Throughout the years, it has been a joy to see and hear how our clients have become more productive, either by employing our team of VAs or through individual work with me as a Productivity Coach. Here are a few stories from the past year!
Email Time Blocking in Action
Did you know that it takes 1.5–3 minutes for your brain to fully transition from one activity to another? That means every time you are working on a task (like I am right now writing this blog), see a client email pop into your inbox, respond, and then return to your task, you’ve just wasted 3–6 minutes. Multiply that by 20 times a day, and that’s at least 1 hour of wasted, unproductive time every day.
What if you could convert that time into productive or even billable hours? That’s 5 hours a week, or 20 hours of extra billable time per month!
This is exactly what I told one of my new Productivity Coaching clients, and he was immediately interested. Between our second and third coaching sessions, he implemented work blocks with email blocks in between each one-hour work block. As a mortgage broker, here’s an example of his work blocks:
30 minutes - Email
1 hour - Admin tasks: CRM management, inputting new prospects, follow-up emails
30 minutes - Email
1 hour - Reaching out to prospective clients through leads, introductions, and networking
After one week, he said it was a game-changer:
"I felt so much more productive. I feel like I got so much more done this week than I have in any other week in years. This is something I will definitely continue doing!"
If you want to learn more about how to time block your email, check out my past blog, 6 Tips on How to Avoid the Black Hole of Your Inbox.
Never Underestimate the Power of Reaching Out to Past Clients
One of our clients in the health and wellness space, who has been working with us for about three years, saw one of our promotional newsletters this past fall. It encouraged them to implement a tried-and-true process: an email series reaching out to past clients who hadn’t engaged with them for more than six months. (Check out our newsletter HERE.)
She wanted to try it. She has a smaller client base, so we reached out to about 20 clients. After sending the first email, five past clients had already booked a catch-up call. After the second email, two more responded, and after the final email, nine clients had re-engaged—a nearly 50% success rate!
As of our last call, she was in contract negotiations with three of them and still talking to the other six.
The Power of the Follow-Up
In a recent conversation with one of my productivity clients, I went through my usual accountability process of to-dos and strategies we had implemented. He works in the team development space, helping corporations build teams and brands through storytelling.
He had two big proposals in progress but hadn’t followed up for about three weeks, even though it had been on his to-do list the entire time. The reasons? They were the same I often hear from clients: fear of rejection. Instead of risking a “no,” it feels easier to wait for the client to respond in their own time. It makes sense, but it’s not effective.
During the call, I had him write the follow-up emails. It took him about five minutes to draft both.
On our next call, he let me know that both clients had responded and were now under contract!
Sometimes the simplest actions can have the biggest impact on our time and bottom line. I love that our team helps clients implement these strategies and, in many cases, executes them on their behalf. Being part of this process is incredibly rewarding, and as we continue to collaborate with our clients, we at A4H get to see them build and grow their businesses!
May 2025 be a very productive and successful year!
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Written by MerriLyn Gibbs
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