TCC Podcast #284: How to Use Dubsado to Streamline Your Business and Elevate Your Client Experience with Charlotte Issac

The people and stuff we mentioned on the show:

The Copywriter Think Tank
Kira’s website
Rob’s website
Charlotte Isaac’s website 
The Copywriter Club Facebook Group
The Copywriter Underground
Episode 44
Episode 207

 

Full Transcript:

Kira Hug:  We’ve noticed a growing trend in the copywriting space. More and more copywriters are up-leveling their systems and creating automated client experiences that far surpass the somewhat sloppy back and forth that typically takes place in the inbox. Today’s guest for The Copywriter Club podcast is system specialist, Charlotte Isaac, and she lets us look under the hood of her business. We nerd out on automations, Dubsado, and client management. So if you’re trying to automate the processes in your business and maybe, just maybe you’d like to hear Charlotte’s number one business lesson from Harry Potter, you won’t want to miss this episode.

Rob Marsh:  I’m feeling attacked Kira, based off that intro. I’m the guy with the sloppy back and forth in the inbox. If you’re listening to this podcast on the day that it was released, that means that we are currently in Nashville at The Copywriter Club In Real Life, hanging out IRL with some of the best copywriters in the world. And we’re sharing with them some of the changes that we’re making to The Copywriter Think Tank here in the very near future to make it better than ever, like introducing two new coaches to the group. So that members don’t just depend on us, but have access to specialists and things like systems and mindset.

The Think Tank is our mastermind coaching program that helps copywriters take their business to the next level, whatever that means for you, that might be a larger income number, it could be creating a new program or a new offer for your clients, it could be launching a podcast or writing a book to grow your authority, whatever you are ready to accomplish next, we’ll help you do it in The Copywriter Think Tank. Go to copywriterthinktank.com to learn more. And let’s get to our interview with Charlotte Isaac.

Kira Hug:  All right Charlotte, let’s kick this off. How did you end up as a business operations consultant? What is your story?

Charlotte Isaac:  It’s a bit of a roundabout one. Probably like a lot of people in this online space, I worked in creative agencies in my traditional offline job. And when I started my own business, I thought I would do a very similar thing. So I started working as an OBM, I really loved it, but I realized after a while that a lot of people in that space don’t really need an OBM, what they need is a really, really solid system to look after them and look after their clients. And once they have that in place, their business can kind of run on autopilot. So I kind of got dragged into it by my clients, I guess.

Rob Marsh:  So what were you doing before that? What was the thing that you were working on with clients before you started doing the automations?

Charlotte Isaac:  So, I was kind of helping them look after their clients and look after their team members and basically hold everything together in their business. Kind of like an operations manager.

Kira Hug:  Okay. So can you just talk through all the differences? Because I think, especially if someone hasn’t worked with an OBM, can you differentiate between a VA, an OBM, business operations, developer, all the terms that are thrown out there, can you talk through them?

Rob Marsh:  Yeah, I think that’s the question I meant to ask. You said it so much better than I did, Kira.

Kira Hug:  I always do, Rob.

Charlotte Isaac:  Girl power! It’s really confusing. Everyone kind of uses a different name and it would be so helpful if there was a bit of a standardization out there, but a VA essentially helps you with tasks and an OBM can manage your VA and manage other team members and basically hold all your business together. So in some ways, they hold all of the people below you together.

Rob Marsh:  Knowing that then let’s talk about, as copywriters, as business owners if we’re thinking, “Okay, I need help in my business.” Help us do the decision tree. When should it be the VA, when should it be an OBM, and when should it be a system specialist specifically doing the kind of work that you’re doing today?

Charlotte Isaac:  I think it depends where you’re spending a lot of your time. It’s super old school, but I often recommend when people are trying to figure it out, to walk away from their computer, grab a notebook and a pen and start writing out all of the things that frustrate them, that take them a lot of time, and that they feel like they drop balls on. So if it’s a lot of things like chasing out my clients for homework, sending out invoices, sending proposals, all of that kind of stuff, that can be really easily systemized. If it’s stuff like scheduling social media posts and things like that, a VA or somebody could be good. If it’s a little bit of everything, sometimes an OBM is a great fit to help you kind of guide, do you need a system specialist or do you need to plug in a VA eventually. There are so many things it could be.

Kira Hug:  But again, you’re not an OBM at this point, right? You’re in your own category?

Charlotte Isaac:  Yeah. I would fall into the system specialist category, I guess.

Kira Hug:  Okay.

Charlotte Isaac:  The very loose categories we have.

Kira Hug:  Okay. All right. So then let’s say we’re working with you. Let’s say I’m a copywriter and I’m working with you for the first time to set up systems. Where do I start with my system development? If I’m not a systems-minded person, and I’m not, Rob knows this, I like to use my paper and notepad and stay away from systems, but I also understand the value of them. Where would you start with someone like me who’s just not systems friendly?

Charlotte Isaac:  So firstly, again, I’d walk away from the computer and we would have a chat around what things look like right now. So what do you do to look after your clients, what your process is, what’s working and what’s not working? And we kind of come up with this giant list of things that need to happen from the very beginning of a client relationship when they reach out to you or someone kind of refers them to you or however that looks like right through to when the work is done and you need to off-board them and maybe invite them to come back to you as a client in the future. So we get all of that out on paper before we start looking at systems. And I find that even the people that are most shy of systems, once we do that, they realize that they probably really need a system because there is so much that happens in that entire process.

Rob Marsh:  So, can we go just even a little deeper in that? I know we’ve sort of got this topical idea of what you’re going to be asking about, but again, I’m almost saying, let’s do this exercise with me or with Kira and me.

Kira Hug:  Just with you, Rob. Just with you.

Rob Marsh:  As we sit down, it’s like, are you going into every single piece of the business? Are there general categories? How many bullet points end up on that list of things that you want to systematize?

Charlotte Isaac:  It’s a little bit never ending. So with my own clients, I tend to focus on the client management side of things. We do dip into other things and kind of touch on other systems that they might need to employ, but my focus is really on the client management side of things. So the first question I ask, because you’re in the guinea pig group, is how people find you and what happens when they find you?

Rob Marsh:  Okay. So mostly it’s going to be through referrals or maybe it’s through something I’ve put out on LinkedIn or social media or something like that.

Charlotte Isaac:  Awesome. And then do you have a chat with them once they’ve been connected with you? Some kind of discovery call?

Rob Marsh:  Yes. For sure. There may be some communication and email before that, but we definitely have a discovery call before we book anything.

Charlotte Isaac:  Amazing. And if someone connects to you and you’ve gone back to them and said, “Hey, great. Let’s chat.” And they don’t book a call with you. I’m assuming you use Calendly, maybe. I think I’ve seen you use Calendly.

Rob Marsh:  Yeah. Calendly or TidyCal is the tool that I’ve been using lately.

Charlotte Isaac:  Perfect. So if they don’t book a call, do you have some kind of follow up system in place that prompts you to go back to them and check-in again?

Rob Marsh:  Other than me just having it in my email or the fact that we didn’t get that booked, no. I don’t have something automated.

Charlotte Isaac: That does not count, Rob.

Rob Marsh:  It counts. It’s just not really a great system. It’s a bad system.

Charlotte Isaac:  It’s the system in your head. That’s where I find that the systems I use with clients, that’s kind of the first place that they usually start to help a lot. So for people that aren’t using something like Calendly or TidyCal or Dubsado, which is the main system I use, has a scheduler. And it can also help going back and following up with people and saying, “Hey, you didn’t book a call. Do you still want to chat? Do you have a question before we chat?” Basically so we can pull this part of the process out of your head and get somebody else, a little robot to deal with it for you.

Rob Marsh: That makes sense. And then let’s say we get that first thing fixed. I’m assuming you’re going to take me all the way through the entire client relationship. So we’re going to be talking about onboarding or we’re going to be talking about writing processes, all of that stuff as well?

Charlotte Isaac:  Absolutely. So the next logical step is some sort of proposal that you might send your client. We get right into the onboarding process. What do your contracts look like? How do they sign the proposal and contract and make that first payment to you? What happens next? Do they schedule a call? What kind of welcome emails do they get? All of the nitty gritty into that onboarding process.

Rob Marsh:  Yeah. Let’s keep going. Writing process is probably not something that gets automated with a tool like Dubsado, but are there check-ins throughout that process that you automate into it?

Charlotte Isaac:  Absolutely. We can kind of automate a bit of a feedback loop. I find, particularly with people that have clients that haven’t worked with copywriters before, they don’t really know how to give good feedback. So something that we could automate is have some kind of thing that is sent to the client that guides them through giving feedback and nudges them after they haven’t given feedback after a certain amount of time. So maybe your timeline allows the client three or four days to look through everything, leave any comments in a Google Doc or whatever you end up using. Maybe the system nudges them after two days and says, “Hey, you’ve got a couple of days left to do this. If you have any questions, let me know, blah, blah, blah.”

Rob Marsh:  Okay. Then as far as off-boarding goes, what are some of those pieces that you would walk me through?

Charlotte Isaac:  So the first thing that I find a lot of people forget to do is ask for referrals or testimonials, all that kind of stuff. The things that kind of feel awkward to do, but we all know we probably should do. So in an off-boarding process we make sure that we always have something to do that, whether it’s asking for a Google review, or getting people to fill out a feedback form. I find it kind of depends on where you are in your business and what’s actually going to be helpful to you. Making sure that we are tidying up the relationship with a nice little bow and kind of closing the door so that you don’t have a client come back to you months and months later saying, “Hey, we’re just going to tweak this one little page.” They’re probably the two big things that go in there.

Kira Hug:  And when you’re talking about the system, we’re talking about the system and these magic fairies that do all this for us and it sounds amazing, but are you just talking about Dubsado?

Charlotte Isaac:  Dubsado is the primary system I use and it can do it all really and that’s the reason I like it so much.

Kira Hug:  Okay. So can you talk about Dubsado versus other systems that we may be familiar with. Why is Dubsado better? Why should we consider Dubsado?

Charlotte Isaac:  So Dubsado and HoneyBook are probably the two that most people have heard about. They’re kind of the big two out there. Anybody that’s met or has a friend that uses one of them probably knows us a little bit like a cult. People get really, really excited about it. The reason I really, really like Dubsado is because of the automation that it can handle. So all of these little touch points that we’ve spoken about Dubsado can automate. It has proposals built in, contracts built in, emails, a scheduler, questionnaires, all of that kind of good stuff, but the magic cover really is that we can create these things in Dubsado called workflows, which are the automation backbone behind it. And we can take your entire process and automate it as much as we want to whereas other systems like HoneyBook, we can start to automate little parts of it, but not necessarily the whole thing.

Rob Marsh:  Okay. So this is maybe where the magic starts to happen, where I start to get a little bit excited because one of the struggles that I have with systems is that even if I build my systems and my business, I’ve still got to jump in at every step and make sure that something is happening. So let’s go back to that booking a client system. I’ve got the tools, I’ve got a document signing tool, and I’ve got a proposal tool and all of that, but they’re disconnected. And what you’re saying is Dubsado puts them all together or HoneyBook puts them all together and basically what you’re saying is I don’t even have to talk to a client until they show up on the booking call. And I may not have to do anything with the client until I send them my work after that, am I oversimplifying this?

Charlotte Isaac:  Not at all. You’re spot on. That’s exactly right.

Rob Marsh:  Okay. Now I’m like, it’s really hard for me to wrap my brain around and if that’s true, why am I not using Dubsado today?

Charlotte Isaac:  A lot of people find it really scary. They’re kind of like, “Oh, this is going to be a lot of work.” And admittedly, Dubsado can be a lot of work to set it up. That’s why people like me have a job, I guess, but it is one of those things that once it’s set up for you, it truly is these magical little fairies, like you said.

Kira Hug:  So is it something that I can do on my own if I’m like, “Okay, Dubsado is a way to go. I’m going to set it up.” Is that something you recommend? I mean, you also do it for people, but can I do this on my own?

Charlotte Isaac:  Yes. You can, for sure. So I do it for people. I also have a group program where I help people do it, but there’s also people that do it on their own. It probably comes down to how much time you have, how techy you are, how willing you are to kind of get into the trenches of it, I guess, and just figure it out. But definitely both of you would be more than capable and I’m sure everyone listening as well would be.

Kira Hug:  I don’t know about that. I don’t know.

Rob Marsh:  That’s a bigger question than we have time to answer for sure.

Charlotte Isaac:  I’m sure that’s not true.

Rob Marsh:  So Charlotte, again, assuming I’m a copywriter, which of course I am, our listeners are, they’re thinking, “Okay, this sounds like something that I want to do.” Walk us through the differences in price and involvement for engaging in the different ways. So hiring somebody to set all of this up obviously is going to require some of our time, but it’s mostly going to be someone like you versus a DIY. Help us just get a sense of the costs in both time and money of the different options?

Charlotte Isaac:  When you hire someone, you do need to put a little bit of time in. The person that you hire will ask you what you do at the moment, which is really, really important. Whoever comes into your business shouldn’t probably be tell you to completely overhaul everything you do. I always say that you know your business better than anybody else. So we want to look at taking what you’re already doing and just tweaking it and streamlining it to make it better. So your big involvement is handing over what you do now, maybe any templates that you already currently use, you’ve already got a contract template, I’m sure you kind of know how long your process takes, all that kind of stuff. So once the person gets all of that info out of you, they should be able to take it and run with it and build out your Dubsado for you and all of the automations that come with it as well.

Charlotte Isaac:  I charge in Australian dollars, which makes us a little bit tricky, but my project pricing is kind of 6500 Aussie dollars, which I think is around about 4500 US. It changes of course. There’s definitely people who do it with a bit of a less investment, people on the higher side as with anything. So that’s kind of what it looks like to get it done for you. To do it yourself, I would start with the exact same process that somebody doing it for you would start. So walk away from Dubsado or whatever tool you end up using right at your process, kind of make sure that’s all streamlined before you start touching a system.

Then you would spend a bit of time making sure you’ve got all your templates together. So if you need to redo your proposal template, you need to write extra canned emails. That’s one of the big things I find people need to spend time on coming up with all of the emails that they write one by one, the whole way through a client process. So come up with all of the content, I call it, and then spend some time sitting down in Dubsado and doing it. When I work through that process with people in my group program, it’s a six week process and people usually spend like three to six hours a week.

Kira Hug:  Now, can we talk through just best practices around client management? I mean, Charlotte, you’ve looked under the hood of many different businesses and you’ve set up the automation so that everything works seamlessly. But what do you feel is really critical for creating an excellent, not just good, but excellent client experience? What works and what do you stand behind when you’re working with your clients?

Charlotte Isaac:  Absolutely. I think the first big one is communication. I think at times we tend to get caught up by the new clients that are being onboarded and we kind of forget about the clients that are midway through the project or the clients that have just finished with us. So I think it’s important to remember that there’s not really such thing as over-communicating. I mean, of course there is, but none of us are going to ever accidentally do it. So being really, really proactive with our clients about what’s happening, what we might need from them. A tool I like to use is a Services Guide. Do either of you use a services guide or an investment guide or anything like that?

Rob Marsh:  Like a lookbook or something that just sort of walks you through the services that we offer?

Charlotte Isaac:  Absolutely. That kind of thing. So something you’d maybe send to your clients before they’ve even worked with you or your potential clients at that point,.that’s kind of the first stage that I like to start giving my clients a lot of information before they’ve worked with me before they’ve signed on. And I’m really clear about what the process looks like, what I need from them, what the timing looks like, all of that kind of thing. So I guess the first step is we want to be really, really proactive with what we’re communicating with clients and when.

Rob Marsh:  That makes sense. And then what about limits? Because this sounds, the magical fairy thing, very intriguing. What doesn’t it do or where do people get hung up when they try to implement and things aren’t going to work the way that they’re supposed to?

Charlotte Isaac:  I mean, it can’t do your copywriting sadly. It wouldn’t do a very good job if it did, I suppose. The biggest limit, I guess it can come up with, is it can’t listen back from your clients. So if your clients, maybe you’ve sent them an email kind of saying, “Hey, we’re getting started next week. Don’t forget. I need you to fill out this questionnaire or something like that.” What Dubsado can’t do is take that they’ve replied and said, “Hey, my cat is sick. Could we push this back to next week?” That involves a little bit of manual interruption, I guess, to keep things moving.

Kira Hug:  Is that easy to do because I have my processes in place, but sometimes I do like to change things. I’m always tinkering and trying to improve, hopefully improving. So how does that work with a system like Dubsado that’s in place? Is it easy to adapt?

Charlotte Isaac:  Absolutely. So in that example, all we would do is go to what we have told Dubsado is the project start date and we would shift it back a week or shift it back two weeks or whatever that looks like. And then all of the emails and communication that’s built in Dubsado can kind of remap to the right dates based on that start date. Definitely a lot of things are easy to change. There is a magic checkbox in Dubsado that requires approval that we can build into your workflows, which basically says, yes, I want you to automate this, but before you send it out, I want to check it.

So that’s great if you have any emails that need to be a little bit personalized or maybe you work really intensively with your clients and it’s not appropriate at the end of that offboarding sequence to send them an email that feels really, really generic. So there are kind of mechanisms in there that Dubsado can check with you before it sends it out. It’s not just going to be flying out emails left right center and you have no idea what’s going on.

Rob Marsh:  This is probably a dumb question, but it’s mostly because I’ve never used Dubsado, but I have used tools like Client Portal, some of the other tools provided by 47 Signals and those kinds of things. What is the client experience with Dubsado? Is there something that they log into or does it all happen inside their inbox?

Charlotte Isaac:  It depends on how people want to set it up. Dubsado definitely has a client portal feature. Some people choose to use it. Some people are like, “Do you know what? My clients don’t need that. It’s too much. We’ll just kind of ignore it and pretend it doesn’t happen.” It does connect into your inbox. So all of the emails that it’s sending out go straight from Google, if you use Google or whatever you use. So from the client’s experience, it could look exactly the same as if you were just sending it to them from Gmail or you could choose to use the client portal in which case your clients get those emails, but they can also log into the client portal and see all of their invoices and see all of their questionnaires and things like that.

Rob Marsh:  And would you recommend using that as part of making the service better and added value? Or would you say actually that stuff is extra. You don’t have to worry about it? What’s the recommendation there?

Charlotte Isaac:  It really depends on how you work with your clients. So the copywriter I work with uses the client portal and I love that because I’ve probably done about 10 projects with them. So I know everything they’ve ever sent me is in the one place and I can go and find stuff, which is so, so helpful. On the flip side of that, I have clients who maybe their clients are in the SaaS industry or something like that and they’re just going to find a client portal kind of annoying. They just want the bare basics of things. They want a really, really easy process that doesn’t have extra bells and whistles and they just choose to roll with the email so that everything is in one place. And they’re kind of working with the clients the way their clients expect them to be working with.

Kira Hug:  As we work with tools like this one, Dubsado and HoneyBook, and we have so many great tools we can use as service providers to elevate the experience, what do you think will no longer be acceptable as a service provider working in this space, this online space? What do you feel like we should be aware of that it’s not going to look professional moving forward because there’s so many tools we could use to improve our services and the client experience?

Charlotte Isaac:  There’s a couple that jumps out at me. The first one is I really, really hope that under communicating or ghosting kind of becomes a thing of the past. It is so easy now to set up automations that make it easy to look after your clients so that they never feel like you’ve just dropped off the face of the earth. That’s a little bit of a selfish answer. The one that I think people are going to kind of realize there’s a bit of a problem not to have is kind of a whiz-bang proposal that looks really beautiful and professional or looks similar to your website, has great images, has great testimonials, has your contract and your invoice attached. I think that’s something that’s becoming the norm in the industry and it’s quite obvious when you work with people that don’t use that, that maybe they need to systemize a little bit.

Kira Hug:  All right. Let’s cut in here and talk about what stood out from the first half of the conversation with Charlotte. So Rob, for me we’ve talked a lot about OBMs, virtual assistants on the podcast, but hearing Charlotte talk about the differences between an OBM and a VA and a specialist helped me understand it even more. She described the OBM as someone who manages people and the VA as someone who really manages the tasks in a business and the system specialist is someone like Charlotte who will come in for a project to build the thing and then leave. And so that did help me clear it up a little bit more in my mind because we do get asked that question repeatedly. So I’m glad that she clarified that for us.

Rob Marsh:  Yeah. That’s definitely helpful. And I think this is where a lot of us get tripped up when we’re ready to have that first hire in our business, figuring out, who is it that I need to bring in? And we’ve talked with people who say, VA is not always the best place to start. You sometimes want to bring in that OBM because you need somebody who can help you figure out your systems and figure out what software you want to use. And so whether it’s an OBM or system specialist that actually could be a better first hire than a VA and then you bring in a VA to help when all of that stuff is running smoothly.

Kira Hug:  Yes. So what else stood out to you about this part of the conversation?

Rob Marsh:  So I think first of all, we should maybe even back up a little bit and just note that what Charlotte is sharing is applicable to all kinds of tools. She’s specifically talking about Dubsado, but a lot of the stuff that she’s talking about can be done in ClickUp or Trello or HoneyBook or Monday, there’s a dozen other software systems that help do parts and or all of the same stuff. And so while Charlotte is knee deep in Dubsado, maybe even deeper than that, because that’s the system that she uses, the tool that she uses, what she’s sharing in particular about processes systems and the way you run your business can be applied to a whole host of other tools. And so if you’ve been listening and you think, “Ah, I’m not going to use Dubsado.” There’s still a lot here that’s worth listening to.

Kira Hug:  Yeah. And just knowing, I mean, tools will change, but just knowing that this is available to us and a lot of copywriters are opting in and creating these systems, whether they DIY it or they hire someone like Charlotte to create these professional automations so that they can save time. I mean, there’s so many benefits and I feel like Charlotte covered them pretty well, but having a system like this set up from the beginning when a client or a prospect reaches out to you and having it all dialed in is really impressive. And so I think that builds confidence in someone that may want to work with you and may even help them make a decision to work with you and even pay a higher fee because they’re impressed. They trust your system. They can tell that you’ve done this before.

And so I think we’re just seeing more and more copywriters understand the value of a system like this, even though it can be a really big investment to set it up time wise or just financially. I know Charlotte mentioned she charges around 4500 US dollars, so it’s not cheap, but I mean, as she talked through it, this was almost like a training on Dubsado for me listening and I was sold on it. I mean, I think this is something I would definitely consider, especially if I was working with three to four clients at a time, having this in place makes so much sense and could really save you money on hiring a VA or project manager to manage your projects. If you can get this dialed in, you could actually end up saving some money.

Rob Marsh:  Yeah. Charlotte kind of called me out when we were talking about all the various systems and how we might set them up in a tool like Dubsado, when she pointed out really that the systems are all in my head and her job as a system specialist or somebody who might be working as an OBM would be to get those systems out of my head and into a tool that can then just have them be automated. And I think a lot of copywriters, maybe even most copywriters have our systems in our head.

We know what has to happen in each step or we experiment with it a little bit, making a change here or there, but it’s generally the same flow every time. But because it’s in our head, sometimes we miss a step or sometimes it takes a couple of days to get to a step. And that, I think is really where software like this can help because it gives you that prompt, it sends out that automated message, it serves up the proposal or whatever the next step is, it all just happens automatically and you don’t have to rely on your memory to bring it back into the foreground.

Kira Hug: Yeah. And there are cool ways you can leverage it, like with the feedback loop. I really like that she shared the feedback loop where you can start to nudge your clients if they haven’t provided copy feedback within a few days. And that’s something that you just don’t have to think about. I like that you can have prompts and emails going out to ask for referrals and testimonials. I mean, let’s just be honest here, so many of us do not ask for the referral or the testimonial when we wrap up a project and I am guilty of that too. And wouldn’t it be nice if we just had an automated email that went out so we didn’t have to worry about it and we got those referrals, we got those testimonials. So to me, that is actually the biggest benefit is that you can have a system doing what we don’t actually want to do ourselves.

And even she mentioned if you set all this up, you don’t even really have to talk to your client until you have a kickoff call because everything is automated. And I think for many of us introverts that’s appealing. It’s not because we’re a jerk. It’s like, I just don’t want to talk to the person until I really need to jump on an in depth call and have a deep conversation, but until then, I don’t really want to talk to anybody. So this is a great way, especially for introverts to allow us to do our thing and have some space, but also not leave the client hanging.

Rob Marsh:  Yeah. I appreciate how Charlotte made it very clear that this is not something that’s necessarily easy to set up. You can’t just buy a product like Dubsado and it’s going to work. It does take time to figure out what the processes are, to set them up step by step, to put in the templates or the automated messaging, the emails, the contracts, all of that stuff. It does take time and so it may be worthwhile paying a specialist to do it for you, but as you were asking her, it’s something we can do on our own. And the time that will save over the course of 5, 10, 20 clients year to year to year is massive. And instead of doing that work over and over and over or even paying a VA to do that work over and over and over, the system can do it for you.

The other thing that I really appreciated is that, she didn’t say it in these words, but it’s clear that Dubsado is not artificial intelligence. It can’t answer emails back, it can’t predict things that need to happen. And so it’s not like a human being or a human VA who can maybe do some of that stuff or an OBM who maybe can jump into a process if something’s going wrong. But as long as that’s clear and you’re not expecting too much out of a system like that, something like Dubsado or HoneyBook, whatever can be a big benefit for your business.

Kira Hug:  Let’s jump back into the interview with Charlotte to hear about the standard of systems for service providers.

Rob Marsh:  So Charlotte, as you’ve worked with copywriters and I guess, other freelancers as well and you’ve seen the systems that they’ve built, what would you say is kind of the standard, the systems that we ought to be implementing into our business to make sure that from the beginning to the end we’re taking care of our clients, what are those?

Charlotte Isaac:  So these three things, I think are really, really helpful. The first one is a client management system like Dubsado or HoneyBook, whichever one feels good to you and feels like the best way to kind of go in terms of getting it set up. So something to look after all of your client communication, your proposals, your contracts, all of that kind of stuff, of course, invoicing as well.

The second one is a scheduling tool. So most people are already using a scheduling tool. Like I mentioned, Dubsado and HoneyBook now have one built in. So if you’re going to use that client relationship management software, you could shift over your scheduling to that. You could use a separate one, if that feels good, but having something so that your clients don’t need to go back and forward over email with you to choose a time for something.

And then the third one is a project management tool. So Asana, Trello ClickUp, Monday, so many options out there. Pick one that you like, but something to help you keep your client work on track and make sure you don’t miss anything in terms of actually delivering the work.

Kira Hug: And maybe you can share the impact of all this? I mean, why does this all matter? I guess we want to make our clients happy, but if you are able to share any specific examples, whether it’s naming a client or not naming them, just how this can transform a business, especially for a copywriter?

Charlotte Isaac:  Yeah, absolutely. I think the first one you touched on, keeping a client happy is really, really important. There’s a quote from the book, Paul Jarvis, the Company of One, and it’s, customer happiness is the new marketing. And I think that couldn’t be more true. I know Rob, you already said you get a ton of referrals. Kira, I’m sure you are the exact same. In fact, I know people that have referred you.

Kira Hug:  I get less than Rob.

Charlotte Isaac:  Oh, interesting.

Kira Hug:  Less referrals than Rob, yeah.

Rob Marsh:  That can’t possibly be true, but I just keep my clients happy, I guess, is what it comes down to.

Charlotte Isaac:  Yeah, absolutely. And the thing is, Rob, you’re probably working really hard to do that because you can keep your clients happy without systems. It’s just that you’re working really hard to do it. So the next thing that a system gives you is it takes all of that stuff out of your head and moves it into something that just deals with it for you. So you’re kind of programming your own VA when you use a system like Dubsado or HoneyBook you’re saying, “Look, this is what I expect from you. This is the process that I want to take my clients through. You go and manage that, I’m going to dip in with the copywriting and the high level client care, but you just take care of that basic stuff for me.”

So a lot of time back is the big thing, a lot of space-in-your-head back. And one of the examples and this is from one of my copywriter clients, but I won’t name her. She mentioned that it used to take her kind of four or five hours to onboard a new client and it takes her less than 10 minutes for each client now.

Rob Marsh:  Okay. That’s significant. That’s definitely worth considering.

Charlotte Isaac: Definitely.

Rob Marsh:  So I’m curious about your business, Charlotte, how do you use systems in the work that you do in helping others set up their systems?

Charlotte Isaac:  Yeah. So I, of course. I like to walk the walk. I’ve got all of these things set up for myself and I’m such a nerd that I had them set up on day one of my business. Maybe not the right decision, but it felt good and exciting to me. I have a lot of other systems as well around keeping myself and my team on time. That’s probably the other one. I usually recommend people start with something like Dubsado or HoneyBook to at least automate the communication side of things. The next step, another one that I’ve been really focusing on for the last year is working on my ClickUp, which I really, really love.

Kira Hug:  Can you share more about your team? So how many team members, how do you all work together and what does that structure look like so that you aren’t overwhelmed by managing a team?

Charlotte Isaac:  Yeah. It’s going through a little bit of a change at the moment. So it’s influx at the moment. I have one person who works with me. She is still a contractor, but works kind of as a part-time employee. So I’m about to move her into an account manager role and then hire a new person to work through some of the implementation in my business. So, at the moment, she has just kind of, for the last 18 months, been working on inputting things into Dubsado and doing a lot of that kind of technical stuff behind the scenes. That can be quite repetitive once you’ve done this for a while. I’ve been doing it for four years now. So things like putting in canned emails, I don’t need to be doing that. So I have someone to kind of handle all of that kind of stuff and the person I’m looking for now as an account manager, which is kind of exciting.

Rob Marsh:  Yeah. I’m curious more on team systems, because as I think about our business and what Kira and