As I mentioned in my previous post, I am leaving May 26, and returning June 17. But I didn’t give you many details, did I? That’s because I wanted to be sure you came back to read more.

I fly out of Houston May 26, headed to Washington D.C. From there I will catch a connecting flight to Rome along with ten other people who will be flying from Chicago to Washington D.C. at the same time I am flying there. The ten people from Chicago include my sweet daughter, Erin, and eight other family members from the Milwaukee/Chicago area who I am excited to be travelling and reconnecting with. I don’t get a chance to visit with them near as often as I would like, and I can only hope they will be not be tired of me after 21 days.

So what happens when we get to Rome? Well, you will just have to wait until you get the blog post from Rome to find out about that. But the current plan is to tour Rome for two days, then take a train to Florence where we will tour for another two days (including a tour of the Tuscany area – yum), then take another train to Bologna (where we have heard that we will find the best food in all of Italy, and plan to get our fair share), then another train to Venice. We will tour Venice for a few days before boarding our cruise ship along with another 18 family members from Chicago/Milwaukee area who will be meeting us in Venice for the cruise. Yes, it’s a nice big happy family reunion with 29 of us, and I am delighted to be able to participate in the festivities.

Erin will be my roommate, companion and partner-in-crime. We can only hope that the damage we both do to our bodies (not to mention our reputations) with all the food and wine in Italy will be neither irreparable nor permanent.

Stay tuned for my next post, where I will share our planned destinations. Not subscribed to my blog yet? You can do that by clicking here to subscribe.

You’ve heard a rumor that I am leaving my husband? And worse, you heard that I am doing it on the day after our wedding anniversary? Yes, sad to say, it’s true. And I’m not ashamed. Because not only do I have a very good reason, I will only be gone for three weeks.

I am beginning an adventure on May 26 that will take me to Italy and on a cruise to several destinations throughout the Mediterranean. And I’m so excited; I want to take you all with me.

Follow me on this blog by subscribing below, and I will tell you all about it each step of the way.

Please leave comments, too. I’d love to read them. But please don’t feel hurt if I don’t respond right away. While I will be writing the posts, I won’t be accessing the internet much while I am away. I will send the posts to another Virtual Assistant (what a concept!!!) who will be uploading them, so I may not see the comments until I get back on June 17.

Stay tuned for further details and … Arrivederci!

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Continuing in our recent series regarding using LinkedIn for your business, I wonder how many of you know that you can set up a Company Page in LinkedIn to further develop your business presence.

I learned about this recently, and it looks like a wonderful way to increase your opportunities to network with clients, prospective clients, potential job candidates, vendors, and your peers.

The first step is to create your company page, integrating images, hyperlinked banners and links to your website and blog pages. Use informative descriptions about your ideal customer and the products or services you provide, and begin posting regular updates.

Similar to your Facebook page and Twitter profile, you will need to work to build a community of followers; your updates won’t be visible unless someone visits your page directly. Begin building your community by following the company pages of industry peers and current and prospective customers. Follow companies that are outside of your industry but in your location. Watch for their company updates and engage with them. Thank them on their page for something they post that is helpful to you in your business.

Send an announcement to your LinkedIn personal connections and group members, being sure to provide benefits to them in following your page. Be sure to provide interesting and valuable updates to your company page.

It is important to invest in your LinkedIn company presence regardless of the size of your business. Your LinkedIn company page will also be indexed by search engines, which can provide more visibility to your business. This is one of the best ways to set your company apart and provide ongoing value to your customers and prospects.

When using LinkedIn for lead generation, your goal is to stay connected to existing customers and branch out those connections to include prospective customers. There are several ways you can use LinkedIn to generate leads for your business, and what you need is to create a plan of action and make a commitment to following your plan.

• Applications: This is a great place to go to find new applications to improve your LinkedIn page. Everything from setting up polls for customers and prospective customers to adding blog posts to your LinkedIn page can be found here. The two most popular are The Reading List by Amazon, and the WordPress application.
• Groups: Check out industry-related groups on LinkedIn, join several of them and get involved with the conversation. Also, be sure to also join groups outside your industry circle that are related to your business or target market. Connect with the leaders and other group members, being sure to let them know that you are members of the same group and have some things in common. Commit to join 15-20 groups, start a discussion in each new Group every day for five days after you join each one. You will start to make a few new friends in the group if you do this consistently. If appropriate, include a link back to your website so people can download a relevant item of interest, or sign up for your newsletter. Now you will be able to stay on top of their mind through your newsletter on a regular basis.
• Answers: The LinkedIn Answers section is a place where people go to ask questions and get advice. Provide answers to their questions and show your industry experience and knowledge. It is a wonderful place to get your name in front of potential clients or referral partners by being helpful without being pushy. Answer two questions each week in the Answers section of LinkedIn. Doing this consistently over a long period of time is a long-term strategy for generating leads
• People: If you are trying to get connections within a specific company in your target market, the best way to get your foot in the door is to do a search in the LinkedIn search box for the company name, and then click on the company. If you have any direct connections to anyone in the company, the number of connections will appear on the right hand side. Clicking on the number will bring up a list of names of the people at that company that you have a first or second degree connection with. Consider asking one of them through LinkedIn to introduce you to the people at their company that you would like to be connected to. Commit that once a week you will connect with at least five current or former business associates. This will ensure that they will remember you when they or someone they know needs the product or service you provide.
• Direct Ads: LinkedIn’s advertising program works the same way that Google paid search ads work. They make it simple to create your ad, and then bid on how much you will pay when someone clicks on your LinkedIn ad. It’s a great way to drive prospects to your web page or other destination. Commit to creating a DirectAd that links to a page on your website where you can sell something direct or collect your prospective client’s contact information when they sign up for something you are offering.
• Mobile: Download the free LinkedIn application on your smart phone. When you meet new contacts at a networking event or trade show, get them to also download the LinkedIn application if they haven’t done it already. When you bump your phones together lightly, LinkedIn will transfer the contact information between the two phones, quickly and easily.

The key to LinkedIn is to be consistent and committing to the above. Don’t give up, because results will not be obtained overnight, but your network will be built at a slow and steady pace and you will eventually reach your goal. As always, I am happy to help. Call me at (832)295-9804 or email me at Jaclyn@croftvs.com.

There are many social media tools available, but many business owners would agree that LinkedIn is a very helpful and useful tool for most business people, and one of the best tools for making valuable business connections. It is great for connecting with prospective clients, research prospects, stay in front of prospective employers, build awareness of your company and expand your circle of business contacts.

The first step toward getting started with LinkedIn is, of course, setting up your profile and optimizing it with as much information about you and your business as possible. The next thing you will want to do is create your personalized LinkedIn URL. If you are active on Twitter, connect your Twitter account with LinkedIn by clicking on the “Twitter” link above the “Public Profile” link. Now every time you update your status on LinkedIn, you will be sending a tweet about it.

The next step is to grow your LinkedIn network by joining industry related groups. Click on the “People” link and drag it down to “Groups”. Here you can type in an industry or subject you’re interested in. When you do a search, LinkedIn provides suggestions in “Groups”, and also in other categories such as “Connections,” “Companies,” “Features” and “Skills.” Feel free to reach out to people you know or want to get to know, and just be sure you are not pushing your products or services on them.

The first approach is the direct approach, providing valuable information to prospects and connections on LinkedIn, keeping their interests in mind. If you have ever been to a party or business gathering and someone approached you and talked about themselves and their business for ten minutes, you will remember that as an unpleasant experience. But if they spent ten minutes talking about you and something of interest or value to you, there is a much better chance that you will be interested in what they have to say. Try to be helpful by offering advice, industry insights or general information.

Another approach is the indirect approach, in which you still start out by offering free advice or helpful information, but once you’ve connected with your prospect, you will drive them to a landing page on your website where they can download a white paper, sign up for your e-newsletter or get more information on your products or services.

Stay tuned next month when we will talk about using LinkedIn for lead generation. If you are not on LinkedIn yet, what are you waiting for? Now is the time to get started. If you need help, just give me a call or email me at jaclyn@croftvs.com.

One of the skills that is most often requested as a Virtual Assistant is WordPress website or blog set-up and maintenance. I have learned a little about WordPress “on-the-job”, with the maintenance of my own site and those of a few of my clients. I know a little about html, but the thought of getting into the back end of a website and taking the risk of possibly “breaking” something has always driven enough fear into me to avoid it altogether.

That is why I’m excited to learn about VAClassroom’s (my favorite online learning center) most recent course offering – WORDPRESS SKILLS. This unique, online, live and interactive class is scheduled for September 27 and 28, and it sounds like a wonderful opportunity to learn what themes to use, how to make the site SEO friendly, what plugins to use and more. They are offering some top-notch ideas and skills on WordPress development and implementation.

The best part is that they are offering a $50 discount if you sign up by midnight on Wednesday, September 21.

If you or anyone you know needs to brush up on your WordPress skills, VAClassroom is the place to be. Just click here to be taken to their sales page, and I will “see” you in class.

I was recently introduced to Online Logo Maker, a free logo creating tool with the single purpose of bringing a free professional logo design tool to everyone.

Although there are many computer programs available which can certainly be used to create wonderful logos, they are typically expensive and require a professional designer with a certain level of expertise to get the best results. Online Logo Maker, on the other hand, is very easy and intuitive to use, enabling you to create a customized logo with very little effort. No technical or design skill is required. They offer hundreds of symbols of various categories to choose from, and logo ready fonts selected by professional designers. All the user needs to do is drag and drop your selected items and choose your colors. They have tools to rotate, resize and transform your logo effortlessly.

Though Online Logo Maker is free, they do offer a Premium account which costs $9.00 and provides you with four weeks of full access to more than 250 exclusive symbols, more than 25 exclusive fonts, and unlimited email support provided by Online Logo Maker.

After a frustrating experience with another similar program a few years ago, I gave up and had my logo professionally created. I am now considering using the Premium account to create professional looking logos for clients who need them.

As a special gift to my blog and newsletter readers, for a limited time I am offering a free Premium Online Logo Maker account with three months of premium access to the first three people who leave a comment on my blog or email me at jaclyn@croftvs.com to let me know that they are interested. This is my gift to you, so don’t delay!