Welcome to part 2 of this mini blog series.
During this series I was delving into the concept of collaboration vs competition.
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So I don’t know about all of you but I was brought up believing that if someone offers the same or similar service to me then they must be my competition right??
How wrong was I?
Being successful requires you to acknowledge not only your strengths but also your weaknesses.
Having a weakness in a certain area doesn’t mean I can’t offer it as a service to my clients. It just means I need to seek support from someone who is an expert in this field to fill the gaps in my service.
So through this series I wanted to introduce you to an amazing group of entrepreneurs who I have or will be working with in the future, to offer my clients a complete, rounded, holistic service.
Today I want to introduce you to Danielle Plesner. Danielle is in a very similar line of work to me, but instead of providing administrative support to your business, Danielle offers admin support to your life.
When speaking to Danielle, I asked her to provide me with some insight into exactly what she does and why she does it. This is what Danielle had to say:
“I launched DPLifeworks in May 2018 as a result of finding a niche in the market for busy working professionals who were unable to focus on their lifestyle admin needs and concentrate on business and work ones themselves. There was a gap in the market to tap into with so many varied VA’s available. It was also important to differentiate between being a VA and a PA.
I love a list, love my diary and love to organise. To start with I used some friends as examples of the profile of my ideal client. My friend was a partner in a huge law firm in London, working full time and long hours, had 3 kids at different schools and was overwhelmed with so much life admin that consumed her late at night!
I am entering my 40’s this year and my children are growing quickly. My background was marketing but spent many years being a regular PA to a financial adviser. For me there was a need to work virtually/remotely, to be around for my family’s needs as they grew, so the idea began there.
I am not a competitive person myself, I always preferred to take part. I do understand the need in business but find a specific niche/gap always help lead the way.
My clients are varied but ultimately their needs are the same, and I offer the reassurance, I provide to support to them on a contract or adhoc basis.”
Danielle’s services are a perfect example of why we should be looking more to collaboration over competition.
Although our services focus on slightly different areas they are incredibly similar. My previous beliefs would have led me to avoid association with Danielle because she might ‘steal’ possible clients but the truth is, this is ridiculous.
I soon came to the realisation that although our services were similar, our target clients were very different.
So there was no need to view Danielle as competition but more as a colleague. There will always be times when a client’s needs will overlap in a number of requirements so why not call on the support of someone like Danielle to strengthen my offerings to my clients.
If you would like to contact Danielle directly, you can do so via her website, follow her on Insta (@dplife) or like her page on Facebook.
If you are interested in my Virtual Assistant Services or Accountability Coaching Programme, you can contact me here. Also, don’t forget to like me on Facebook.