Can I share a secret with you?
The past month has been a complete whirlwind.
I just finished up a monthlong sprint in Seth Godin’s altMBA program.
It was 31 days of reading books and articles, watching videos, listening to audios, writing projects, looking at new ways of thinking, thinking about at new ways of thinking, group learning sessions and projects. (I’ll tell you all about it soon.)
It was A LOT to say the least. That’s why the program is called a sprint – it’s not something that you do long term.
During this time though, I didn’t stop working with clients… I actually continued to work with each one of them.
Mind if I tell you another secret?
I had help in keeping things on the rails, both my clients’ and my businesses full steam ahead – Voxer.
Voxer is an incredible walkie-talkie style app that allows you to communicate with people all over the world, through voice and text messages. And there’s also fun emojis and gifs to share, too.
You use it on your mobile device or in a computer browser.
So why not just connect through my regular phone number?
Because my client teams are based across the globe, on different international phone carrier networks, so Voxer allows us to avoid long-distance charges.
Plus, it’s an added boundary between business life and personal life, and you know me, I love a solid, enforceable boundary to protect my time.
You could use this app with a client, to provide support outside of the 1:1 sessions. It allows you to stay connected without having to give out your personal phone number.
So, back to why Voxer is so fantastic…
I let my clients know about the program in advance, as I figured my usual routine would change slightly. 20-25 extra hours of work a week will do that to you.
My thinking was that I might not be as accessible via email during my usual hours and I didn’t want to become the bottleneck for projects moving forward.
Voxer allowed for quick messages to be exchanged, so that the momentum wasn’t slowed.
Team members could quickly send over a question or thought and I would typically get back to her within an hour or two.
All without slowing my workflow or theirs.
On one client team, the assistant and I sent vox messages back and forth at least a few times a week. If a question came up, like about what to do with a client process, instead of sending an email to me and waiting until the next day for a response. She could send a 20-30 second message and get a quick 10 second message back that same day, typically within a few hours.
On another team, it allowed us to talk things out without having to find a mutually-fitting time on both of our calendars. Since this team is made up of coaches and we work together in a large group program, we often times need to talk through next steps in the program, like what challenge to release for the following week or what type of video we want to record for the clients. With Voxer, it sped up that conversation and made it convenient for us to all get on the same page, in almost real time.
On all of my teams, it’s been one of the top drivers for reinforcing a team atmosphere, even though we’re based all over the globe. In this one app, we’re able to come together and talk things out.
I’ve actually had full Voxer conversations with team members while on a walk with my dogs.
With the mobile device app, you can also listen to messages in double and triple time, which doesn’t sound like anything special, but what I’ve come to realize is that we speak slower than we’re able to listen to an audio note. So this feature cuts down on the time it takes to listen to a message. So cool, right?!?
Voxer has various pricing levels, from free up to $6.25/month/user for larger teams. I find the free version is more than adequate for how I use it.
The Pro level does allow for some nifty features though, like the voice-to-text transcription, unlimited message storage and the ability to recall messages.
Yep, Voxer is a top tool to have in your business to speed up conversations that might have lingered a little bit longer because context gets lost in the written format of email.
It helps to uphold the team atmosphere and connection we strive for on our virtual teams and worlds, when working with people that are based hundreds or thousands of miles away.
Even though the monthlong sprint is over, Voxer will stick around as a mainstay in the pieces of tech that helps my business work.
What about you? Are you using Voxer? How do you use it to drive your business forward?
Photo by Brooke Cagle on Unsplash