When you take the step to work with a virtual assistant, you empower yourself to accomplish so much more. You hand off the tasks that someone else can do, so you can do more of what you do best.

One of my clients came to me recently, concerned about how her VA wasn’t getting work done. Her virtual assistant had a very hectic life including children, going to school and working. She suddenly became unavailable because she had a a virus. As a result, deadlines were being missed.

My client started blaming herself for her VA not showing up, thinking it must be her own mindset causing the problem. She had a lot of fear around confrontation and being seen as mean or unreasonable, when she preferred to be seen as understanding.

Showing up to do your job is non-negotiable. I show up 110%, go above and beyond as much as I can. This is what I expect from myself and it’s important to me that my team shows up the same way. Otherwise, and I’m not a big meanie, they simply can’t stay. This is how I do things and what has made me successful, so there can’t be any slacking or sense of entitlement.

The same is true for your business. While being understanding is important, it’s okay to expect your team to perform well. So, if your virtual assistant or other team member is not doing what they should be, you need to address it.

When this happened to me, I had one conversation with my virtual assistant who started out doing an amazing  job. For some reason, things changed and details started falling through the cracks. I talked to her about it, asking what was going on and she assured me things would change. When the problem persisted, I thanked her for her work, told her that things just were not working out and wished her success.

This is not being mean, it’s business. If you want to serve your clients at 110%, then you need your team members to do the same. Otherwise, you might hold yourself back from the success you deserve and you cannot show up for your clients in the way you want to.

Don’t shy away from doing what you need to do. You don’t need to provide any excuses, just have the conversation, thank the person for the work done, wish them well, change the passwords and move on.

Your Client Attraction Assignment
If you have a virtual assistant, have you talked about expectations? Does your VA know what you need done and your preferences? Be sure to communicate clearly on a regular basis. Good communication can keep everything working well. and, if and when a problem crops up, address it right away.

Now, if you’re just starting out and trying to fill your practice in the FIRST place, then follow a step-by-step system that feels easy and authentic to you. The Client Attraction  System^® gives you the most important things to do to set up simple, solid systems, so that you consistently fill your pipeline and continually get new clients. It’s all step-by-step, not a big mishmash of things. So, you do step one of the system, and when you’re done with that, you move on to step two, and so on. All the tools, scripts, templates, and examples are handed to you on a silver platter. Easy. You can get it at TheClientAttractionSystem.com.

Today I’d like to share a strategy for any business owner who works with a team or an assistant, even a part time assistant. Many business owners have difficulty delegating because they feel that it would take less time to do it themselves, rather than explain to someone how to do it, wait for it to come back to them and then go back and forth. This is how most entrepreneurs delegate and frankly, it is a waste of time.

Whether your team is virtual or on-site (and this can also apply to the vendors you work with), your business will thrive and be more productive when you create an environment where delegation is focused on your team providing you with solutions, rather than more questions and problems.

Skillful delegating requires your team to bring you solutions, rather than questions and problems.  (Click here to tweet this.)

I recommend you educate your team on 1) what needs to get done, 2) by when, and 3) with a very clear picture of what the ideal outcome looks like, including success criteria. That means, the team member has a clear image of what the end result looks like when it’s been done well.

But what happens when your team runs into a challenge where they must get your input or have you make a decision on a roadblock or problem? How do you not become the bottleneck and have your team take more ownership so they don’t rely so much on you, while producing much faster? Watch this week’s video on how to educate your team to bring you solutions, rather than questions or unsolved problems. Before you know it, everyone will be on board and problems will got solved easily and effectively.

Your Client Attraction Assignment

Whenever you’re brought a problem without a solution, ask them to come back with some potential solutions and pro’s and con’s for each. It may take a little while for everyone to get into the habit of bringing you only answers and solutions, rather than questions and problems to be solved, but the key is to be consistent. Before you know it, everyone will be on board and problems will got solved easily and effectively.

If you want your website content to attract clients, you need to know how to speak their language. Here are five steps that will make your home page a client attraction magnet:

1. Provide real solutions. To capture the attention of your ideal clients, you want to talk about and provide real solutions. This proves you know what you are talking about and makes you credible.

2. Focus on results. Your web content must focus on the clients’ desired results, not your methods to achieve them. Your prospects don’t really care how you get the job done. They just want to know about the outcome of what you offer.

Remember your prospects want to know, “What’s in it for me?” It’s what they’re searching for and what they want to know more than anything else. This kind of copy literally “pulls” them in which is why it’s called “Pull Marketing”.

3. Use questions that tap into clients’ struggles. To create website content that uses pull marketing, come up with questions that are your ideal clients’ pain points – what they struggle with and what keeps them up at night. To discover this language, think about the results people get from working with you and the advantages you have vs. competitors. Also, figure out what makes you a credible resource.

When you can address the conversation already going on in a person’s head, they’ll feel like you know them. When people feel understood, they get comfortable with you and this establishes a foundation of trust, the essential quality needed to land new clients.

4. Start with the toughest question. Put the hardest hitting question at the top of the page, followed with a description about what you offer – the results and solutions. I recommend using no more than three pull marketing questions total on the home page to keep the copy simple.

5. Tell visitors what to do. Lastly, make it clear what you want visitors to do on your website. Put your primary objective first. When you go to ClientAttraction.com, you’ll see there’s a video that leads people to sign up for my irresistible free offer (IFO) – the free CD. Basically the video script repeats, “Sign up for the free CD” over and over to capture the emails of as many interested prospects as possible. When your ideal clients opt in to your mailing list, you have a shot at marketing to people who have already chosen to learn more about you.

Your Client Attraction Assignment
Come up with answers to these questions for strong website content:
1. What results do your clients get from working with you?
2. What advantages do you have vs. your competitors?
3. What makes you a credible resource?
4. Why should clients choose you?

Think about your ideal clients’ biggest problems, challenges and worries. Then create provocative questions to ask web visitors that show how you already understand their needs.

Now, if you’re just starting out and trying to fill your practice in the FIRST place, then follow a step-by-step system that feels easy and authentic to you. The Client Attraction  System^® gives you the most important things to do to set up simple, solid systems, so that you consistently fill your pipeline and continually get new clients. It’s all step-by-step, not a big mishmash of things. So, you do step one of the system, and when you’re done with that, you move on to step two, and so on. All the tools, scripts, templates, and examples are handed to you on a silver platter. Easy. You can get it at TheClientAttractionSystem.com.

Could you be experiencing self sabotage? Sometimes as a new business owner gets clear about what they offer and their marketing message, good things start to happen. But then, you might hit a bump in the road where resistance shows up. For example, you might meet prospects who are excited to work with you, but they don’t become clients for a variety of reasons.

If you find this happening in your business, here’s what I recommend. I’m sharing the exact process I used several years ago to clear up self sabotage for myself. Write down every single negative thing you say to yourself about what it means to be successful in your business. Also write down any negative beliefs as well as all the fears you have about your success. Put it all down on paper.

Some typical things that might show up on your list are:

• Fear of your success
• Fear you might fail
• Fear of being overwhelmed
• Feelings of inadequacy
• Fear of jeopardizing your marriage
• Loss of free time
• Worry about your children
• Losing friends or alienating family
• Not wanting to get too busy

All of these fears can be lodged in your subconscious mind and create self sabotage. We all have these fears. However, these subconscious beliefs or fears that are not congruent with where you want to go and all the good stuff happening, you can muck up your success. Your subconscious thoughts need to be aligned with your vision of success, so you don’t create any self-sabotage that gets in the way of attaining your dreams.

Take your list to a professional who can help you work through the fears and negative thoughts. Seek out an EFT practitioner, a hypnotherapist or an intuitive healer. I’ve done all these things and still work with an intuitive healer who helps me figure out the cosmic stuff and sort out things from the past that might get in the way.

This is the single best thing I did for my mindset years ago to understand what was driving me or getting in the way. This worked really well for me, eliminating any potential self-sabotage. The following year, I made a million dollars in my business–so you can see it works!

Your Client Attraction Assignment
If this sounds familiar and you might be experiencing self sabotage, take out a sheet of paper and start making your list of fears and negative thoughts about success right now. Dig deep and turn over all the rocks to discover what might be getting in your way. Then select a practitioner to help you work through these concerns to make way for the success you dream of.

Now, if you’re just starting out and trying to fill your practice in the FIRST place, then follow a step-by-step system that feels easy and authentic to you. The Client Attraction  System^® gives you the most important things to do to set up simple, solid systems, so that you consistently fill your pipeline and continually get new clients. It’s all step-by-step, not a big mishmash of things. So, you do step one of the system, and when you’re done with that, you move on to step two, and so on. All the tools, scripts, templates, and examples are handed to you on a silver platter. Easy. You can get it at TheClientAttractionSystem.com.

When it comes to building your email subscriber list with ideal prospects and customers, you may believe that you you’ve got to do it all on your own. You may leave it all to your own abilities and efforts and end up fighting an uphill battle by doing all of the work yourself.

Let me guess… do you often feel that way when it comes to list building? Well, I’m here to tell you that you don’t have to do it alone… at least not anymore. There’s so much help and support out there when it comes to building your list. And in this week’s video strategy we’re going to talk about using joint ventures to build your email subscriber list.

Find joint venture partners who already have a target audience that will resonate with your message. (Click here to tweet this.)

In my personal opinion, joint ventures are an excellent way to efficiently and effectively build your list with ideal prospects and leads – in a very short amount of time. Joint ventures are strategic relationships with other people or partnerships that you create – to mutually support each other’s list building efforts.

Watch this week’s video for my top three key strategies to keep in mind when establishing and building joint venture relationships. Doing this alone is not the only option. From our years of experience at Client Attraction with dozens and dozens of joint venture partnerships, it’s been one of the biggest reasons we’ve been able to grow our email subscriber list to close to 75,000 people. And, now you can do the same with these 3 key strategies in mind.

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D15BW7ySl6Q[/youtube]

Your Client Attraction Assignment

Who can you partner with when establishing joint venture relationships? Often times they are people you already have a relationship with and you have a mutual interest in helping and promoting them (and they do of you.)

Sit down and write out that list of 5 top potential JV partners and do the reach-out starting today. Make the connections.  You’ll be happy you did when you start to see the results it has with your list building efforts!

Hiring a virtual assistant (VA) to help you handle tasks that you can delegate is one the best ways to be able to grow your business. Taking this step frees up your time to focus on what you do best and attract more clients. But how do you choose the right VA?

1. Write down all the things you and your team are doing that is not the best use of your time. This is a bit tedious, but actually make a list of everything you do over two to three days or even a week.

2. Note the dollar amount next to each task that you would pay someone to do these things.

3. Group all tasks that are similar. For example, all the technology or web based things can be grouped together and delegated to one person who knows technology. Or customer service items could go to another VA specializing in this area.

4. Then post an ad on a site like Craigslist, contact VA’s online or ask colleagues for recommendations. Once the responses start pouring in, look for the assistants who specialize in the type of tasks you need to delegate. From there, be sure to take some time to thoroughly interview them. Find out their fee, their availability, the standards for their practice, how they typically work with clients and most of all determine if you feel a certain rapport. A good rapport will go a long way. It may take some time to build a trusting relationship and that’s ok and to be expected.

The key is to get clear on what needs to be delegated. You’ll need to get very organized so you can easily communicate the details of each task and your expectations. That’s how we do things at Client Attraction. We’ve created an operations manual for everything to help any transitions between team members take place as seamlessly as possible. If you don’t have procedures established, that’s another task you have hand off to your VA!

Your Client Attraction Assignment
Are you ready to hire a virtual assistant? Don’t skip the step of cataloging your daily activities for a few days. It’s the best way to know exactly what will be best for you to delegate. Once you figure out what can be handed off to someone else, you can get back to doing what you do best and attract more clients.

Now, if you’re just starting out and trying to fill your practice in the FIRST place, then follow a step-by-step system that feels easy and authentic to you. The Client Attraction  System^® gives you the most important things to do to set up simple, solid systems, so that you consistently fill your pipeline and continually get new clients. It’s all step-by-step, not a big mishmash of things. So, you do step one of the system, and when you’re done with that, you move on to step two, and so on. All the tools, scripts, templates, and examples are handed to you on a silver platter. Easy. You can get it at TheClientAttractionSystem.com.

An important part of client attraction involves knowing how to make your current clients feel special. There’s a concept I really like by Joe Polish and Dean Jackson, my friends and brilliant marketers. They think beyond attracting clients to keeping your current clients happy and then staying in touch after your work has been completed.

Here are some things to think about:

• What are you doing that makes current clients feel appreciated?
• How are you “wowing” them on a continual basis?
• How are you surprising and delighting them?

At Client Attraction, we made a long list of the things we do to answer those questions. For example, depending on what program you join, you may get a box of brownies and a note from me. It’s the little unexpected things sometimes that make people feel most special and significant. Think of all the touch points where you connect with clients. Think about where you experienced superb customer services and see if you can build on that with your business.

The idea is something that really hit home for me when I first heard it. I thought how I’d been focusing on the first part – client attraction, doing a little bit of client appreciation, but completely ignoring the third part of client service after the work is done.

Once you create your list of ways to show client appreciation, then you want to find a way to automate and systematize so it doesn’t always need to come from you directly.

You’d be shocked at how few businesses carry client appreciation through all three stages of the client relationship. Doing this is an extension of your brand that makes people feel really good and continue to be drawn to you so they come back for more or refer their friends and colleagues because it comes from such a loving place. If you do this, you’ll never be without clients or customers.

Your Client Attraction Assignment

What can you do to show your appreciation to clients? Think of all three parts of the relationship, while you are winning them over, while they are clients and after as well. What can you do to wow your clients and make them feel special? Make a list of what other businesses have done to wow you and what you can do that fits with your brand. Then set it up so everything is automated so it gets done without your direct involvement.

Now, if you’re just starting out and trying to fill your practice in the FIRST place, then follow a step-by-step system that feels easy and authentic to you. The Client Attraction  System^® gives you the most important things to do to set up simple, solid systems, so that you consistently fill your pipeline and continually get new clients. It’s all step-by-step, not a big mishmash of things. So, you do step one of the system, and when you’re done with that, you move on to step two, and so on. All the tools, scripts, templates, and examples are handed to you on a silver platter. Easy. You can get it at TheClientAttractionSystem.com.

This is the third article in my series about marketing with authenticity, integrity and love. Today I want to wrap it up by talking to you about Marketing with Love. Yes, that’s right, with LOVE. This is going to seem like an unusual topic, especially when we’re talking about what it takes to bring on more clients and make more money, but stay with me, because it’s one of the most powerful and fundamental things you can do to attract more client and make more money.

OK, so how do you market with love? First, realize that everyone on earth wants to feel loved and significant. There is not a single person on earth who doesn’t want to feel loved. And you can use this—authentically of course—in your marketing.

The more loved you make prospects and clients feel, the more they will be attracted to you. (Click here to tweet this.)

And exactly how can you do this? Watch this week’s video where I share what works for us here at Client Attraction.

Your Client Attraction Assignment

Marketing with love may be a challenge for some because it’s not how we were taught to do business. So go easy on yourself. Incorporating more love into your marketing can be a gradual process. Take your time with it, but I promise as it becomes more natural for you, you’ll see wonderful results. People respond to love—it’s human nature.

If you are working to build an information marketing business online, there is one key piece of the puzzle that everything else builds on – the Irresistible Free Offer (IFO). Creating an Irresistible Free Offer helps you build your list of contacts so you have people to markets your goods and services to. To get the most from the IFO, you need to come up with something your target market has a very strong desire for.

Think about what your ideal clients need most. What problem wakes them up at night with the 3am sweats? What solutions do they crave?

Your IFO can be any of the following formats:

• Free audio program on CD like I have
• Free report
• Free checklist
• Free ebook
• Free assessment
• Free home study program

There are so many types of Irresistible Free Offers to choose from, so pick the one that will best fit your business. Go with your strength and what you feel your ideal clients will most likely want. What’s great about the IFO is that it gives prospects a sample of what you are all about, the services you offer and how you can help them get their needs met.

The next decision for your information marketing business is how you tell people about your IFO. Since people have opted into your marketing funnel by requesting your IFO, you know they are fairly good prospects.

I talk about list building frequently and so does Derek, but here’s a brief refresher with a list of ideas that work great.

• Speaking
• Webinars
• Teleclasses
• Joint Ventures
• Telesummits
• SEO content
• Blogging
• Facebook ads

Some clients choose the list building method for their information marketing business that most appeals to them. Another way is to simply go with the easiest option so you can get started right away.

Your Client Attraction Assignment

If you haven’t created your IFO yet, it’s time to get started. You can poll some of your current or past clients to get a good feel for what your ideal clients really need. Once you know what information you want to share, select the format (free report, audio on CD, etc.). Then decide how you’ll let people know about it and you are on your way to building a great list for information marketing online.

Now, if you’re just starting out and trying to fill your practice in the FIRST place, then follow a step-by-step system that feels easy and authentic to you. The Client Attraction  System^® gives you the most important things to do to set up simple, solid systems, so that you consistently fill your pipeline and continually get new clients. It’s all step-by-step, not a big mishmash of things. So, you do step one of the system, and when you’re done with that, you move on to step two, and so on. All the tools, scripts, templates, and examples are handed to you on a silver platter. Easy. You can get it at TheClientAttractionSystem.com.

I often work with clients who would love to devote their entire practice to giving back to the community in a big way. They have a strong desire to help those who normally could not afford their services.

The idea of sharing what you offer at no charge or a small fee comes from the heart and is a truly wonderful gift.  However, what many of my clients find out quickly is that it’s challenging to stay in business at this level of service–because there’s no real revenue coming in.

So what can be done to give back and remain prosperous? This can be hard to accept for some, but you must get paid for your work. There’s no way around it if you want a profitable business right? But think of it this way–if you can sustain a certain level of income, you can afford to give back to the community!

I’ll use myself as an example. I run a successful business and there are women around the world who can’t afford, no matter how well they’re doing, to take advantage of what I offer. Specifically, I would love to share my message with women in regions like Africa. The income I make from my paying clients would allow me to fly myself there and cover the cost of my stay so that I may then share the work at a very low cost to thousands of African women (and other places where they need me).

But would I be able to do this and affect these people’s lives if I didn’t properly charge for the value I give? Look at it this way – you get paid in one area, then you do something benevolent in another.

My advice is not to see this as all or nothing. Keep your business active rather than shifting to serve those who can’t afford your fees and let that support your charitable desires so you have the funds and support to give back. Obviously, the clients who pay the fee will get more access and more of everything you offer. But they are getting value and the results. Then you take a portion of that money from the value you provide and help those who can’t afford your fees.

Look at this like tithing. You take 10% of your time or 10% of your revenues and share this with people. This is done all the time in church. You are using this 10% to help those who can’t afford what you do to give back to your community, whoever or wherever that might be.

Your Client Attraction Assignment
Is there a group of people you want to help who can’t afford what you do? Think about who you might want to serve and who could gain the most from what you offer. Then start in a small way and test the waters to see how it works for you and those you want to give back to. You can perfect your offering with a bit of practice so it feels good for everyone involved.

Now, if you’re just starting out and trying to fill your practice in the FIRST place, then follow a step-by-step system that feels easy and authentic to you. The Client Attraction  System^® gives you the most important things to do to set up simple, solid systems, so that you consistently fill your pipeline and continually get new clients. It’s all step-by-step, not a big mishmash of things. So, you do step one of the system, and when you’re done with that, you move on to step two, and so on. All the tools, scripts, templates, and examples are handed to you on a silver platter. Easy. You can get it at TheClientAttractionSystem.com.