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I'm sorry, for some reason I didn't see this before now. Yes, I used Canva. I'm quite enjoying Canva, although I still think Photoshop is better. There are some things you just can't do in Canva.

Hello Danielle, Thank you, it works perfectly the way the video shows.

I am definitely backing away from this for now. I need to earn some real wages first. This is something I could come back to but honestly I really hate MLM type stuff. According to them I can earn a lot, as long as those I recruit don't surpass my level. I've never been very good at getting ahead w/stuff like that anyway. I'm going to reach out to some people I know. I also made some flyers to put up wherever I can. So hopefully I'll find some real clients/work soon. I'll be posting & writing new posts for my blog as well.

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, (1 year) 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 am about to launch 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.

What do you think?

Thank you, Amber. It does help.

Site Builder is where my website is. And I really love it. So, while I can't use the images from there some place else, it suits me for now. The customization is amazing for free. I've got exactly what I need. I've done a lot of comparison. And some of the cheapest sites have poor customer service, some of the more high-end ones are too expensive, and I just can't stand WordPress. I know lots of people find it useful & simple. But I can't customize it the way that I want, not with the free version. So I've found what makes me comfortable. I need to be able to manage, maintain, and also not be frustrated w/the design. I can't be productive if I'm sitting for an hour trying to figure out how to get things to look the way I want them to. I don't like tons of time spent "troubleshooting". It's a serious drain on my energy.

Thank you Marco. But I find a big differences between the U.S. and Spanish markets.

Hey Brittany - great start on your site and congrats on having it live! Since your site is very white, I'd definitely 2 colors that you want to go with your brand and have those pop. Since you have pink in your logo, definitely go with that and then one more to really make things stand out. I think it will liven it up a bit. Since it looks like you are a solo VA, I would change some of the wording to "me" or "I". You kind of have both singular and plural and it can be confusing to users. So it's better to stick with one or the other. If you are the only person people will be dealing with, then just go with that. And lastly, I'd add a picture of you - it makes it more personable and people can relate more to someone they can "look in the eye". Good luck!

Hello, I hate to admit this but I have been a VA insider since June and have yet to start my business. Part of the reason is that I stand in my own way and overthink things but the other part is feeling really lost on where to start. I cannot purchase the VAC program at this time which I know would help me. Where should I begin in VA insiders and VA networking to actually execute steps on starting my business?

Hello Everybody, I volunteer for a very low budget 501(c)3. Hightail used to allow us to mail out audio tapes to 350 people at no charge. They have recently changed their rules. They still allow us to send out as many audio tapes as we please, but to a maximum of 10 people at no charge. Is there anyone out there that have a recommendation of a low cost service. or on that doesn't charge at all? The problem is that these are webinars that go about an hour an a half. They are huge files. Mary PS is there another area I could have posted this? Suggestions welcome!!! Mary

Hello! My name is Jesica. I'm a 38 years old Spanish woman currently based in Lisbon, Portugal. I've recently joined this group because, after several years' experience in the Customer service & Service Delivery in different countries, I've decided to pursue my dream of traveling the world while working remotely. I don't have children and my partner is a traveler by nature, living around the world working with his paraglider. I also speak 4 languages perfectly and I've lived for quite a few years in 3 different countries (Ireland, the US, and Portugal). Day by day, I feel more passionate about this new profession, wanting to learn more and more about this business, enabling my organizational, practical and communication skills to thrive and the most important thing: be part of this VA community. Regards, Jess

I have been following up with two emails instead of three. I am unsure how to remove my emails from potential clients spam folders. I do not think I have an email campaign as I am responding to RFPs. I hope this is making sense

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 :)

I highly recommend Lastpass and it's free

Hi and welcome to our network! You have great experience behind your belt and you should do well in this career as a freelancer/VA. Congrats on almost getting your website finished as that is a huge accomplishment in the beginning stages. Pat yourself on the back! I hear you about the roller coaster of emotions you are going through right now. We never stop worrying about our babes right? Hunting scorpions, now that's a first I've ever heard anyone doing here, ugh...I am not a bug fun so wouldn't have fun doing that HAHA! Enjoy the boards!

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

Yes, they have a great deal right now, hoping to get in on that before it goes away. I was thinking more long-term, hopefully by then I'll be earning money & can take the increase in price.

Thanks, This is helpful.

Hello everyone, my name is Layla and I've been serious about freelance work for about 3 years now. I have a disability so things have been a bit bumpy for me. My landlord just told me that the rent will increase next month. So I have to get on task, and stay on task. The Goth Writer Here's my website, still free for now, so it takes a moment to load. I also have a blog, with the same name. I love writing, write fiction, primarily supernatural & Sci-Fi, poetry, and blogging of course. I'm divorced, childfree, and have one cat who is about 5 years old. I love Goth subculture, clothes, & music. I don't get dressed up as often as I'd like, or as much as I used to when I frequented clubs. I like to watch Sci-Fi & supernatural TV shows & read books. I'm hoping to find something relatively long-term & steady soon. I hope that I've answered all the basic questions. If anyone would like to know more, please send me a message. I look forward to interacting with all of you.

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.

Thanks for the article for putting zoom recordings onto Facebook live shows. I will be reading that one soon.

My situation is similar. I started back in 2016, then had a long hiatus, due to my illness. I'm in a rush now, my head is buzzing with business ideas, but if I don't make money soon, I don't know how I'm going to make it. My landlord just raised my rent, so the pressure makes my ADHD brain even more scattered. It can be very difficult to prioritize & focus

Hello, I was wondering, what would you say I must have already and put together before I launch my business. And what are some things, I can wait until right after launch. Thank you!

Hi Jullian, You will love our little family of virtual assistants. This is the best positive group to be part of. Thought I would answer your questions. Your Name: Marie Mason Your Website URL: www.cmvirtualassistantagency.org Years in Business: 1 Year Description of your Business, including any specialties: Our premier agency serves coaches and speakers by providing an event team to manage your webinar so you can focus on sharing your message. Services for your event include management, marketing, video production, and bookkeeping. On a more personal note: What City/Town/State/Country are you from?: Charlottesville, VA., USA Are you married? How long?: Married 16 years to my best friend. Any kids and how old? I have one son age 13 years old, and he is a boy. He is smart, funny and a gifted and talented young man. Can you tell he is my pride and joy? Hobbies & Interests: Baking, especially beg for more brownies. dancing gardening knitting Playing TCG games like Pokemon cards How did you hear about us? Kathy Goughenour in January/February 2018.

Cool! Let us know how you go, Melissa.

Welcome, Delia! Hope you get lots of great ideas from the forum and resources.

Than you, Julian.

Hi Melissa, I think it looks great! The only thing I'd recommend is maybe have "FONTS" and "IMAGES" stand out more, like maybe make them capital to really help separate the sections. And I'd get rid of the color name and just leave the hex codes to make it a bit neater. Then you can align the text neatly. Hope that helps! Love the logo. Cheers,

Looks great Melissa!

Hi Everyone, I wanted to very briefly introduce myself and my services. I am from London (UK) and recently moved to the sunny island of Barbados where I will be working in a virtual/remote capacity. I have in excess of 15 years' experience in administration, event management and logistics, acquired in London, Europe and the Caribbean. I have worked as an Administrator, Personal Assistant, Project Support, Event Manager, Marketing Coordinator and Logistics Manager, in a number of sectors, to include; Investment Banking (10 years), Agency, Retail and Real Estate. I am offering services as a VA and also Virtual Property Management for vacation rental homes. I am new to the VA scene, but have been working as a Virtual Property Manager for 10+ years, as a sideline. On the property management side, I have a few clients, but of course welcome more . On the VA side, I am starting from ground zero. It seems like quite a long and tough process to get going in the VA world, and I am particularly finding that there is a strong bias for people who are based in the USA and that anyone considering a VA outside of the US is looking for cheap labor in Asia. So, I have taken everyone's advice and started reaching out to previous business contacts to spread the word about my services. Thanks for taking the time to read my post and I wish all the VAs in this group every success. Keisha KW Empire Limited www.kw-empire.weebly.com

Thank you so much. that helped a lot. and if I remember correctly, you said most clients do not like retainer pricing right?

I truly haven't decided. I like keeping some of it, but the format of the site needs to change. I really don't like 1and1. The only way I can have a staging site is if I use managed wordpress. I disabled that function because I could install cache mangers or security using managed. I'll have to do this the long way.

Here's a video to show you how to access the freebies: Let me know if that works for you.

Thank you Tawnya.

Hello everyone My name is Afshan Ahmad and I'm a full time mummy. I have previously worked in a solicitor's office and for a bank for 4 years. After being full time stay at home mum for 4 years I now want to get back into working and focusing on my career alongside my family. Therefore, im interested in setting up my VA business from home and using my previous skills and experiences to get started. I would love if you could share your experience of being a VA please especially mummies. How do you manage with children especially during school holidays or your child is off for some other reason and you have work, meetings etc scheduled.. Thank you very much. Afshan

Hello All, I owned Norrell's Virtual Assistance back in 2004-2006 at which time life threw me a whirlwind and landed me in Germany upside down in a hospital bed. I closed my doors due to illness and time/language constraints. Fast forward to present time, I have time on my hands and in a small college town where jobs are far and few between, my skills need to be put to work. I am working to get my business off the ground floor which isn't easy days, especially being introverted. Any tips on where to start and how to jump into this cold bath water. I must say that I'm nervous, older, and wiser now. With these put together along with my General Administrative skills, I am looking to jump in with both feet.

Great start on your website, pat yourself on the back!!! Our website is always a work in progress as you will soon find out. As for some constructive feedback... 1. I love your logo at the top left. See if you can remove the words on the right of it in black as it is redundant. You only need your business name once. Maybe you could put a nice photo there instead to represent your business. 2. There seems to be wasted white space to the right of all your pages (almost like a column not be used). Maybe see if you can extend your copy to use all the space as that will bring more of your copy above the fold. 3. I'd add some visuals (images/pics) to your website too as this helps warm up a webpage and make it more welcoming for visitors. Or videos too if you are more creative. 4. For credibility/trust since you are a VAinsider you could add our logo to your page (use your affiliate link if you do). I also see you are a member of IVAA so add their logo too. 5. On your services page I would do a call to action (either paypal buttons to buy your services or a link to email you about them). Great job and look forward to seeing it grow with your business.

Congratulations on the launch Brittany! Will you be able to attend this week's VAinsider call? We can do a review of your site on the call if you'd like. Virtual Assistance is a great career for military spouses. What branch are you in? On your home page, I recommend switching around the 2 top headings. It's always best to have "how you can help" a client at the very top. You want them to see how you can help them right away, stress those pain points. Will you be setting up social networks as well? I didn't see any listed yet, was going to follow you. Hopefully you can attend our next call. Let me know if you can't and I'll put a note to get Tawnya to review it even if you aren't there.

Let us know when you publish it live and we can take a look. The chances of a potential client finding it right away are slim so I wouldn't worry about it being online.

If Zoom works for you use Zoom! Here's an article I found using zoom to put onto Facebook Live I used BeLive for my Facebook Lives.

Thank you, Tawnya, I think the interviews you did on Facebook live really helped inspire me. That and I had several speakers encourage me to do them. Every time I did a Facebook live it flopped. I have zoom and I don't know how to go onto Facebook live with zoom. Any ideas?

Hi TJ and welcome! So looking forward to getting to know you and seeing your business grow in the future. Enjoy the archives and if you have any questions, just ask

Hi TJ, welcome to VAnetworking! Sorry for the delay in welcoming you. We just wrapped up our week-long conference so am finally catching up at the forum. Let us know if you have any questions about starting up.

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.

I know that some freelancers charge for words and or by content. So for example per word could start at.50 or $1 as an example or for the whole content at 1000 words $50.

Thats awesome! I started on a freelancing platform, was a bit frustrated with the limitation there so I started my business on my own.

Julian, I'm so thrilled to have you as a Moderator with us. Your cheerful and giving nature will really benefit the members in this forum and make them feel right at home. I'm truly looking forward to your business flourishing over the next year and thank you again! Tawnya

Hi Theresa, welcome to the forum! There are some amazingly helpful people and resources here - I'm sure you'll learn everything you need to know as long as you have the time to take it all in. It can be overwhelming at first, but I promise it's not only fun it's worth it. ------------------------------------- When you ask about other ways to network, are there ways you have tried already or are you completely new to networking? I'm guessing you've told at least one friend or family member you're going to start a business and work from home...so you did network with at least one person. Unless your business is a secret (I've seen it happen) in which case you may not have networked at all. The best way to start networking is to work out what you will say when people ask you: What do you do?With this question, what you want to communicate is some of your services. Try to figure out what the other person does before they ask you this and you can tailor your answer to the needs of that person. If you have never networked before you may want to put together an elevator speech. You can find more about elevator speeches in this thread (including a super-helpful fill in word document from Candy B.) What are your rates? Right after you talk about what you do there are some people that want to dive right into the rate discussion. Don't let them. Tell them your rates or packages vary depending on the services required and that you'd love to set up a time to talk further so you can see if you can help them and then you'd be happy to provide them a rate. Unless you have time to educate the potential client about rates and how $30 is not expensive right there at the networking event, you're going to want to save the discussion for a later time. How long have you been in business?Especially for new business owners, you do not want to answer this with a perky, "I've been in business a week and a half!" That doesn't build trust or make the potential client feel all warm and snuggly. Respond that you have been in the secretarial industry for x number of years and it was a natural transition to do it for yourself rather than someone else. This showcases your experience, not when you applied for your business license. Can you do X for me? Sometimes people will ask you on the spot if you know how to do something. Be careful, because you want to make sure you aren't getting sucked into giving free advice they can then go home and tell a cousin, friend, or mom and have them do the work instead of you. Be friendly and helpful, but don't give away the farm. Oh, and if you don't know how to do what they're asking, never just say "No." That shuts down the relationship. Tell them you don't take care of that but you know someone that does and you'd be happy to provide a referral. Then they will see it as a favor and it gives you a chance to follow up with them to see if they need your services. (If you don't know someone to refer them to, come to VANA and ask around, we have people that can do just about anything between all 8,500+ of us!) While these may be the most popular questions that pop up at networking events, they are certainly not the only questions that arise. As you become more confident talking about your business you will get so that you know what people are asking for and be able to answer, but the only way to get to that point of comfort is through practice. Lots of practice. As for the car wrap, I've never met anyone that got a client from car wrap...people just don't make split decisions about outsourcing secretarial work when they're driving down the road and stop at a red light. At least, not in my experience. If anyone has experienced anything different I'm sure they'll let you know!! Hope this helps. Also check out the links in my signature line to get some helpful starter tips on how to use the forum! You're going to have a blast here, just get ready and hang on for the ride!