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Business Management Time Management Transition Virtual Assistant

Transition from the Corporate Office to Your Office

Aspiring entrepreneurs dream of the time when they can tell the boss “See Ya!” and start working in their PJs. Working from home is definitely a relief from the commute, stress and politics of the office. You have your freedom to call the shots and do things your own way.     Continue Reading>>

Marketing Resources Virtual Assistant

How to Find Your First Ideal Client

This is the question that plagues all virtual assistants regardless of how long they’ve been in business. Clients are our lifeblood. But you don’t want to be so anxious for business that you will take on just anyone as a client. You need to have standards for what you will and won’t put up with in a client.

Virtual assistants have to be proactive about finding and acquiring these ideal new clients. Thanks to the Internet, prospecting for clients has become easier in regards to your ability to reach more people in a shorter amount of time. But the basic business practices that apply in the brick and mortar world still apply.

There are three ways to grow you business, online or offline. And they are:    Continue Reading>>

Marketing Virtual Assistant

Turning Your Website Into A Client Attractive Marketing Tool

Smart virtual assistants recognize the power the Internet has to build their reputation and bring new clients to their doors. We often invest money in a beautiful site, launch it and expect to be flooded with new clients. Unfortunately, they don’t usually come. A beautiful web design and catchy business name is not enough to attract clients anymore. Continue Reading>>

Business Management

Why Smart Virtual Assistants Create Systems

Virtual assistants are gifted professionals who can typically organize and run any business their clients hand to them. But when it comes to being organizing and running their own businesses, that’s more of a challenge. When you’re wearing multiple hats it is easy to put off creating our own systems.

A smart virtual assistant’s business should strive to run as smoothly as their local 5-start restaurant. At anytime you should be able to add a new client to your workload and not miss a beat in your productivity and service standards.

Creating and documenting your business procedures can be done quickly and easily if you take a few steps. And thanks to technology, we can create our systems plan in a variety of ways. Here are three steps to get you started:

  1. Gather Your Information. This step is quite challenging for many because it means collecting all of the information you have previously stored in your brain (and all over your office) into one specific document. Your goal is to record your daily business routine to paper. Be sue that it includes all passwords, resources, the web addresses, phone numbers, contact information, etc.
  2. Create a Video Record. In addition to recording your information on paper creating a video tutorial where you explain and describe exactly what you’re doing and why you are doing it. You can use Camtasia or its open source counterpart CamStudio to complete this step. The benefit of the video is that you’ll be able to share them with future contractors or employees.
  3. Monitor Your Results. This step involves paying attention to your business. For example, let’s say when you began your virtual assistance business you were using Excel to keep track of your accounting. But now you have more clients and Excel is becoming cumbersome. So you decide to try a program like FreshBooks. So you’d take a moment to compare how much time you are saving (or losing) with your newly proposed accounting system. Once you’ve examined your experience you would update your systems document.

Business systems can be broken down into three words: Plan – Do – Review.

  • Plan out how you want you business to run.
  • Do what your systems plan outlines; don’t improvise or change anything until you get to the next step which is to Review.
  • Review if the way that you’re working is the most effective way to get business done and if not, make adjustments as necessary. By repeating these steps you’re well on your way to a well-run business organization.

Time Management

Achieving Goals Mindset Virtual Assistant

Overcoming the Challenges Every Virtual Assistant Faces

Being a virtual assistant can trigger many fears that you may not have even known existed before. You know that you have many talents and a lot to offer your clients. Nevertheless, it’s not an easy job to keep your confidence up while dealing with the realities of marketing your services and being your own money manager. In order to reach your goals of profitability and success you have to develop the proper mindset.

One big issue that comes up in our business is the one of how to get and stay profitable. Women, especially have issues with this idea of profitability. We tend to be hard workers with a passion for what we do and deliver an excellent product to our clients. However, we don’t always “own our value” in the marketplace. What does that mean? “Owning your value” in the marketplace means charging, receiving money, and asking for money.

Another is the fear of standing out. How many of us really feel comfortable standing up in front of people and saying, “You know what? I am awesome at what I do.” For many even the thought of saying those words might make you squirm. It could be because doing so triggers a lot of old baggage that we may have picked up as we were growing up about being modest and not acknowledging our accomplishments.

As with all fears (False Evidence Appearing Real), these limiting beliefs can be conquered by taking advantage of the many resources available. Some of these include:     Continue Reading>>