Posts Tagged ‘how-to’

Bartering is making a come back in these hard economic times that we are facing.  Back in the early days bartering is how businesses and people got the goods and items they needed and wanted.

Before you consider bartering for your services or products, there are a few things that you need to take into consideration. You need to consider whether or not you are getting equal value for your services.  Also, you need to consider the length of time you agree to barter and also be sure that the price of your services/products are not substantially lower than the price of the service you are bartering for.

If you are a virtual assistant and you are bartering marketing services but the person providing marketing assistance is only telling you what to do and not physically doing anything for your business, that may be perceived as not of good value. As a virtual assistant you are DOING the work for the marketing professionally not just telling them how to do it.  So you need to decide whether or not this is of equal value to your services.

Now it’s time to consider the length of time that you agree to barter with someone.  Recommendations are no more than one month at a time.  If you barter longer than that, you may find that your needs as well as the person you are bartering with needs have changed. In this case, you lose the passion for doing the work because you feel you are getting nothing in return so therefore you don’t continue to do the work as passionately and as quickly as you did in the beginning.

Price is also an item that needs to be considered.  Again, we will use the example of a virtual assistant and a marketing professional. Let’s say the virtual assistant charges $25 per hour and a marketing professional charges $100 per hour.  The virtual assistant will then have to do 4 hours of work to be equivalent to one hour of work done by a marketing professional.  That’s a substantial difference in time. A virtual assistant will be working four times more than what the marketing professional will.

Bartering is a great way to get what you need or want without breaking the bank. As well as getting experience you may not have otherwise had.  When you barter for something, the person you are bartering with is more likely to be understanding and patient when it comes to you learning new things.  This is simply because of human nature.  While they are “paying” for the service they are not paying for it with money so they look at it as nothing gained, nothing lost.

So the next time somebody offers to barter with you, don’t write it off immediately but don’t jump on the chance quickly either.  Ask questions, make sure you are getting good value, good price, and reasonable time length.  Who knows, that barter client may just become a paying client in the future.

When bartering works, it is a terrific way to fill your needs. When it doesn’t, it is a time drain.

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It appears that spring has sprung and with it comes the thoughts of spring-cleaning our homes but have you ever thought about spring-cleaning your business? Spring-cleaning is a great way to find things that you haven’t seen in a long time and just getting rid of things that you no longer want or need.  Amazingly enough, spring-cleaning can be applied to your business as well.

This time of year is a great time to get back in touch with former clients, just to see how they are doing. Think about it, when a child gets bored with a toy they usually put it aside and forget about it and then when they find it, it’s all new to them again. The same concept can be applied to former clients. They may have thought they didn’t need your product or service any longer and then by contacting them again, they realize how beneficial it was to work with.

It’s also a great time to get in touch with people that you met through networking meetings. Go back through your business card collection and find the ones that interested you the most. Contact them just to see how they are doing and how business is going.  How many times have you been at the store or somewhere and wanted to buy something but decided you didn’t need it?  You had the money for it but didn’t need it. Then a couple of months down the road, you found a need for it but they no longer have it.  The same thing applies in business. Someone you may have met at a function may have thought they didn’t need your product or service but by contacting them several months later, their business may have grown and realize that they really do need your product/service.

It’s also a great time to go through your computer and get rid of the stuff that you no longer need. Go back through your computer, email, etc and get rid of the junk.  It could be old files from an old client, old email giving you instructions or training that you no longer need, old software discs that you no longer use, etc. Once you get rid of the files that you no longer need, spring-clean your computer as well by running disk defragmenter and disk cleanup. Those two tasks are extremely important to keep your computer running smoothly.

Besides spring-cleaning you computer and getting in touch with past or potential clients, it’s also a great time to spring-clean your mind and your to-do lists. When you spring-clean your house, you usually do a thorough job of getting rid of dust accumulation and you start working on that to-do list that has been getting longer and longer throughout the cold winter months. You do this because you don’t like dust in your home and you want to get that to-do list as short as possible before summer comes.

Delegating your tasks is one of the best ways to spring-clean your mind and your to-do lists. The task you can delegate are just like the dust in your house. You do it because you don’t want to have them around anymore and you delegate your to-do lists because then you can have them completed before you start thinking about that summer vacation so when you go on vacation, it’s less that you need to worry about because it is already taken care of.

Besides the weather being great in spring and your house being in tip-top shape because of spring-cleaning, your business can be just as good simply by getting back in touch, cleaning up your computer and workspace, and by delegating that stuff that you just don’t like to have in front of you all the time. So why not make spring a good time for cleaning up your business as well as your personal life.

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We’ve all ran into this from time to time, a potential client contacts you about a project and you aren’t sure how to quote the price.  That’s okay, no matter how long you have been in business there will always be times when somebody needs your assistance and you aren’t sure how to quote it because you’ve never done it before, you have never quoted it before, or there are so many variables that you don’t know how to quote it.  Here are a few steps to get you through it:

Step One: Breathe. Don’t panic.  Panicking will only get you to make irrational quotes that are way underpriced.  If the client is really interested in using your services, they will wait for your quote.

Step Two: Look at it from a rational point of view.  Do you still need more details? Are all the variables there or do you need more?  Potential clients will not have a problem if you need to ask more questions to get a better understanding of what they need.

Step Three: Consult with somebody.  If you believe you have all the details and variables that you need to be able to make an accurate quote but you are still unsure, talk to somebody.  Go to a trusted friend or family member (preferably somebody who is business savvy), explain to them what was asked of you (without breaching client confidentiality), and get their input.  They may bring up something that you might not have thought about.

Step Four: Go with your gut.  Once you have sat down and analyzed what is needed from you, go with your gut.  If you think it’s too high, then lower the price.  If you think it’s too low, then raise the price.  But always tell the potential client that that quote is good for only that project and that the price is subject to change should they need a similar project done.

Step Five: If you don’t get that particular client, do not be concerned.  It may not have been that you were unprofessional or that your quote was too high.  It could just be that they decided to do it themselves or the project got pushed back because something more important came up.  In business, the trick is to not take everything personal, it’s just business.

With these few steps, you can create a professional and correctly priced quote that will be both beneficial to your client as well as your pocketbook.

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