The Gritty Virtual Assistant Blog

Here’s an article published today in “The Portable Business™.” If you’d like to subscribe, go here:

Excellent communication–not merely good or okay–is vitally important in your business relationships, even more so when your mode of doing business is entirely virtual. How well you communicate with prospects and clients directly impacts the trust and confidence you instil in them. One aspect of beyond-excellent communication is consistently following through in your responses to emails and voicemails.

To be clear, I’m not talking about the occasional message or response that falls through the cracks; that happens to the best of us. What I’m talking about is establishing consciously-devised standards and policies for handling communication your business. This includes being in the habit of making sure those who correspond with you via email know that their message was received.

There is nothing more frustrating than sending someone a message, and then hearing nothing but crickets in response. If you’ve ever been on the receiving end, you know what I’m talking about. You’re left wondering whether the recipient is taking whatever action might have been required, or if they even got the message at all. This kind of poor communication is not only an instant trust-killer, it creates extra work for the folks trying to correspond and work with you. It doesn’t put you in a good light and definitely doesn’t engender any confidence in your professional abilities.

Don’t do that to your clients and customers — or yourself, for that matter. Here’s a quick checklist to improve your customer communications (and earn greater trust from your clients) today:

1. Establish a timeliness standard in your business. Be disciplined about sticking with it. If you have a 24-48 hour turnaround policy, make sure you demonstrate a pattern of consistently responding to all messages within that timeframe.

2. Inform clients and customers upfront. Include your communication policies in your new client welcome kits. Talk about it in your new client orientation meetings. If you are closed on weekends or holidays or any other particular days of the week, let clients and site visitors know that. Let them know exactly how communication is handled in your business, during what hours, and what the response turnaround policy is. When clients know how things work and what to expect ahead of time, they don’t worry and wonder so much in the meantime.

3. Create a management plan. Devise a system for keeping track of messages and following-up efficiently. Use tools such as Outlook and ClearContext to organize and prioritize emails.

4. Respond to every message. Even if you can’t do anything right away, you should still acknowledge receipt of the message. A simple “Got it!” or “Thank you. I’ll let you know as soon as I take care of that” makes all the difference in the world to the person at the other end.

RESOURCE: Last issue we overviewed ClearContext. Another email management app that comes highly recommended is David Allen’s Getting Things Done plugin for Outlook.

About the Author: Danielle Keister is a business advisor and innovator in the Virtual Assistance profession. An administrative professional of 20+ years and veteran Virtual Assistant of 12+ years, her logical, no-nonsense approach to business development has gained her recognition as one of the leaders in the field. She loves what she does and is passionate about sharing her knowledge and know-how with the world. She’s all about inspiring others to reach for their highest excellence. When not taking care of clients in her own Virtual Assistant practice, she is busy leading the Virtual Assistance Chamber of Commerce and helping Virtual Assistants create six figure businesses.

© Copyright 2009, The Portable Business™. All U.S. and International rights reserved. You may print this article for personal use or republish it online only if it is left unaltered and used in its entirety, including bylines, links, copyright notice, resource and author information. Contact the author for any other permission.