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Welcome Readers,

It has been too long since our last broadcast, we know. To say that we have been lax in sending you Inside VA Training is quite an understatement. We have been in development of numerous things. Most of those relate to our Virtual Assistant Business and not specifically to VA Training. However, because we have a deep passion for VAs and the betterment of our industry, we plan on making Inside VA Training more robust for you. More on that in another section of this message.

To rectify our faux pas of inconsistency in getting these broadcasts to you in a timely fashion, we have brought on board a VA (go figure) to help us in delivering the broadcast to you. Please welcome Crystal Pina of Visions Virtual Assistance to the team. With her effort coupled with ours, we should make your inbox happy. :o)

Bi-Weekly Newsletter Announcement

As mentioned previously, we are making changes to Inside VA Training. Starting in January 2008, instead of a single brouadcast message, you will be receiving two (2) broadcasts from us each month. One message will be just like this one. An article, Welcome Message, Announcements and a few other items.

The other message will be an Inspirational Quote, Quip or Profound Statement. You will receive these message on the 2nd and 4th Tuesdays of each month, alternatively. We do not plan to bombard you with a littany of messages. We only want to give you a little something extra. Why? Because we like you.

If you do not want to get either of these messages, you may still unsubscribe by following the links at the bottom of this message or any of the messages you receive from us. Additionally, if you would like to share this message with someone that you feel may find the information important, by all means share the message with them or send them to VATraining.com to sign up for Inside VA Training.

Featured Resource

Do you need help figuring out how to set your business up whether you are using brick and mortar or just the walls inside your computer? This book has been a staple in my office since 2003 (when we had the older version). I have since bought the newest book and it stays within reach at all times. It has been a valuable commidity to my business as well as those I have recommended the book to. So, if you do not have a copy that has a broken spine from overuse, then you have not done this book justice.

- Dale Noles, Head Coach

Determining Your Target Market: A Heartbeat and a Checkbook?

by: Dale Noles

PART 1: September, 2007 Issue

Marketing is vital to growing any business in any industry. It is especially true with a virtual industry like the virtual assistant industry. The hard facts are that VAs do not set up a brick and mortar storefront, they typically set up a web site. The disillusion of having a website is that once it is built they expect to have “walk-in” traffic like most new businesses experience when the open their doors for business. The “if you build it, they will come” attitude is somehow adopted into the thought of creating a VA business. The origin of this thought is unclear.

Marketing is paramount to any entrepreneur starting out utilizing the Internet as the primary medium for attracting clients. However, marketing to everyone on the Internet means that your one business is marketing to a billion potential clients. Marketing your business to everyone who has a heartbeat and a checkbook is not effective. The likelihood of someone stumbling onto your website is possible but not probable, especially if you expect that visitor to use your services.

The question becomes, how do you make your business attractive to someone who wants what your business provides? The answer is to determine a target market. This is one of the biggest roadblocks that most of the VAs experience before they enter the VA Training program. The I.D.E.A.L. coaching principle was designed to help bring out what already lies beneath the surface of entrepreneurs and show them how to build a business around it. Included here is a portion of that principle. It is a fairly straight forward process and can be broken down into six workable components and then putting the pieces together. The six pieces of this puzzle are listing your five talents, identifying your five loves, identifying what industry or industries need what you have, knowing who you know, target the market and structuring your business to appeal to that or those industries.

The Five Talents

To best define a target market for your business you have to know what you are capable of doing. This is not a laundry list of the tasks that you can handle, but rather paring down the top five talents that you possess that would be considered marketable skills. Examples are typing speed and accuracy, web design, graphic design, public relations, etc.

Once you have a crystal clear vision of what you are great at, you will be able to more accurately hone in on where you can be an asset to a potential target market. Occasionally, it helps to ask someone who is already familiar with your talents to outline them for you. This way you are getting the perspective of someone who is unbiased, as yourself, on what your expertise may be.

Do What You Love

How many times can you recall as you were growing up, when you were asked the age old question, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” Answering this question when you were a pre-teen brought answers like; ballerina, fire fighter, police officer, doctor, astronaut, etc. These were high aspirations. Much like asking yourself this question, “What do you LOVE to do?” Do you like being creative? Do you dream of helping others achieve their best possible self? Do you love numbers?

If you can identify five key loves for your business you can compare these against your five talents and note where they overlap. The ones that do overlap should be the key services that you offer. Why is this useful? If you can do what you know and what you love, your business will flourish. Think of how it makes you feel if you have to do what you dislike. Most people do not put forth the effort towards something they loathe; on the other hand, their best effort is put into what they love to do.

Get the Big Picture

Now that you have identified the common threads between your talents and loves, take a step back and look at the overall picture. Think of the types of businesses and professionals that make up our great big world. What kinds of services do they require? What are the businesses or professionals that use the types of services that you have just identified? How do you see, feel or sense the potential partnering with these groups?

The most important part of this is getting a sense for what you offer and identifying the types of businesses or professionals who can afford and could use the services that you provide. It is this action that will help you get some clarity for what is next to come.

Knowing Who You Know

Many VAs were in professional positions before they left the corporate arena to launch their own businesses. Additionally, they may have experience with other industries while in their corporate jobs that gives them an edge. It could be that to get “inside” an industry you would need to have specialized skills like knowing the lingo or how that particular industry operates. But there is always an “in” to any industry. The key is to know what that “in” is.

If you are familiar with a specific industry or industries, this knowledge creates that edge you may need to break into that industry. Areas that can set you apart are; knowing the lingo, the needs, the desires, the goals and other nuances that set that industry apart from the pack, at least from your perspective. Being aware of what each of these particularities are will prepare you in setting yourself apart from the crowd. If these industries can see you as an expert then you are well on your way to attracting the right industry.

Nail Down Your Target Market

The best advice that I can give any budding business owner is know who your services will best pair with, know how to communicate with them and communicate with them! This sounds all too obvious, but it works. Now pay attention to this. If you own a coffee house in a town that loves tea it would take you a long time to convince tea drinkers to switch to coffee. But the key is to not switch them to just any coffee. You have to convince them to switch to your coffee brand. It is much easier to sell coffee to coffee lovers. Additionally, coffee lovers are likely to try other coffee, which makes it easier to get them to switch to your brand of coffee. Which is why knowing your target market is so valuable.

Read PART 2 in next month's issue of Inside VA Training

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