Have you ever had anyone ask you why your clients work with you?
As a coach, I ask people this all the time. And a lot of time, I get the answer, ‘I don’t know.’
It’s okay to answer the question that way, but then we have to get into what the answer should be.
Let’s take it from you being the consumer.
It’s like anything you buy – what helps you to make the decision to pick one brand over another?
I’ll use my toothpaste example! (I use this in my Getting Started program!)
One toothpaste is family size. Another is travel size.
One toothpaste is white paste. Another is gel.
One toothpaste has whitening properties. Another does not.
One is on sale. The other is not.
One is Crest brand. One is Colgate brand.
These are the features of the toothpaste that help you to make your decision about which one to buy. So how do you decide?
Some people buy based on loyalty. Or sale prices. Or for some of the features I’ve mentioned above.
In our house we buy Colgate Total white paste family size, mostly when it’s on sale. But I’ll buy it even if it’s not on sale, because it’s our favourite brand.
My husband doesn’t like gel toothpaste. I like the cleaner feeling of Colgate. It’s a compromise!
But you get the picture. There are things here that help us to make the decision of what we want to buy.
The same thing happens with your potential clients.
They will decide whether to work with you based on what you can offer them. And it isn’t always based on price.
So you have to figure out what it is that makes you different, and make sure that message gets through to your clients.
Do you have special experience or training?
Do you have a technical (or creative?) mind?
Do you have a system you use to make their work more efficient?
Do you offer regular phone calls to keep their project management ticking?
Do you have a developer’s license for some kind of software that you can use for them?
Do you have a team of people who help you get your client work done?
Do you work full time as a VA (as opposed to part time)?
Are you Canadian (or US, or Australian, or from the UK) – ie in the same country as them?
Do you practice the same hobbies as they do?
Do you have the same core values as them?
All of these questions and more are things that you can ask yourself to figure out what it is that sets you apart from the others who can also ‘do their work’.
It’s important to do this exercise so that you can incorporate this information into your marketing and networking.
Try it – I bet you’ll learn something about yourself.
And this exercise also helps us to value ourselves as well (something that’s good for us to remember every day of the week!)
I challenge to determine what makes you different than other VAs. Share your findings on my Facebook page!