Communication … the KEY To a Successful Virtual Relationship

Communication …. the KEY To a Successful Virtual Relationship

We all know it – even subconsciously. Communication is the key to any relationship – virtual or not.

Ironically … although we know the importance of communication, it’s one of the main reasons behind a VA/Client break-up.

Why?

Because we often avoid discussing topics that we believe to be unimportant or slightly uncomfortable to discuss. Instead we literally wave our hand and say "it will all work out."

When it comes to a Client/VA relationship – it’s really up to us Virtual Assistants to ensure great communication with our clients.

This goes beyond a phone discussion every once in a while or emails back and forth throughout the week or instant messages throughout the day. These forms of communication are great and convenient but when it comes to creating, building and solidifying relationships with our clients, we need more than the casual connection.

Perhaps you can relate to these scenarios:

• you receive an email from your client asking you to complete a task immediately ….. you were out of the office for a few hours and it’s now ‘too’ late
• your client has expectations that are well beyond what was originally discussed….. you sense and feel frustration from the exchange of emails and feel irrate, annoyed and uneasy about the issue. How do you deal with it now?
• your client is busy and possibly difficult to connect with… in an attempt to ‘not bother them’ you don’t connect at all or perhaps send the odd email to check in yet they seems annoyed or frustrated with you

Any of these ring a bell?

One of the practices that we all (Andrea, Tina and Cindy) firmly believe in is connecting with clients every week – even for just 20 minutes at a time. The voice-to-voice connection has proved to be invaluable. By coming prepared to the meeting, ready to discuss upcoming deadlines, priorities and goals, the time is well-spent and more efficient than sending countless emails (which may be intrepreted differently) on the same topics.

After seeing the struggles that VAs and clients have faced due to ‘bad’ communication, we came up with a checklist on "How to Communicate With Your Client". This was first written a couple of years ago and recently updated to include even more information. Let us know if you have anything we can add!

Use this tool to help you effectively communicate with your prospective and current clients. Will you make any changes on how connect? Enjoy! Click here for PDF.

Think back to growing your own business … ever wish there was a tool or resource created to help you? Let us know … we’ll be happy to create something to help all Virtual Assistants. Just hit reply to put in your request.

© 2009 Virtually Successful.com. Reproduction permitted with full attribution.

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Tags: Cindy Greenway, communicating with clients, communicating with virtual assistants, successful business relationships

This entry was posted on Thursday, July 23rd, 2009 at 5:25 pm and is filed under Free Goodies, Tips & Resources. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.