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Hey there! Welcome to VAnetworking.com --> The Social Network for Virtual Assistants. I am so excited that you have decided to join the friendliest social network on earth for Virtual Assistants. Let me give you a quick intro of who I am. I am Juli and I have not been in the Virtual Industry that long, (3 years) but by being your moderator, I can relate to some of your challenges that you might possibly face that I might have gone through. I was unemployed looking for way to pay off my student loan debt and how to make money at the same time. I saw an AD on my local TV explaining how to make money online, that educated me a bit on how to make money online but through one of those freelancing sites. I was still not satisfied with only working from that platform so I went on Google and found ways how I could make money online, and this is how I found the forum and joined. Fast forward a year later I have a business in place and I have launched my website. So I have gone through the path that you now are on. Enough about me and more about you! One way to get to know you better on the forum is through your first introduction to us. I will outline some tips on how to get you started on the forum. First you can do a quick introduction about yourself and this can be done by clicking here http://www.vanetwork...al-Busi-f4.html If you are like me and don’t like to talk much about yourself here is a breakdown to use as a guide to ease those introductions jitters: Your Name: Your Website URL (if applicable): Years in Business: Description of your Business, including any specialties: On a more personal note: What City/Town/State/Country are you from?: Are you married? How long?: Any kids and how old? Hobbies & Interests: How did you hear about us? We love to know how you heard about us so please let us know! i.e. Google search (what keywords did you search?), article in magazine (name of mag?), word of mouth (who?), etc. Please feel free to browse around and get to know others. If you have any questions please don't hesitate to private message me or any of the other moderators here or contact us at our help desk Until then, can't wait to see your growth here and your accomplishments. Best wishes.

I just wanted to introduce myself, my name is Maralee and I am very very new to the VA idea. Still going through the free resources available on the site and am getting a TON of information. My poor brain is a little overwhelmed but I am really really wanting to stay home and be able to make my own schedule while having fun and being able to help people. Getting started does anyone have any tips and tricks for free or cheap programs to start out with? As we don't have a ton of money to throw at this, and my hubby is not for sure convinced I will stick with it. Which is kind of fair as I keep getting ideas and run with it for a little bit and then stop So any advice would be so appreciated! Thank you so much!

Here are my answers to your questions: Your Name: Julie Smith Your Website URL (if applicable): https://juliesjoyfulsolutions.wordpress.com/ Years in Business: I started in 2014, haven't had any steady clients as of yet. I was on Upworks and decided it is time to change directions. Description of your Business, including any specialties: I create efficient systems for Realtors and Entrepreneurs to keep them on track with their deadlines while providing quality customer service so they can focus on what's important-- selling and growing! - Empower Realtors and Entrepreneurs by helping you achieve your goals - Assisting you with tasks to help you be more productive - Create solutions to overcome the obstacles you encounter to relieve the stress - Process information through well-honed research to meet timely deadlines I received training as a Transaction Coridonator from a Realtor. When you hire me for all your transactions I will: - Verify that all required signatures and initials are on the contract and addenda. - Verify that all required addenda are included with the contract. - Fill out commission disbursement forms. - Open the file with the escrow or title company…And much more! On a more personal note: What City/Town/State/Country are you from?: Angola, IN USA Are you married? How long?: Not married now, was for about a year. Any kids and how old? I have a son that is 18, 2 daughters a 15 and 9-year-old Hobbies & Interests: I love camping, fishing, and reading How did you hear about us? I found this group a few years ago, and I set business aside for a bit then, I re-discovery it through Kathy Goughenour-Expert VA training program.

Hey we have a great trend going here! Danielle is an Innovator that collaborates with the Maker (me), who collaborates with the Visionary (Tawnya). This is the start of a really creative team!

Thank you so much ladies for the great feedback! In regards to coding, I wanted to learn how to design and build websites so I could do that for others. I've done some searching though after I saw what you said, Tawnya. This is something I definitely don't need to know prior to getting my website live. I'll put that on the back burner for now. Thank you!

Hi all! I just wanted to introduce myself. My name is Adele. I was a VA for years and then went back into working in corporate America after going through a divorce. Life circumstances at the time just called for that kind of change. I was only a VA on a part-time basis and needed to go back to full-time income -- and quickly! Anyhow, fast-forward to the present. I am now happily remarried and in a much better position. I have decided to take the plunge and delve back into my passion. I assist businesses with their HR, recruiting, and SMM needs. I also assist in a variety of other projects when time allows, such as event and meeting planning and trade show coordination.

I'm a retired Quality Assurance Manager who started editing part time (I'm a writer as well) and it just grew into editing, copy editing, proofreading and virtual assistance. I'm only wanting to do this part time, as I am writing novels. But jobs and projects and clients have a way of blossoming! So I network with other freelancers to spread out the work I don't want or can't do. I feel like I have friends all over the world now. Good luck in your business! Pat www.editalley.com www.pathauldren.net www.remotegirlfriday.com

I'm new here too. Welcome.

Welcome to VAnetworking! I agree with Tawnya as to creating graphics to see how long they take you to create so you can build your pricing structure.

I just signed up my first client, very small retainer one hour per day, but i am a firm believer in starting at the bottom work your way up, Super excited........................

Hi Jason, welcome to VAnetworking! Looks like your FB cover photo appeared blurry because you posted the mobile link. I've updated your post for you. As Tawnya said, you'll want to post engaging content consistency on your Facebook Page.

Welcome to the forum Hannah! I agree with the suggestions Tawnya gave. Awaiting on your response to see if their is anything that I can add. All the best.

Welcome to the forum! I understand that at first it can be daunting to find clients. You can visit this link on tips by Tawnya on how to find clients. All the best.

Finding out what motivates me will certainly help me in the long run Solution always exists but we need to find it

Awesome you have Pinterest and Tailwind training. Did you do a training program or just learn under someone else as an apprentice?

Sorry I missed your comment. Where in Idaho are you? We are in the Sandpoint area.

So sorry I missed your comment. I currently offer services for account payables, receivables, customer service, data entry, collections and billing. I just finished training on Pinterest and Tailwind through working as an apprentice. Really excited to implement what I have learned. Hopefully, this will open some doors for me.

Hiya Raychelle and welcome to our network. Looking forward to getting to know you more through your participation here. Enjoy!

Hi Alonda, welcome to VAnetworking! I've spent some time in Arkansas camping over at Lake Ouachita, beautiful area!

I use the WD ones, I own about 5-6 or them. I actually have the 4TB one in my wishlist to order at some point as I want another one. This is the one I buy. I've had no issues with them (am on a Mac). I also own these cases to keep them in for traveling and even just at home so that they don't get damaged. I haven't tried the seagate ones, I'm sure they are fine though too.

Hello. My name is Laweesa McCray and I am seeking advice on becoming a virtual assistant.

Hello everyone! I'm Chuck (Some call me Charles, that's okay too). I am just getting started in the virtual world of assisting as one of those rare males in this profession. I don't have a business URL yet, but I am working diligently to to get that up and going. I have spent the last 20 years helping businesses become better through leading up as an employee, informal business coaching, and advising on system/process implementation to improve different aspects of business. My business is general virtual assistance helping small, medium, and large businesses Maximize the BIG THREE Es of Business, Efficiency, Effectiveness , and Execution! My education is management information systems and psychology. This education coupled with my experience in the military and the business world helps me to assist others accomplish what needs to be done in a technological world where change is the number one crippling factor. I specialize in business systems, social media implementation, web design, and tech support. My wife and I currently live in Vero Beach, Florida. I am originally from Lenoir, North Carolina. We have been married for 26 years and have two kids away at university. Our daughter is studying veterinary medicine at the University of Louisville, and our son is in the masters program for classical vocals and composition at the Boston Conservatory. YES, we are extremely proud of them! Being the nerd that I am, I am actually turning my hobbies into a virtual assistant business. My hobbies are actually web design, social media profile initiation, and business coaching for friends, family, and associates. So, I figured since I do this stuff in my free time, why not go professional and get paid to do it! Like they say, "If you love what you do, you will never work a day in your life." This does lead me to a question though. Has anyone else experienced burn out, or other pitfalls, from the psychological shift in doing something as a hobby but now having the responsibility of getting paid for it? I would love to hear your thought or experiences around this. Please leave a response, because I really don't want to get headed the wrong direction! Thank you all for being here. We can all work together to make one another better! Chuck Kanupp

Pricing can always be a difficult question. In my practice, I charge at an hourly rate. I find the hourly rate model to be flexible enough to suit a diverse set of clients. Perhaps if I had an ongoing relationship with a client and could get a better sense for their specific needs week after week, only then do I think it would be beneficial to set a flat fee arrangement.

Amber that was so so so helpful thank you so much. Amber do you have a link so i can see how your looks and Tawnya thank you so much im going to check hers out now :)

My all time favorite picks are: 1) Project Management - Asana 2) File Sharing - Google Docs 3) Messenger - Skype

I think keep the descriptions simple, don't give them too many options or things to think about. Provide a pay pal buy button under each service description and a call to action like 'download my FREE working with a VA ebook' or "You may also like my book editing services <<click here>>" the link would then lead to the next service description. Do this for all your service options on your home page. Which would have an icon or image for each with short description that opens to a new page with the service details, buy button, freebie ebook and call to action or upsell for another service. >image/ icon >title e.g. transcription services >short dot point description of service >PayPal buy button >link to download ebook >link to another service offering hope that helps amber

Thanks, This is helpful.

The meds thing is OK, after all. Thankfully. I was able to get all of my RXs. They have this thing on the drugstore site, when the Rx is being filled it will often show the price minus insurance, then when it's filled, it shows the co-pay. This always makes me nervous. B/C sometimes it shows your co-pay. So when I see a funny high number I get scared. But it's all good. I will check out the group coaching. I actually had forgotten about that, what with trying to find some income. part-time is all I can manage at the best of times. I also live in a very disruptive environment, noisy neighborhood makes it hard to concentrate for a lot of the time. Some afternoons I have to put earplugs in so that I can think & (try) to block out pounding bass. My current site is by Site Builder. I love it, it's just pricey. But I'm attached to the interface, the current template/design that I have really works for me. Thank you so much for sharing that article with me. I actually wrote an (upcoming) blog post about writing with ADHD. I really need to get my ADHD medication soon so that I can be more in-depth in my research & writing. Oh & I'm not the hyperfocused type, I'm very inattentive & scattered, moving from one thing to another, sort of drifting. Coffee helps, but overall it's very difficult w/o Ritalin. Docs are very wary & hesitant to help me at all. I work best in short bursts.

Hi Danielle, thank you, I have looked at them, even appied to a couple. I've arranged some reviews for pay, but that's not much more than beer money. I've placed some Craigslist ads, and am attending a networking event this week to see if I can make any connections. I tend to do best in-person. Before I got sick, I did really well with interviews, preparations, etc. But the online job seeking world is so much different. I've had to readjust my techniques and parameters many times. Since I don't have any money for anything, not even bills, The Dept. of Ed also took 15% of my check from me, I'm hoping to find something before the month is over.

If you use WordPress.org then you can completely customize your website to how you want it.

Cool! Let us know how you go, Melissa.

Than you, Julian.

Hey there - Do you mean running google drive on the desktop? If so yes, I use it all the time. What specific question do you have about it?

Looks great Melissa!

I like the logo with Tagline from madness to methods. The three colours tie in nicely and I'd recommend creating yourself a brand board in Canva to get idea of the look and feel for your site and marketing going forward. You can save these three colours and the two fonts in Canva for use in all marketing materials like Facebook posts etc. Knowing your brand helps to give you a consistent look and feel which is what I think your looking to achieve with your site.

Hi Nancy, welcome back! I think your website looks great as well! I would just recommend the same things as Tawnya did above.

It's difficult to direct you to specific trainings before learning exactly what the client wants. Let us know how the discovery call goes and maybe I can recommend some training once she says what she needs. Also, congrats!!

Thanks. Will do.

Welcome, Kristin! I am so happy to have you here. I do hope your mom is better now and wishing you all the best as you gain clients.

Do I need to have a license to work as virtual assistant in Kentucky, USA?

Hello, I do provide Transaction Coordination Services, I know this post was a few years ago, but just in case your looking again sometime.

Hi Marie, One service I think would be pretty cool as a package would be this. To extend your webinar package by offering to transcribe or create shownotes out of the content that is created. I know some marketers like James Schramko have very in depth pdfs created from their webinars, with formatting and images + transcribed text.

If I don't have someone to personally recommend to prospect, I tell them to post an RFP at VAnetworking's job board. I explain that it's free to post there as well. I always make sure to use my affiliate link, then I get a $5 referral. I'm not sure of the best way to find VAs to outsource to. I have VAs contact me on my website all the time about working together and I usually take a look at their website to see if its someone I'd be interested in working with. Then I keep their contact info on file with what they do. I've posted RFPs myself and have found a few good connections for outsourcing as well. Maybe we should start a thread in the forum in the VAinsiders area and put our information so we can all learn a bit more about each other. Maybe something like: Name: Contact Email: Website: Who do you work with: Specialties: Or something, and we can create a little database on our VAinsiders Forum. Maybe Tawnya has some ideas on that.

It's been awhile since there has been a new post in this section, so let's get it going again! Whether you are new to graphic design or a veteran, what are your favorite programs and tools? There are SO many programs out there and some are specialized, so go ahead and choose your favorites. I'll go first! 1. Adobe Illustrator - This is by far my favorite program. I use this strictly for logos, icons and creating 2D graphics from scratch. Illustrator is great for creating vector graphics, which will let you retain their size without losing quality. There is still sooo much more I need to learn about it as it's ever changing. 2. Adobe Photoshop - My second favorite program for editing images and enhancing photographs. Auto batch editing in Photoshop is also a dream. You can create all kinds of things in photoshop! 3. Canva - Canva is an awesome alternative and great for businesses. I use canva to make tons of social media graphics, infographics, e-books and more. It's very user friendly and a great starting point if you are new to graphic design. Those are pretty much the only 3 that I use, because I can do everything I need to do in them. There's also InDesign, which is great for posters, e-books and various layouts. I haven't gotten into it much, but it's highly recommended. Let's hear your favorites!

If anyone is wanting to upgrade from the run of the mill email signatures, I recommend WiseStamp It's free and ad free, even gives the option to remove their name and logo if so desired! Also, it allows you to include social media buttons for Twitter, FaceBook, etc, as-well-as your latest blog article! Let me know what you think

I've done something similar with clients in the past. I bluntly asked them, how much could you afford monthly for a Virtual Assistant? Once they gave me the amount I wrote up the best services I'd offer them that would help their business the most that month (give them the best bang for their buck).

In the email I state: Attached please find your invoice for the month of XXX for virtual assistant services. To ensure you hold a spot as a client with us for the upcoming month (and don't go onto our waiting list), payment is appreciated by the 25th so we can schedule our clients accordingly.

I think outsourcing is really a personal choice for everyone and everyone will have different reasons if they would or would not outsource overseas. Neither are right or wrong. No different than some will shop at Walmart and others won't. I have outsourced to Philippines, UK, Australia and India for my clients and for my business and had fantastic results. Wherever I can find the expert they need. For example the guy who maintains our forum is from Nepal and he knows this forum backend stuff inside/out so that is why I outsource to him, not because of where he lives.

Here's my story: One of my former clients (who has since moved into a partnership with two other people & have a full time office staff) used one of the services you mentioned (I won't name which one). They didn't comprehend that there were certain ways you had to do things here. He's local to me, I met him at a networking event, and he had just had a really bad experience with them, and he spent most of the time talking to me about his issues. He told me how much he paid for what he got and I thought, at the time, there's no way to compete with that. Monetarily - if someone's watching the bottom line - you can't. But how you can compete is through SERVICE. Skip ahead 3-4 weeks, I get a frantic call from him (he was not my client at the time). He's flying from Michigan to California to meet with several people. He's a real estate investment advisor, so he meets with people with M.O.N.E.Y. and its very important that things go a certain way. This overseas VA company had done the following: 1. Only allowed him one hour between appointments, in other words: Appointment with Mr. Smith at 10:00 a.m.; appointment with Mr. Jones at 11:00 a.m. And the problem is: Smith and Jones' offices were an hour apart! Leaving no time for travel!! 2. Had scheduled his last meeting almost 2 hours away from the airport, an hour before his flight was to take off. 3. And that last meeting was with people that had major M.O.N.E.Y. Client called me from the airport in Phoenix, clearly distressed. Now remember - he had only met me once. We had talked for about 30-40 minutes, tops, and had exchanged emails a couple of times after that. We had no client-VA relationship at all, hadn't even talked about it, really. He called me because he was trying to start his company on his own, watch his money, and had no support. He had my business card in his pocket from meeting me weeks previous. So I asked that he fax me all of his paperwork - itinerary, phone numbers, anything he had and I told him I'd do what I could to straighten things out. Already long story short: I got all of his meetings fixed & organized the way they need to be. Got him on another flight (which ended up being direct, rather than 2 stops), so he got back home earlier. And I did not charge him for this. He did send me a really wonderful gift basket from Ghiradelli chocolate, and he refers anyone and everyone to me that he meets that could use a VA. We ended up working together for about 6 months until his company was merged with another, and they put an office staff in place. I still see him (and his partners) at functions, and he introduces me as his "Life Saver". So - no, you can't compete with the cheap prices, but you CAN compete with the service.

Whoops! It wasn't Candy B. it was MLZambos. I've reattached the doc to this post. Elevator_Speech_Topic.doc