Working from home is becoming a more practical and sensible option for many business start-ups. However, revealing to clients that you run things from home can come across unprofessional and convince people that you’re only a small business, when you may want to look big.
Fortunately, there are many ways to convince clients that you are a large business, even if you’re not. Here are just a few methods.
Grow Your Online Presence
A huge online presence can convince people that you’re an established corporation.
Pouring some time and money into digital marketing can achieve this.
Your website should be your first point of call – this needs to look professional. Whilst you can use a content management system such as WordPress and make your own website for free, you may prefer to put this job in the hands of a web designer that give you something a little more official.
From here you should start branching out.
Get some social media pages and regularly update them with the news.
Consider paying for SEO, pay-per-click advertising, and sponsorship from other companies.
Encourage online reviews on sites such as Trip Advisor and supply testimonials on your website.
All of this will make your internet presence huge, leading people to believe that your presence in the real word is just as gigantic – even if you are actually just working alone from your sofa.
Take Care When Video Calling
Video calling tools such as Skype have allowed face-to-face meetings to be possible without actually meeting in person. Because of this, you don’t need an office to invite clients in and can simply chat with clients from the comfort of your home.
The issue with this is that it’s less private than a phone call and clients can see what’s behind you and what you’re wearing.
Make sure that if you are involved in such calls, your home office doesn’t look like a bedroom, and that your clothes look like clothes you’d wear to work. Also, let any family at home know when you’re going to have an important video call – you don’t want your kids bursting in half way through a video chat, as this will blow the entire illusion.
Use A Virtual Address
Services such as Physical Address now allow you to outsource your mail to a virtual address, which then forwards the mail onto you.
Such services can give you an official city address to put on your website that can make your business look much more official.
It’s not only more professional but protects your privacy.
Consider A Virtual Assistant
If clients keep ringing up and you keep answering the phone, they may soon start to realize that it’s a one-man-operation.
You can trick clients into thinking otherwise by outsourcing a virtual assistant agency to take calls for you. Other than this sneaky purpose, such services also have their practical uses, filtering out sales calls as well as being able to handle calls that don’t need immediate action required, recording important details and relaying these to you afterward allowing you to focus on the bulk of your work.