The more hours you can bill as a Virtual Assistant or work at home service provider, the more money you make!
Ideally, the goal will be to fill your schedule with clients you enjoy working with and who have ongoing work for you to do.
Here are a few excellent marketing strategies to attract more clients online…
1. Offer blocks of times. Time blocks are a great way to motivate clients because they hold the promise of having a Virtual Assistant on call and they give you an ongoing commitment. For example, you could offer 5 hour a month, 15 hour a month, or 40 hour a month time blocks. People can sign up for whatever meets their needs, pay each month and then send you their work as they have it.
TIP: If you offer a discount on your hourly rates it will entice your clients to pay upfront for these monthly time blocks. For example 10% discount off your hourly rates if they buy a prepaid 15 hour monthly time block. If your hourly rate is $40/hr then a 15 hour package would cost them $540 instead of $600 if they paid by the hour. They save $60!
2. Offer referral bonuses. Ask your current clients for referrals and give them a bonus, say an hour of free work, in exchange for every client they refer to you. You can even offer a structured affiliate program on your website with commissions, affiliate links and marketing materials to promote your services.
3. Consider advertising special promotions. One great way to attract new clients is to give them a break on rates. For example, a $30 coupon for first time customers helps new customers feel like they’re not taking as big of a risk. And it also takes advantage of the law of reciprocity which states that we tend to want to give back to people who give things to us. We want to reciprocate. You can offer these promotions on social networking sites, as PPC ads, and on your website to attract online attention.
4. Specialize in an industry or with a particular task. Specialization is a spectacular way to differentiate yourself from other Virtual Assistants and it gives you an extra edge when seeking more online customers and attention. You can optimize your website for your specialization, making it easy for new customers to find you.
5. Partner with other service professionals, like a ghost writer or a web designer. Partnering with other service providers is a great way to broaden awareness of you and your services. And it doubles your opportunity to attract online customers. You can swap advertisements with partners, each posting an ad on the other’s site, you can guest blog on each other’s blogs and you can refer each other when talking to clients.
Social networking, article marketing and other traditional marketing tactics will also help increase your awareness online and attract new customers. Offer free reports, and position yourself as an expert.
Even as your business grows, never stop marketing. One day you’ll be turning away work and won’t that be great!
