Improving Client Communications
One of the things that can make or break your relationship with your clients is your communication. Here are some important questions to consider when you're crafting your communication style and method to communicate efficiently with your clients:
How often do you communicate?
What do you communicate - and as important, what DON'T you communicate?
What email templates can you create for communications you send regularly?
What system do you use to automate communications when applicable?
Let's go a little more in-depth with a few of these!
How frequently should you communicate with your clients?
The best answer to this question is: as frequently as they prefer.
If you're one of a business owner's first hires, they may want to know every detail of what you're doing.
In contrast, if you're working with a business owner who is experienced and comfortable with delegation, they may want less communication given in regular, high-level reports.
I tend to prefer overcommunication over under, for a LOT of reasons. However, I adjust to each client's preference. It's important to be able to flex based on what your clients need from you!
What do you communicate, and what do you leave out?
Again, this is likely dependent upon the client.
For clients who prefer to be looped into more detail, I recommend giving at least weekly reports.
For clients who don't want as frequent or detailed communication, you may want to try a monthly meeting or email report that includes a high-level dashboard and anything they need to approve or complete for you. For these clients, it's important to leave out the 'in the weeds' details that will make their eyes glaze over, or that they don't have time to read. A great way to do this is give a checklist or bullet points at the top of the email so they can see important info at a glance.
What email templates can you create for regularly sent emails?
You know I love saving time whenever possible - and using email templates is a great way to ensure you are effectively communicating, ensuring your communications are consistent, and saving you time and mental energy. Here are a few ideas of email templates you may consider creating:
Payment Reminder Emails
Contract Updates / Addendum emails
Onboarding emails
Notification / Out of Office emails
Project Update Reports
Project Completion / Deliverables report
Nurture Sequence
Scheduling reminders / Meeting Prep emails
W-9 Emails
Requesting Reviews or Feedback
What system do you use to automate communications with clients, when possible?
Here are a few ideas of ways you can automate communications with clients. Now, remember, these are not marketing emails, so the tools we use for them might differ from the ones you use to email leads (like a CRM!).
Project Management tool: Set up an automation whereby when you change the status of a task to "Approval needed" or "Done" , it sends an email to your client. We have this automation set up in our ClickUp lists. Setting it up is part of our Internal Client Onboarding.
Client Management system: Create a dashboard for your client to see high-level progress on the different projects you're doing for them. This can usually be generated in a project management tool, a google sheet, or even a Canva document. These templates can be saved in and sent from your Client Management system, like Honeybook. In this method, you'll set up an Automation that will trigger sending the appropriate email template at the right time.
Regular email provider: Most email providers have their own email templates. While they can't necessarily be automated, having the emails saved in the place you normally communicate with clients at least saves you the time of starting from a blank email every time! Gmail even has a template feature you can use if you want to include images in your emails.
Choosing a Client Communication Tool
I often talk about the value of having an All-in-One tool for your business. I realize that this isn't always realistic, and even when it is, the tool can be really tech-heavy and not as user-friendly.
However, there are a lot of great tools out there that are very CLOSE to being an All-in-One.
One of my favorites is, of course, Honeybook! It is very user-friendly compared to the other options out there, and it has everything you need to...
Collect & qualify leads
Schedule appointments
Manage the entire booking process (interactive proposals, e-signing contracts, invoices, and payments)
Send Onboarding Questionnaires
Organize leads & clients into stages in your pipeline
Track time
Manage simple Tasks
Automate your client process
Communicate with clients
Offer a white-label client portal
As you can see, there isn't much it CAN'T do. It has saved me SO much time and headache in my business!
Psst: if you haven't paid for a Honeybook subscription yet, you can use my coupon code CassiePremierOps or click here to begin your subscription, and you'll get 50% off your first year!!
*Don't wait! This is a limited-time special that ends December 2023. Beginning January 1, it will go back to 35% off.
Emails in Honeybook
Because Honeybook has a project space where you can communicate with clients, it's perfect for streamlining your important, day-to-day communications.
But what about mass emails? Can you send mass or bulk emails in Honeybook?
The answer is yes - and it depends.
If you need an email marketing tool that includes templates with images, analytics, etc., this isn't exactly that. However, you can send emails in bulk to all the contacts in one of your pipeline stages.
Here are some examples of the type of emails this works well for:
Sending your W-9 to all your paying clients for tax season
Sending an update to clients on upcoming out-of-office dates
Sending a special, limited-time offer to leads or existing clients
Notifying clients of a new team member
Informing clients of a rate change
Sending follow-up emails or offers to former clients
Requesting reviews in bulk
Pretty great, right?!
Two options for Mass emails in Honeybook
Technically, Honeybook has two options for sending mass emails.
Batch Emails
The first is called BATCH emails. They can be sent from your Tools or Contacts area, and is most similar to a marketing email in that you can send the same text to ALL the contacts in your Honeybook. This would include anyone who's ever signed a contract, paid an invoice, used your scheduling link, or has been imported to your Honeybook from another tool.
There are also some analytics available - you can see deliverability and who has opened the email in one spot.
What's the drawback? There isn't a great way to segment, tag, or label each contact, so this email could potentially go to people your email isn't intended for.
In addition, you most likely don't have permission to email these folks in this manner, like you (hopefully) do when you're using an email marketing tool.
Currently, there also isn't a way to include images in these emails - they're simple text emails.
Bulk Emails
The second is the BULK email feature, which I highlighted above. This has many more practical uses. The emails are recorded individually in each client's project space / client portal, and you can see whether or not they've opened it - but you have to navigate to each client's space to be able to see that.
Ready to see it in action?!
Honeybook Tutorial: Bulk Emails
Below, I've included my Honeybook Tutorial on Sending Bulk Emails. This video also shows you the difference between BULK and BATCH emails.
There you have it! If you have other questions about how to use this feature, feel free to comment below.
Want Honeybook help?
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