I was contacted by a lady who has a furniture store. She has a good client base of doctors, lawyers, hospitals, etc.  She wanted to build a business line catalog of all her office furniture that she offers with pricing.  I knew that I could do the task. However, I told her since she was local I would like to come to her store to see how she does business. She was excited that I was willing to come out to sit with her for a face to face consultation.

So, we arranged a time for Saturday, June 5, 2010. I met her at her store. Prior to meeting her at her store, I prepared a contract after our phone consultation and she had verbally stated that she would like to go with the hourly rate for starters. I prepared the contract and emailed it to her hours prior to our meeting.

When I arrived I saw that she had printed the contract and had it lying on her desk.  We proceeded to discuss, what she needed and how she wanted the catalog designed. She also welcomed my suggestions and input. She stated that she could tell that I was a very professional woman, after listening to my input. She also stated she was going to leave everything up to me on the design setup. However, I told her she would approve off on every stage of the catalog, she agreed.

We discussed a few things on the contract and I walked out of her store with a signed contract in hand.

I share this because, even though we are virtual assistants, does not strictly mean that you cannot get out and do a face to face consultation. That potential client just may need to experience your character in person to fully decide if they can trust you with something that can make an impact on their business. However, I do know that your work will speak for itself, but go that extra mile if a client is local and wants that face to face contact. That contact, may be the deciding factor if they use your services or not.