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How’s Your Hive Buzzing?

I posted this piece to my own blog back in June and never had one comment on it! I was disappointed cause I thought it was a pretty good little post. I would like to share it here because I believe it’s a great analogy.

Enjoy!

Let’s, for a moment, imagine that your business is a beehive and you’re the Queen Bee. After all, the Queen’s the most important person in the hive – her sole job is to lay eggs. Without eggs, there are no bees so nothing else can happen. You are also the most important person in your business – goes without saying if you’re a ‘solo-preneur’. You’re responsible for getting new clients and ensuring all daily operations run smoothly.
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Posted by on October 16, 2008 in All Topics, Deep Thoughts | Comments closed

Freelancer Versus Virtual Assistant: What’s the Difference Anyway?

As an Internet marketing consultant I’ve had the opportunity to work with an array of talented individuals who assign themselves an array of titles, including “virtual assistant” and “freelancer.” Though I’ve never worked with a “freelance” admin assist, I have worked with VAs who proofread and copy edit AND freelancers who proofread and copy edit. I’ve had both good and bad results with each … uh … genre?
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Posted by on October 14, 2008 in All Topics, Partnering Benefits | Comments closed

The Easiest Administrative Task to Delegate…

For anyone looking to add more time to their days (who isn’t?!), partnering with a Virtual Assistant is definitely the way to go.

Before this process starts, the potential client (that would be you) often has a ton of questions about how it all works. There is a lot of information about this in the blog archives here, take a look and see what questions we may have addressed already.
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Posted by on October 9, 2008 in Administrative Services, All Topics | Comments closed

Get Dozens of Skills With One Virtual Assistant

There are so many benefits to working with a Virtual Assistant. One of those is that in most cases you get a lot more brains than one!

No, Virtual Assistants aren’t two-headed creatures, but most are very well connected through the VA networking forums they frequent.

Let me explain.

If you wanted to hire one employee who could maintain your website, manage your bookkeeping, design brochures, draft up sales letters and maintain your filing how much do you suppose you would pay that person if he or she did indeed exist?
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Posted by on October 6, 2008 in Administrative Services, All Topics, Hiring Tips | Comments closed

Aiming High is Important, Recession or Not

A lot of small business owners are no doubt feeling the pinch of looming recession. But apparently so is the demand for outsourced business assistance. Our very own VAinsider Club is proving that economic downturn is no match for a virtual empire of home office entrepreneurs. In just one year 100s of virtual assistants have signed on to an exclusive network of business experts, marketers, speakers and coaches. Not to mention a very active RFP forum.

In a recent press release, our VAnetworking.com founder, Tawnya Sutherland, said this:
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Posted by on September 30, 2008 in All Topics, News | Comments closed

What’s The Worst Question You Can Ask a Virtual Assistant?

Easy…

“Can you send me a resume?”

Even though people ask this question to VAs all the time, as a general group, we don’t like it.

I think it’s because it means we’re being thought of as employees. Remember, administrative assistants don’t get paid very well and often have to take a lot of orders and abuse from bosses. When we leave that world to start our own businesses we want to leave that world far far away! Being asked for a resume is something that happens when you apply for a job, not when someone approaches you looking to hire a contractor.
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Posted by on September 25, 2008 in All Topics, General, Hiring Tips | Comments closed

Make a Plan Before Working With a Virtual Assistant

When you think you’re ready to choose a Virtual Assistant to start taking care of your administrative headaches, there are some things you should do on your end to make things a bit easier for everyone.

The most important thing you can do before you get into a contact with a VA is to clearly lay out everything you would like to delegate so you know what you want done and it will be easier for your VA to dig right in and start working.
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Posted by on September 21, 2008 in Administrative Services, All Topics, Hiring Tips | Comments closed

What Did You Waste Energy On Today?

I’m willing to bet you did at least one thing today that you either rolled your eyes over or had to take a deep breath to get through. Could have been faxing an email, organizing your receipts, typing up a letter or coming up with content for a newsletter. Maybe you’re the type that hates returning phone calls or updating your blog.

How many administrative tasks did you do today that could have been outsourced to a Virtual Assistant? Or more importantly, how many administrative tasks did you not do today that could have been outsourced to a Virtual Assistant?! ;)
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Posted by on September 10, 2008 in Administrative Services, All Topics, Deep Thoughts | Comments closed

Please Don’t Paint Us All With The Same Brush!

Because Virtual Assistants are a relatively new concept to many people with this industry being so young, there are a lot of challenges we face on a pretty regular basis. Let me share a story with you.

I attended a small tradeshow about a year ago which was sponsored by a local business women’s group. I was walking around doing the networking thing when I noticed there was a VA exhibiting. I thought that was very interesting because at that time, I thought I was the only Virtual Assistant in my province. I was looking at her booth waiting to chat with her and couldn’t help but overhear the conversation she was having with another booth visitor. I heard the lady ask her what she did and she went on to tell her that she was a Virtual Assistant.
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Posted by on September 5, 2008 in All Topics, General | Comments closed

VAs and Training

It shouldn’t be up to you to train your VA. The VA you choose to work with should already be experienced in the work you want them to do. That’s one of the big benefits of partnering with a Virtual Assistant.

If you find someone great who hasn’t any experience in the services you need, if it’s specific to your business – a very specialized tool or service, you should expect to pay your VA for training.

If it’s a skill that’s generic that could benefit the VA’s business by being able to offer a new service to other clients, s/he will probably agree to train at no cost.
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Posted by on August 22, 2008 in All Topics, General, Hiring Tips | Comments closed

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