold serif or a sans serif. Make sure the font color you choose is easy to read on the background you’ve chosen as well. A white font on a light gray background is going to be clicked away from almost immediately. People don’t want to strain their eyes to read your ad.
Test for colors in your headlines too. For example, it’s often found that red headlines draw more conversions. That may or may not be the case for your audience; test it.
3 – Use special handwriting and formatting to draw the reader’s attention to certain aspects of your letter. Many copywriters have found that a personalized signature help the reader feel connected. Additionally, rather than using standard bullets in your direct mail piece, what about stars, checkmarks or other unique symbols.
4 – Photographs can really boost conversions. What photos do you use? Photos of people who represent your audience are the best bet. It helps the message connect to your reader. For example, if you’re marketing to moms, then you could include a picture of a mom with her child.
5 – Who is your audience? If they’re an older generation then they’re probably not going to relate to or appreciate a piece that’s graphically heavy. However, if you’re marketing to a younger crowd then they do appreciate lots of graphics.
6 – Show the product. If you’re marketing a product, by all means show it. That includes digital information products. Have a cover designed and use it in your sales copy.
7 – Use real stamps instead of a postage meter. They’re less inclined to dismiss it as junk mail if you use a real stamp.
8 – Address your envelope personally, or at least make it look like it’s addressed personally so they don’t dismiss your direct mail piece as junk mail.
9 – Place a teaser on the outside of the envelope. A teaser is a bit of tantalizing copy that makes your direct mail piece irresistible.
10 – Consider the envelope itself. One of the most successful envelopes is a standard white #10 envelope. However, be sure to test the success rate. You may want to change the color of the envelope, use a window envelope or change the size of the envelope depending on your market.
Direct mail and advertising is as much a science as it is an art. There are tried and true methods for reaching an audience and converting them, however, your audience might be unique. Track and test what works until you have a proven recipe for success.
Yes, someone said ‘Blog Crazy’ but I actually said ‘Blog Crazy Special’ because that is what is going on… right now! What is this bloggy craziness, you ask? It is nothing. Do not worry about it. Forget I said a word. I am warning you, this could help your business strategies.
Yaro is always interesting. However, I suppose that you want to know about this Blog Crazy Special.
Fine. But do not say that I did not warn you.
It is no secret that I am a fan of Open Source Programming. Well, this Blog Crazy Special was built on Open Source Programming and all the wondrous benefits of it. Some of the additional programs that you will get with this special are tools for Google. Soon you will be creating Google friendly site maps, using Google Analytics to track your stats, optimizing your blog for SEO, hiding pages (like thank you pages and client specials) and more.
Now, you will get much more than some applications made for Google. You will also get an events calendar, a social connection tool (for Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and many more), one-click upgrades and many more apps pre-installed for you.
If that were not enough, you will get a real self-hosted WordPress installation on your own hosting account. On top of that deal, we will custom design your chosen blog theme’s header graphic.
All of this is one crazy deal to get your business moving. The Blog Crazy Special is $299.97 and includes one full year of hosting. Yes it’s a blog (and so much more). Yes it’s crazy (because of all the extras). But, you are the one who makes it special [Awww. I called you special. Oh wait, the good kind of special, like when your significant other says that you are special to them. That kind of special. Whew.]
Now that you have written those helpful articles to bring more business to your business, they’ll need to find a home. Good articles can find plenty of homes at article submissions websites. Here are the basics for getting that article ready and submitting it to an article site.
1. Write about what you know. This goes for anyone who wants to write articles and have them accepted by a submission site. For the business owner looking to increase traffic and revenue, the topics will pertain to your business in general, business products that you sell, and/or business services that you provide.
2. Aim for an article length of at least 400 words. Some sites will accept articles with as few as 250 words, but it will take at least 400 words to flesh out an idea and gain the interest of the reader. Check with the sites you will submit to for word count requirements.
3. Proofread the article. There is nothing worse than an article with typos and grammatical errors. Good articles have been rejected because of simple errors that could have been avoided. Use spell checker or a second pair of eyes to be sure the article is ready to go to a submission site. Even if you use a ghostwriter for the articles, give the work a once over to be sure it says exactly what you are trying to convey to the reader. Don’t forget to use keywords for a more SEO-friendly piece.
4. Check out the sites where your article will get the most coverage. Popular article submissions sites with high marks will work the best. If you don’t want to put all of your eggs into one basket or even a few baskets, use an article submission service. They submit good quality articles to hundreds of sites for you depending on the subject matter of your articles. You submit once on their site and that’s that. Be aware that there are sites that don’t accept submissions from article services. For those you will have to submit one by one.
5. Some sites require registration. Even for the free ones, the registration comes with a profile page. This is where you will post links to your business and talk about it.
6. Keep a running list of article submission for your records. This way, you can track when the articles are published, the upfront payment, and how business traffic and sales change as a result of the articles.
7. Wait for news that the articles have been published and are being viewed. Submit more articles as you have time. It is a good idea to keep making regular submissions. If you gain a following you don’t want to lose them.
About the Author
Becki Noles is the virtual business manager and online marketing dynamo of the Virtual Accuracy Companies. She and her associates work with the top business and marketing coaches in the United States and the world over providing SEO, Pay Per Click, website development and technical virtual assistant services. Get the free 9 part series “How to Market Your Business” by visiting The Selon Group (a division of the Virtual Accuracy Companies).
Offering something of value for free is a very important step in marketing. It is a way of introducing yourself to prospective clients in a non-intrusive, friendly manner. People are naturally more cautious and skeptical these days so you need to make it as easy as possible for them to get to know you at their pace – which will be different for each person.
As well, offering a free-giveaway is one of the fastest and most reliable ways to build a list of prospective clients and customers. In order to do this, you must ask for the person’s name and email address. When people have indicated an interest in finding out more about you by asking for your “sampler”, then you can offer it in exchange for their name and email address.
The easiest way to get prospect’s contact information is to have an opt-in box on your website. If you look at my website you’ll notice that I have my opt-in box in the top right corner of every web page.
When you use this in conjunction with an autoresponder/list management system such as Aweber, people’s name and email addresses are captured automatically and put into a list so you can contact them further via email.
In this day and age of internet selling and buying, the majority of people are comfortable with giving you this information. Once you have this data you will now be able to continue to develop the relationship with these prospects and move them through the other steps in your marketing process.
If you don’t have an opt-in box but you do have a website, the best thing to do is get one created and set up. It doesn’t cost much as it’s pretty easy to do and many Virtual Assistants can do it for you.
However, don’t worry if you haven’t got your website up and running yet, you can still collect names. You’ll just have to do it manually and then input them into some kind of spreadsheet (Excel) or a database program like Microsoft Outlook or ACT.
There are many ways to use your free-giveaway and leverage it. But first you need to have a free product to entice people onto your list, and into a marketing relationship with you.
I encourage you to spend some time today thinking about what you already have of value and how you can repackage it into a valuable free-giveaway that your target group wants and needs.
About the Author
Jody Gabourie, The Small Business Marketing Coach, teaches simple, innovative and powerful marketing strategies to help business owners find and keep their most profitable clients. To learn more about how she can help you take your business to the next level, and to sign up for her FREE special report, ezine and articles, visit her site at http://www.JodyGabourieMarketingCoach.com
E-books are one of the valuable products that many coaches produce to help build their coaching business. Small e-books can be a give-away that you use for visibility and list building. Larger e-books can be a source of passive income. Many coaches don’t write an e-book because it looks like such a big task, but it doesn’t have to be daunting. Try this step-by-step guide to getting your e-book ready to go.
1. Research the needs of your niche. You need to know that what you write about will matter to your audience. Spend some time finding out the problems encountered in your niche and write your book to solve one of the most important issues. Make sure that you write a one or two sentence statement about the purpose of the book in order to guide your writing.
2. Title your e-book carefully. There are several points to consider in choosing your title. You want it to be catchy and at the same time be clear about your subject matter. This is often accomplished through the use of sub-titles. I titled my recent e-book Mind Your Own Biz (for the catchiness) and used the sub-title “Discover the Secrets to Creating a Successful Coaching Business” (to be very clear about the purpose). Finally, think about the use of keywords in your title. It is great if you can make sure the book title comes up when your target market does a Google search.
3. Write an outline. You may think this sounds like high school English class, but there is no other way to collect your thoughts completely and make them into a document that flows smoothly. The outline can be as simple as listing the important topics to cover or as complete as writing out a table of contents. I usually list all the general points that need to be covered and then make subpoints for each thought I have related to the main point.
4. Write the e-book. One great way to make this happen is to schedule writing time into your calendar using ink. If you have an outline, it doesn’t matter what part of the e-book you write first; write whatever appeals to you when the appointment time for writing arrives. As a coach, you know that it helps to break down any big project into small, doable steps and your outline helps you do that. When you begin to write, don’t worry about whether it is good writing – just try to get your thoughts down. Some days you will not feel like writing new material and you can use those days to polish portions of the book that you have already written. Don’t spend too much time agonizing over word choice and sentence structure because the best e-books read as though the writer was speaking to you. Write what you would say to your client about the subject. The final part of writing is to add any transitions you need between sections to help the book flow more smoothly.
5. Edit the book. You want to make sure that the book says clearly what you are trying to say and that you are using reasonable language to do so. I highly recommend you find someone to do the editing for you because a fresh set of eyes will do a better job of evaluating your writing. Ask a friend, find an English teacher, or hire an editor to do this work. You need someone who is expert in the language. Your editor will look at punctuation, grammar, word choice and meaning and is far superior to the grammar-check on your word processor.
6. Format the book. This is when you look at how the book is laid out on the pages, making it look clear and easily readable. For an e-book, you want to make sure there is lots of white space on each page. Choose your font and be consistent with it throughout the entire book, varying only the size for headings and titles. Look at where each page ends since you may want to make sure that a paragraph is not split into two pieces on different pages. If your e-book is more than about 20-25 pages, you will want to add a table of contents. This is done after formatting to make sure you have accurate page numbers.
7. Design a book cover. You will want a great looking book cover for your e-book especially if you are selling it because many sales are made by the cover. It is very important to tie the look of your cover to your company branding so the best option is to use a graphic designer to do this job. If you absolutely cannot afford to hire a designer then you can buy one of the software programs that generate book covers. The downside here is that these programs have been used many times and your book will not look as distinctive as is possible with a designer. Some e-book cover resources are Cover Factory, E-cover Generator and Absolute Covers. You should expect to pay between $50 and $100 for the software and $100-$150 for a designer.
8. Convert the book to PDF format. No matter what software you use to write your book, your last step is to convert the file to the format called PDF. This is a universally used file format that can be read by any computer. PDF format also protects your work so that it is not so easily copied. There are many programs that convert documents to PDF format at a range of prices. Free programs often work well if you have a little technology savvy. PDF995 has a limited free version of their software which is ad supported. Their suite version costs $29.95 and does not include ads. Adobe Acrobat is the original document converter and is the undisputed leader despite a hefty price of about $400. NitroPDF is very similar and costs only $99.
There is the eight step plan for creating your e-book. Don’t let the size of the project stop you – just take it one step at a time. An e-book can help tremendously with your coaching business development. Get started soon!
About the Author
Janet Slack of Life Adventure Coaching is a specialist in helping new coaches, therapists and consultants create the thriving business of their dreams. Find more business building ideas and learn all the details that you need to know as a coaching entrepreneur at http://www.biztipsforcoaches.com/blog/. She recently released Mind Your Own Biz: Discover the Secrets to Creating a Successful Coaching Business a step by step guide to starting your coaching business right.
Don’t just focus on the home page, keywords and titles.
The first step to sales and inquiries when potential clients or customers visit your site is that they see the services or products they were originally looking for. Unfortunately search engine optimization and better rankings can’t keep your customer on your site or make them buy. The potential client or customer having visited your site, must be interested in your products or services in order to stay and browse. Motivate them to purchase the service or product by providing clear and unambiguous information. If you happen to sell more than one product or service, provide all necessary information about this. Consider having numerous pages which have a singular focus for each of your services or products. By providing suitable and easily visible links, the customer can navigate to these pages and get the details.
Understand Your Target Market
If you design a website you think will attract clients, but you don’t really know who your potential clients are and what they want to buy, it is unlikely that anyone will choose to work with you. Online business is an extension or replacement for a standard brick and mortar storefront. If you’re just not sure about your target market what can you do? Start by sending an email to your existing clients and ask them to complete a survey. You could even direct your potential clients and customers to an online survey on your website. Ask them about their choices:
Why do they like your services or products?
Do you offer retainer discounts or discounts/coupons codes for products?
Do you practice excellent customer service and respond faster to client questions?
Are your product descriptions better?
Don’t be afraid to ask.
Be generous with your contact information.
When you sell online your customers can buy your products 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Your customers can be across town or across the globe. Always provide contact information, preferably on every page of your website, complete with mailing address, telephone number and an email address that reaches you. People may need to contact you about sales, general information or technical problems on your site. Also have your email forwarded to another email address if you do not check your website mailbox often. Nothing turns off potential clients and customers faster than lack of contact information. In an impersonal, online world, your customers want to know where you are and how they can contact you if need be. Don’t disappoint. Strive to be as credible as possible when operating online.
About the Author
Becki Noles, Visionary of Virtual Accuracy Companies has been at the forefront of stream-lining coaching and entrepreneurial businesses since 1998. Utilizing her background in marketing, publicity, corporate training, advertising and media, Becki custom tailors and implements individualized action plans for taking coaching businesses to the next level. As a Virtual Assistant her business partners with top business and executive coaches in the United States, Canada, Switzerland and the world over.
Every business needs testimonials. A good testimonial is the next best thing to a word of mouth recommendation.
As a prospect, if you are looking to buy from or deal with a business for the first time, there may always be a few doubts in your mind, so anything that the business can do to ensure that those doubts are minimized, is worth looking at in depth.
If you don’t know anyone who has bought from the business before, then you’d like to know that at least someone has and that they had a good experience. That is where the testimonial comes in.
Here are the three key attributes a testimonial must have, to be effective:
1. It must be believable. Your prospects like to feel that other people, just like them have been treated well and fairly and that their buying decision was sound. Make sure that your testimonials reflect this.
If possible include a picture of the customer you are quoting, their full name and, if it’s relevant their authority for saying what they do: in other words, if they run a business that you sell to, mention the name and type of business.
2. It must give detail. Don’t just offer up a one line quote, saying something bland like “These guys are great”. Explain exactly WHY this guy thinks you’re so great.
There is a simple format you can use: state the guy’s initial problem or requirement; explain exactly how your business solved it for him and finally state what his outcome was. Then include the quote at the end. That way, it’s obvious why he’s so enthusiastic.
3. It must be checkable. How many testimonials have you seen that you thought were maybe made up? They probably weren’t, but humans are naturally cynical, so make sure that at the bottom of the testimonial, it is clear that if your prospect wants to, they can speak to your champion and hear the praise from his own mouth.
Now don’t go giving out the guy’s contact deals everywhere. When you take a testimonial you always have to get the giver to agree to be contacted at HIS convenience. This might mean that you get fewer testimonials, but the ones you do get will be all the stronger for it.
Get yourself a handful of testimonials like this and plaster them everywhere; in your ads, in your store, in your brochures and on the website. They are like little salesmen building trust and rapport on your behalf, but unlike salesmen, they don’t expect vacations.
About the Author
For more simple and inspiring ideas for marketing any small business, check out my comprehensive e-course, Small Business, Big ideas and subscribe to my free newsletter, packed with tips to win more customers and keep them for ever. You’ll find it all at http://www.marketing-is-easy.com
There are many people who dread having to write white papers, articles, actually any type of content. Many feel like it seems to be too much work and a waste when no one reads it anyway. To some people, reading articles seems like work to, especially if the article is boring and very bland. Well, articles are supposed to be read, that’s their purpose to impart your message and information. If it is not read then it is a waste of time and effort.
Of course, when writing articles, you need to write about something you know or are an expert in. When you write about it, you won’t have a hard time because you already know what it is and what it’s about. It’s just a matter of making your articles creative and interesting.
To make sure that your articles get read and enjoyed, here are six red hot tips to get your articles read. These tips will make your articles readable and interesting.
1) Use short paragraphs.
When the paragraphs are very long, the words get jumbled in the mind of the reader. The person reading will quickly disregard the paragraph and move on to other articles that are both eye catching as well as a good read. Paragraphs can be a single sentence or even…gasp…a single word.
2) Make use of numbers or bullets.
As each point is stressed, numbers and bullets can quickly make the points easy to remember and digest. As each point, tip, guide or method is started with a bullet or point, readers will know that this is where the tips start. Format your bullets and numbers with indentations so your article will not look like a single block of square paragraphs. Add a little bit of flair and pizzazz to your articles shape.
3) Use Sub-headings to sub-divide your paragraphs in the page.
Doing this will break each point into sections but would still be incorporated into one whole article. It would also be easy for the reader to move on from one point to another. The transition would be smooth and easy and if this happens, you will not lose your reader’s attention.
4) Provide a good attention-grabbing title or header.
If your title can entice a person’s curiosity you are already halfway there in terms of getting a person to read your article. Use statements and questions that utilize keywords that people are looking for. Provide titles or headers that describe your article’s content.
Use titles like, “Tips On Marketing Your Business Effectively”, or “Tips For Marketing Inexpensively” .You could also use titles that can command people, for example, “6 Ways To Get More Business”. These types of titles reach out to a person’s emotions and makes them interested.
5) Keep them interested from the start to the finish.
From your opening paragraph, use real life situations that can be adopted by the reader. Use good descriptions and metaphors to drive in your point, just don’t over do it. Driving your examples with graphic metaphors and similes would make it easy for them to imagine what you are talking about. Making the experience pleasurable and enjoyable for them.
6) Utilize figures when necessary and not just ordinary and insipid statements.
Using specific facts and figures can heighten your article because it makes it authoritative. But do not make it too formal, it should be light and easy in them and flow. Like a friendly teacher having a little chat with an eager student.
About the Author
Becki Noles, Visionary of Virtual Accuracy has been at the forefront of stream-lining coaching and entrepreneurial businesses since 1998. Utilizing her background in marketing, publicity, corporate training, advertising and media, Becki custom tailors and implements individualized action plans for taking coaching businesses to the next level. As a Virtual Assistant her business partners with top business and executive coaches in the United States, Canada, Switzerland and the world over.
It was great to work with Becki on the launch of my book, 'EFT and Beyond'. Since I'd never had a major launch before, she produced a manual for my affiliates, and walked me through the expectations and procedures. The launch earned almost $40,000, largely from affiliate sales. I had one of my affiliates (more experienced than I!) say it was the smoothest affiliate experience he'd ever had. Thanks, Becki!
I had socks on before you did some work for me, and your results knocked them right off! I put out a call for virtual assistance and had a ton of responses. You were the ONLY company that not only met my expectations, but exceeded them! Your turnaround time always is quick, your work quality and attention to detail is second to none. You are now a valuable part of my team and I look forward to a long relationship with Virtual Accuracy.
Scott Stratten
Marketing Coach Un-Marketing
Toronto, ON Canada
kO′ch VA adj. 1. a highly specialized and niched virtual
assistant who is in tune with their coaching clients and customizes solutions based upon their individual needs and goals 2. differs from a general virtual assistant as they only partner with members of the coaching industry [syn: 
Planning, writing and creating an e-book can be a labor of love. At the very least you want your efforts to result in good sales however with a few steps your labor of love can rise above good sales and achieve bestselling status. Your eBook can have great sales, here’s how:
Direct mail and advertising are two extremely powerful marketing tools when they’re done correctly. And there are key steps you can take to ensure not only that you’re getting the best conversion rate, but that you’re maximizing your response. These keys rest in the design of your piece. Let’s take a look at ten design tips to improve your advertising and direct mail.
