What would it mean to know your customer service inbox was one of your business’s greatest assets?

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What if your business communications honored your boundaries, stood by the value of what you offer, and communicated strength and confidence with kindness — all with ease and simplicity?

  • Would you be more honest about what you are willing and not willing to do? Take more risks in telling the truth to your clients and prospective customers?

  • What if you felt really great about your ability to speak up with kindness and clarity, even when someone is slow to pay your invoice, complains or wants a refund?

  • Would you relax and welcome inquiries, requests, and even uncomfortable emails, because you know you can handle them with calm confidence?

  • Maybe you would just sleep better, knowing there were no lingering emails flagged in the inbox, sitting there because you just don’t know what to say?

Here’s the bottom line: You want to stay present and connected enough to engage in a warm and friendly manner while staying true to your time, boundaries, and worth. But right now, all of that seems out of reach.

When you’ve built a business based on your own unique talents, skills, and personal touches, it’s personal. How could you not take it personally when you are the one putting your heart, soul, and personality into the work; work that’s built on the essence of who you are - and then someone fires off an email that feels like a punch in the gut? How could anyone handle that with detached professionalism?

You can’t go back, but you don’t know how to move forward.

You know that you need some help, but you worry about the cost of taking on an administrative support person or the liability of letting someone else take the mouthpiece for your sweet business. (It takes a lot of trust.) Maybe you’ve even hired a VA or two, with varying degrees of success. You tried to implement a “system” but weren’t even sure how to get started, let alone how to keep it sustainable and on track. So you thought you could just be your own VA to save some cash, but now you’re spread so thin that you can’t focus deeply on anything.

FAQs

  • In 2021 Jess and I entered into a licensing agreement with an attorney who wanted to use the toolkit with her clients, so some of the new scripts were things she and her clients struggled with like: scope creep, clients not working within the contract, etc.

    Most of the changes were updates that Jess and I had always wanted to make and now we had an excuse to do so.

    The language is now more inclusive, less gendered, and ableist, and we made A LOT of changes that softened our approach to saying sorry - particularly as we saw such a change in the tone of the emails we received following all the strife in 2020. Oof, that was such a hard year and everyone had such a shortened fuse (for good reason).

    Everyone required more compassion and grace (ourselves included) so we expanded the sorry section significantly.

    We also decided to offer print versions, there was something uniquely special about holding a physical copy of something you worked so hard on to make both of us smile and say, wow it's a real book Pinocchio. 😉

  • No. We have a discounted option for those who purchased SIWG 1.0. just reach out to me here with your receipt and I’ll send you a special purchase link for $26. (For the digital option only).

    If you received the Say It With Grace as part of a free giveaway (lucky you!) let me know which one and I’ll give you a discounted rate. (For some “giveaways” we were paid per a license agreement, so the discount will vary based on how you received your copy.

  • Yes! Absolutely. And thank you! As long as you’re not considering an exclusive user agreement, we can make something work for you and your clients.

    Just reach out to me here, and in the words of Tim Gunn, we’ll make it work. 😉

  • Well, Darn. Sometimes that happens no matter how much grace we think we’re bringing to the conversation.

    It would depend on your situation and my bandwidth (I do have a full client load) but reach out and let’s discuss your needs.

    We might be able to resolve things with just a few tweaks to your terms and conditions, your checkout page, or a few custom scripts.

    Connect with me here.

Digital Download

Get instant access with our beautiful digital download. Or gift a copy for a friend in need.

Printed Copy

Get a beautifully printed copy lovingly mailed to you. For US orders shipping + handling are included in the price.

  • Stacy K.

    “Not only does Nita have the friendliest and most generous email demeanor, but her ability to triage what's most important was exponentially felt across the entire team. Nita is dependable, cheerful, organized, detail-oriented, and is always thinking about how to improve the customer experience - she was the glue of our small team. How she juggled all of those emails and tasks with a joyful attitude continues to amaze me."

  • Tara M.

    “For over four years, Nita was the head of my customer service, and her work was just amazing. I can honestly say she resolved every customer challenge/problem/unhappiness quickly and completely, in four years. Pretty remarkable.”

Oh, love. We hear you.

Together we, Nita and Jess, have served many full rosters worth of clients as administrative and technical consultants and virtual assistants. Along the way, we encountered nearly every customer service scenario imaginable: from the inboxes of one-woman startups to those of established and celebrity clientele; from emails full of glowing praise and admiration to long diatribes letters full of frustration and requests for refunds.

We and our clients are cut from the same cloth: we are people whose work is infused with love, care, and pride. We don’t know how to work any other way. So it matters greatly to us that our people are treated with professionalism and kindness. 

We had to find a way to get it right, every time.

We learned how best to communicate clearly, kindly, and effectively with our clients, and then we did it for our clients too. It became, well, our superpower. And we’ve heard over and over that the top-notch customer service we provide changes everything.

Every time we write a customer service email, we look for ways to bring in warmth and welcome, responsive listening, tender playfulness, right a relationship, and healthy boundaries.

But more people need loving inbox management than we can support one-on-one.

So we created a way for folks to offer the same quality of service that we would, at a fraction of the cost. It's a toolkit for people like our clients, who need extra support through the hardest spots.

  • Casey S.

    “For those moments when your inbox leaves you utterly speechless or you just can’t seem to find the right words when responding to a tricky email, this Mad Libs-style guide will be your go-to resource. Nita and Jess cover every possible scenario you might encounter in your business and offer templates, suggestions, and examples so you can tackle each one without batting an eye!”

  • Carrie K.

    “Emails from Nita were the first interaction with my business that my clients ever had - and when they got to me, so often they'd comment on how welcome and at ease she made them feel. I'd get thank-you notes from clients for hiring Nita! She is warm and kind and compassionate and that comes across from the first email. It was easy to trust her with anything and know it would be handled beautifully. Her instincts are brilliant. Her heart is big. My email inbox is no longer a thing of overwhelming dread, an explosion of to-dos. And it's glorious! I highly, highly, highly recommend Nita and Jess. Highly.”

Digital Download

Get instant access with our beautiful digital download. Or gift a copy for a friend in need.

Printed Copy

Get a beautifully printed copy lovingly mailed to you. For US orders shipping + handling are included in the price.

It's called Say It With Grace 2.0: a Blueprint for Stellar Client Communications.

It’s a guide for what to say, how to say it, and what to do when customer service gets gnarly. It’s meant to help you shift from overwhelm, frustration, and anxiety to the pride and relief of a healthy inbox - and a healthy relationship with the folks who comprise your business now and in the future.

It includes: 

  • Our time-tested, dynamic, and living formula for crafting emails with heart.

  • A robust set of elegant email templates that you (or your administrative support team) can copy, paste, customize, and use again and again.

  • An exhaustive list of scenarios and emails that most businesses will need at some point. Plan ahead, build them into your service contracts, and create your own email templates to have on hand.

  • Coaching around the most effective ways to keep your customer service pipeline running smoothly.

  • Our Fiasco Prevention Measures, or the best, most proactive ways that smart money avoids trouble in the first place.

  • And, oops, what to do, say, and remember when sh!t hits the fan. (Hint: we called the kit “Say It With Grace” for a reason. You’ll be proud of the way you handled it.)

For The Win: Excellent service. Ease. Simplicity.

From this toolkit, you can copy and paste an email template into a new draft email, make your customizations, and you’re done. In a pinch, or when a crisis hits, you can follow the step-by-step formula to writing an email with heart, knowing that we are the angels on your shoulder helping you to say the hard thing with grace. (Lemme just dust off my halo...)

Say It With Grace 2.0 is a good fit for some folks, and not a great fit for others.

We made this with a certain kind of business owner in mind. Someone…

  • whose work is infused with love, care, and pride, and whose business relies on email communication. Their work and the relationships they create with clients and customers matter to them.

  • who has had the experience of a business email either making their day (walking on sunshine!) or have lost sleep and shed tears over a prickly customer moment.

  • who measures value-added by the time it saves or the revenue it generates.

  • who is willing to take a moment to get present with their customers, what they’re saying and truly wanting.

  • who is looking for a baby step towards hiring someone special to do this for them OR who already has a team in place and wants a consistent voice no matter who is behind the inbox.

Of course, it's not for everyone.

  • The tone of our approach and email templates is warm, affectionate, and reassuring. This isn’t for businesses with a very corporate approach. (Though we’ve been told that it works well for a policy think tank that needed to respond warmly to donors. Just sayin'.)

  • If you’re skittish of heart-centered communication or an occasional well-placed smiley face, this probably won’t resonate. 😊

  • This is definitely not the thing if your communications require an attorney’s oversight. We can’t offer any legal advice, but would be thrilled to recommend someone wonderful.

Digital Download

Get instant access with our beautiful digital download. Or gift a copy for a friend in need.

Printed Copy

Get a beautifully printed copy lovingly mailed to you. For US orders shipping + handling are included in the price.

  • Marianne E.

    “Knowing that my e-course inboxes were handled by Nita and Jess brought me so much relief over the years. I didn’t have to think twice about whether the first lines of communication would help my brand and the trust clients have in me. They just knew what to say. And now, through some magic, they’ve distilled the essence of what they do into a package that others can learn and implement on their own. There are so many years of wisdom, so much experience and practice packed into this toolkit. This is absolutely brilliant, and a generous gift for so many people.

  • Angie M.

    “This is so incredibly awesome I can't even tell you. The design is so gorgeous and I loved every word written in there. It is so spot on for what I do and what so many other small business owners need. I wish I’d had this after my son was born.  I couldn’t get a handle on the emails that came in while I was on maternity leave. But now that I’ve got it, I’m using the templates and - damn - I’ll never go back."

FAQs

  • In 2021 Jess and I entered into a licensing agreement with an attorney who wanted to use the toolkit with her clients, so some of the new scripts were things she and her clients struggled with like: scope creep, clients not working within the contract, etc.

    Most of the changes were updates that Jess and I had always wanted to make and now we had an excuse to do so.

    The language is now more inclusive, less gendered, and ableist, and we made A LOT of changes that softened our approach to saying sorry - particularly as we saw such a change in the tone of the emails we received following all the strife in 2020. Oof, that was such a hard year and everyone had such a shortened fuse (for good reason).

    Everyone required more compassion and grace (ourselves included) so we expanded the sorry section significantly.

    We also decided to offer print versions, there was something uniquely special about holding a physical copy of something you worked so hard on to make both of us smile and say, wow it's a real book Pinocchio. 😉

  • No. We have a discounted option for those who purchased SIWG 1.0. just reach out to me here with your receipt and I’ll send you a special purchase link for $26. (For the digital option only).

    If you received the Say It With Grace as part of a free giveaway (lucky you!) let me know which one and I’ll give you a discounted rate. (For some “giveaways” we were paid per a license agreement, so the discount will vary based on how you received your copy.

  • Yes! Absolutely. And thank you! As long as you’re not considering an exclusive user agreement, we can make something work for you and your clients.

    Just reach out to me here, and in the words of Tim Gunn, we’ll make it work. 😉

  • Well, Darn. Sometimes that happens no matter how much grace we think we’re bringing to the conversation.

    It would depend on your situation and my bandwidth (I do have a full client load) but reach out and let’s discuss your needs.

    We might be able to resolve things with just a few tweaks to your terms and conditions, your checkout page, or a few custom scripts.

    Connect with me here.

Meet the Authors of Say It With Grace