Welcome to the Lagos Virtual Assistant's blog.!: February 2017

Tuesday 28 February 2017

Your Virtual Assistant as a Customer Service Representative

What is Customer Service

Simply put, Customer Service is the assistance or service provided by an organization to people who buy or use its products and services. It is service offered before, during and after purchase of a product or service rendered.

Every business offers a form of Customer Service ,what makes a brand or business stand out is the quality of service rendered to a customer.

Customer Service plays an important role plays an important role in an organization’s ability to generate income and revenue. The good quality of your service results in an increase in customer satisfaction, thereby propelling an increase in customer patronage. Several studies have proved that the cost of business lost as a result of poor Customer Service is usually greater than the cost incurred in establishing an excellent Customer Service structure.

Importance of Customer Service

Customer Service helps your customers have an easy and enjoyable experience. It is critical to the success of your business. It is often said that it is cheaper to keep an existing customer than to find new ones. Some even estimate that acquiring new customers cost 6-7X more. Prioritizing customer support helps you retain and attract quality customers.

Customer Support can make or break your reputation. Customers are quick to share their negative experiences online . A seriously ticked off customer in the online sphere can write a lengthy rant online, post comment on blogs or forums offering negative reviews. Any one who does a research on the concerned business will see the reviews as what is posted online anywhere never goes away. The internet never forgets!

This will not help any business especially a start up or growing business that is still trying to gain grounds in the market. The product or service you offer is only as good as the service you back them with. It is important to support channels from day one, usually from the point of enquiry.

Customer Service is critical to competing effectively. Customers hardly ever choose based on prices but based on service rendered. Customer support is a major driver of customer experience. It aids in creating winning experiences that helps organizations stand out from competition.

Customers are also willing to pay more for a better customer experience. It makes your customers love you and this is turn increases you profit as a result of increased sales. This is a smart business technique!

Why your business needs a Virtual Assistant as a Customer Service Representative

Customer satisfaction has long been the Holy Grail for anyone in business. Social media now brings a whole new significance to customer satisfaction. Rants and raves reach friends, friends of friends and friends of friends of friends! It is word of mouth of steroids! To further help every business tap into this ever evolving business stimulator, you can employ a Virtual Assistant as a Customer Service representative.

This system encourages the adoption of conventional methods of Customer Service with the progressive use of social media by an experienced service provider to attend to your businesses Customer Service needs.

The cost of running your Customer Service System is reduced as the Virtual Assistant works with his/her own work materials, run operations from their own office space. There is little or no training required as services are handled by professionals. Trainings they take on do not in anyway interfere with your business expenses.

The cost of recruitment and remuneration is also reduced to the barest minimum as Virtual Assistants usually have different service packages to meet the clients needs and budget. The service packages have been carefully designed to ensure that it is less than the minimum amount an experienced and professional Customer Service representative will consider as satisfactory remuneration.

They help improve efficiency in business and sales, bringing on years of experience and expertise on board. The client is also able to focus on other aspects of the business and take on new business opportunities.

Businesses often run unconventional hours, i.e. public holidays, weekends, 24hour services. Virtual Assistants are usually available to take on this challenge to help the clients run their business while they go to rest, trusting us to deliver exceptional Customer Service at any time of the day.

It is important that you ensure the Virtual Assistant has the requisite customer service experience or training. You can conduct a telephone interview and ask pertinent questions. Another option is by reviewing the LinkedIn profile of the intended Virtual Assistant. Lastly, you may ask for referrals from family, friends and colleagues who have worked with Virtual Assistants.

Conclusion

According to Jerry Gregoire “The customer experience is the next competitive battle ground”. With the throng of start ups and businesses being established daily, it is expedient that to all businesses endeavor to make awesome service a secret weapon to staying ahead in the game.

Doug Warner also said “in the world of internet Customer Service, it is important to remember your competitor is only a mouse click away”. Use our online Customer service to extend your voice, solidify your brand and gain evangelists for your business.

My startup failed. Here’s what I’ve learnt.

Below is an article by David Sebo, an entrepreneur, advisor and project designer . Failure especially in business is a global challenge, it is not synonymous with a particular ethnicity or locale. The great thing about Failure is, it is not a destination. You have the opportunity and grace to rise up and continue the race. I shared a quote on Monday for the Monday Motivation which states that "Winning cannot become your habit unless defeats have torn you apart and you sit in the battle field stitching back yourself one piece at a time laughing in the faces of all defeats.”

I am sharing this for knowledge's sake.. and I hope we (myself included) will learn a bit or two from this nuggets of wisdom.

Enjoy..

" In the last few months, my life was dominated by the fact that my business, which I’ve been building for four years failed. In this post I’m trying to pick up a few pieces of insight that might be useful for others.

Momentum (formerly known as Brandvee) was the product of two 20something guys wanting to do some stuff with software and marketing. No mission to save the world or passion to solve a particular problem. We just loved messing with data and solving puzzles. But that didn’t stop us from becoming super passionate about it and doing whatever it takes.

Eventually we raised funds, got into an accelerator, moved to London and started working with huge companies. It was an amazing experience, we’ve felt we’re on the top of the world. However we weren’t profitable and we ran out of cash before we could figure out how to be one.

So here are the three key takeaways of the last four years

Businesses fail, people don’t

I used to subscribe to the idea that in order to succeed one has to obsess over the business, like there’s nothing else. One of my first investors used to joke about us being the team where you add pizza and get a product.

This leads to a frog in a pan situation, one that only leads to happy end if you actually succeed against all odds. The other 99% of the time you’ll end up being an emotional wreck as I was. Laying in a catatonic state for days after a mental breakdown, one for which I’m far too young at 26.

Once I recovered in the following months (thanks to my family and a great therapist) I realised that I became a social hermit without friends or any hobbies and had no money.

We tried to get shit done on a bad market while we were learning how to be an okay team and burnt out in the process.

So no, it’s not worth it, business is the means not the end. If you’re an entrepreneur, you will go through this too at some point. So prepare for the storm because it is coming for you. Businesses fail, people don’t.

Solve real problems and make money

I think the hardest part of this is developing a no bullshit attitude. Entrepreneurs are scientists and the real world is their lab. As CEO I should’ve had my hands on the killswitch at all times from day one and start every day by asking if we should stop.

It’s not about being pessimistic, it’s about trying to disprove what we think about the world. Yes, there are people who can stick to their reality distortion fields and the world will go where they say.

The rest of us have to stick to the next best thing which is cash. Solve real problems and make cash. It’s really that simple, but all the hype makes it look like it’s complicated.

This is also true about fundraising. Always try not to raise funds. They’re not there to make you successful, that’s your job.

Stay humble and use logic

I’ve started this very young so I had no previous experience on how companies actually work. Over the last few years I have shipped many products, led successful fundraising rounds and managed to get the best out of our quite diverse team. I’ve also learned my way in the C-suite and gained experience in building a business.

I’ve also made more mistakes than I could count. Since clarity is easier to achieve when you’re in trouble, most of these mistakes were made when we were doing great. You experience some success, gets in your head and you think you’re invulnerable. Recipe for disaster.

Personally, this journey was a very humbling experience. In the last four years I was constantly working on trying to improve the way I think. I will always be grateful that I had a fantastic coach to work on my ego and a great mentor who pointed out that advanced use of logic is the best friend of an entrepreneur.

I think it’s quite easy to become your own enemy. It’s important to realise that most of the time we just simply don’t know what we don’t know. So the best thing to do is to stay humble and use logic.

Finishing thoughts

Having the opportunity to reflect on this in the last three months turned me into a stoic of some sort which brought me peace and joy I almost forgot existed. And most importantly, I have learned to let go. Now I’m looking outwards.

Because there is a whole world out there. Sounds silly but I kind of need to rediscover it. I love product and SaaS so I’ll probably stick to it while I’m on the lookout for new opportunities. Probably I’ll play it safe for a while so I can put my life back together both personally and financially.

This chapter of my journey has been extraordinary. I am eternally grateful to all of you who put faith in me including colleagues, family and friends, as well as my investors — some of whom also became my mentors. Thank you for your trust and partnership and while I am truly sorry for not being able to deliver the results we all envisioned, I am glad that we had an opportunity to be a part of this together."

Source

Monday 27 February 2017

Yudala Sales Promo

Hey,

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Click on this link 👉👉👉Yudala.com to place your order today.

Don't dull yourself 😁😁

Monday Motivation

"Winning cannot become your habit unless defeats have torn you apart and you sit in the battle field stitching back yourself one piece at a time, laughing in the faces of all defeats.”

― Chetan M. Kumbhar, Panasu The Golden City & The Capasstars

Saturday 25 February 2017

Rising Star 🌟 🌟

Hello guys,

The weekend is here again!

I am excited to feature another rising star who is making waves in the fast growing events management industry. The surge in the Nigerian Events Management industry has unveiled many expert events planners and managers. Standing out in this sea of known and unknowns to make yourself a known brand is understandably very tasking. So it is no mean feat to be an events manager who gets booked for events back to back and who is also fast becoming a force to reckon with in the industry. Without further ado, allow me to introduce our Rising Star the CEO of June5ive Events. I am tempted to launch into an exaltation on how amazing she is as an Events Planner and Manager but I will allow the pictures below speak for themselves.