News from Virtually Sorted

It's a funny thing, I speak to hundreds of small businesses every year, and there are always three things they complain about:

I don't have enough time
I don't make enough money
And I just can't get the staff

Now obviously as a virtual assistant business, we save people time, and we give them "virtual staff" (although they are real people - I promise! Emma even brings cake into the office occasionally - yummy!). But we don't often get asked about what we can do to make them money. Which is a shame, because actually when we work with clients we try and monetarise their businesses as much as possible to offset the cost of hiring us and become an essential part of their team. So here are 10 ways you can instantly make money - all of which a virtual assistant can help with, but if you had time you could do them yourself.

1. Credit control: Retrieve any outstanding debt - after all it's your money they have, and it isn't doing you any good in their bank account. Your VA can chase up non-payers, get a payment date, send reminders, and even bank the cheques for you.
2. Affiliate schemes: Join relevant affiliate schemes to sell products online and earn passive income. Examples include Amazon, Tradedoubler and, of course, Virtually Sorted. From experience, some schemes are better than others at paying out - do your research (or get us to do it!).
3. Increase Prices: This is an obvious one - charge more and earn more. If you are worried about raising prices, perform competitive analysis and see what they charge and what extra value you can offer. There's even the possibility of being a mystery shopper and seeing what their customer process is like.
4. Bundle Products: This comes under the simplistic title of "Sell more". If you can sell a bundle of products rather than a single one you can charge more per transaction.
5. Revisit old clients: It's 10 times cheaper and 16 times easier to sell to an existing client than to recruit a new one. Get your old contacts out and send them an email, pick up the phone or send them a special offer. This also has a simplistic title: "Sell more often".
6. PR: Have a great story or a unique angle on something? We had an excellent ˝ page article in the Daily Record (which has over half a million readers) on "21st Century Office Angels" - the equivalent advert would have cost of minimum of Ł7,000 - for FREE. Come up with an interesting angle - a competition, a survey you have done, a great headline, a cute picture. It's impossible to buy the kind of credibility that good PR gives your business - well worth some investigation. Our fave PR people are Fanhitter PR.
7. After Sales Service: After someone buys something from you what happens? Do they get directed to another page of your website recommending other products they might like? Do you send them a reminder to buy another 30 days supply from you? How about an email a month on to ask them how they like the product and remind them of your business? I was really impressed the other day to get a phone call from a supplier to check how I was finding the product about a week after buying it - fantastic customer service, and I just told all of you about it!
8. Cut Costs: Review all your outgoings each month. Are those phone bills too high? What about your stationery supplies? Could you email rather than post your invoices? Every cost you can minimise means more money in your pocket.
9. Network: If you can get 5 people to tell 5 of their friends about your business, and they tell just 5 of their friends, then that's 125 people all talking about your business! It's a long process getting business out of networking but it's great for gauging opinion, getting honest feedback from other business owners/potential clients and getting those people doing your marketing for you.
10. Stop Being Active: Be productive instead. Think - is it really worth your time to sit doing the books (which you hate) rather than going out there and getting more clients? (And use Emma's Time Management Tips!).