Please Introduce Yourself

[vbmsolutions 0]

Ok, it's hot and sunny in Central Pennsylvania today so I'm going to "dive" right into this wonderful VANA "pool" and introduce myself.

 

My name is Joanne Kay and I am the owner of VBM Solutions (Virtual Business Management Solutions). I quit my job in December 2006 to start my own business effective January 1, 2007. My target market is small home builders and independent contractors that neither have the skills nor the time to do their administrative work. I have worked in management and executive administrative fields for the profit and not-for-profit sector for over 15 years.

 

I'm married with 2 teenage daughters, yup that's why i don't have a picture yet as I need to cover up my grays!

 

I am orginally from Toronto and a dedicated Timmy's fan (Tim Horton's coffee)

 

This VANA forum has been both fun and valuable. What a great group of encouragers!

 

Talk to you again soon!

Joanne

[Guest]

Welcome Tamara and Joanne.

 

Joanne - I have 2 teenage daughters also (and a teenage son) and am finding more gray hairs everyday.

[Caliber Virtual Services 0]

Hello Everyone!

 

My name is Delilah Smith. I am from the Virginia, Tidewater area. I am married with one adult son.

 

I have been lurking for the past few hours since I found this site. I haven't been able to take my eyes off of it since. I am finding more and more helpful information, suggestions, tips and tricks than I can count. Finally, I have a place where I can start to really put things together regarding my VA business.

 

I have always wanted to start, but never really knew where to go for the basics. I am an organized type of personality and really find checklists, suggestive planning techinques, training seminars, and other fellow VAs who have already experienced this business to be helpful to me.

 

I have also had some strong legal and general secretarial background. I have a AAS degree and several certificates in the clerical, specializing in legal fields.

 

Then I decided I wanted to go into business for myself but wasn't sure contracting clerical services would give me the more immediate income needed at that time. Finally, after years later, I started poking around the internet here and there. I even started a file box of the information I had gathered back then. Thus the interest was sparked once again and here I am.

 

I can't wait to get started putting more and more pieces together to really get my business off to a start. I have been up the past two hours writing up a list of things to do, bookmarking great reference sites, etc. I am so very excited and thankful to be here with the VANA group. Thank you for having me. I look forward to interacting with you all soon.

[pmdost 19]

Glad to see everyone introducing themselves or re-introducing themselves!

[Guest]

Welcome Delilah! I'm glad you found us!

 

Thanks everyone for introducing yourself! Looking forward to meeting the rest of you.

[KateC48 0]

Hello Everyone!

 

My name is Delilah Smith. I am from the Virginia, Tidewater area. I am married with one adult son.

 

I have been lurking for the past few hours since I found this site. I haven't been able to take my eyes off of it since. I am finding more and more helpful information, suggestions, tips and tricks than I can count. Finally, I have a place where I can start to really put things together regarding my VA business.

 

I have always wanted to start, but never really knew where to go for the basics. I am an organized type of personality and really find checklists, suggestive planning techinques, training seminars, and other fellow VAs who have already experienced this business to be helpful to me.

 

I have also had some strong legal and general secretarial background. I have a AAS degree and several certificates in the clerical, specializing in legal fields.

 

Then I decided I wanted to go into business for myself but wasn't sure contracting clerical services would give me the more immediate income needed at that time. Finally, after years later, I started poking around the internet here and there. I even started a file box of the information I had gathered back then. Thus the interest was sparked once again and here I am.

 

I can't wait to get started putting more and more pieces together to really get my business off to a start. I have been up the past two hours writing up a list of things to do, bookmarking great reference sites, etc. I am so very excited and thankful to be here with the VANA group. Thank you for having me. I look forward to interacting with you all soon.

 

Welcome and glad to meet you. I look forward to getting to know people myself. I am very new, and trying to find my little niche.

 

Kate

 

[Guest The Edge VA]

Oh! I missed this topic earlier. So nice to meet some new faces and to find out more about the familiar ones.

 

My name is Ros Null (Ros pronounced RoZ). I am originally from South Africa, met my American husband over the internet while living and working in the Netherlands and relocated to Buffalo, NY after we were married, (and had wasted 10 months waiting for my visa to be approved!) At the end of July my husband Peter, our cat Jackrabbit Slim (Jack) and I are relocating to Austin, TX to join the rest of my husband's family. We hope to buy our first home and fill it with dogs of all shapes and sizes just as soon as we can. (Followed hopefully by a wee sprog or two before I turn 30).

 

I opened my practice in July of 06, officially in August of 06 with company registration etc. I had hoped to continue working the the film industry which is where I had spent a large part of my working life however it is a difficult nut to crack virtually and so I switched to Real Estate. Strangely enough, and with a great deal of thanks to a wonderful client of mine, I ended up with a practice of coach clients and so I adjusted my niche once again in the last few months. Some of the services I offer my coach clients are: newsletter assistance, blog updating, website maintenance (and some basic web design... keyword being BASIC), conferencing, scheduling, shopping carts and autoresponders, event planning, pod casting, call answering and a reminder service. Two of my clients were recently awarded the distinction of Master Certified Coach (MCC) by the ICF and I couldn't be prouder!

 

My current focus is to improve my SEO and to spend more time marketing my business. This is something that I have regrettably let slip while I was building my client base because almost all of my clients have come to me by referral. Some of my recent additions are a blog, a newsletter and a portfolio page on my site, with many more changes coming up before the year is through.

Edited June 26, 2007 by The Edge VA

[Robbie 0]

I figured I might as well jump aboard and re-introduce myself, too.

 

My name is Robbie and I live in Austin, TX (I am a transplant from Honolulu, HI). I am the proud momma of two sons. My oldest is 19 (soon to be 20), and my youngest is 12 (going on 16). I decided a while back to pay an arm and a leg to cover up the gray hair. I am also blessed to have the most fabulous boyfriend in the whole wide world. If it weren't for his constant encourgement, unwavering support and complete confidence in me I don't think I'd be as far in my Virtual Assistant business as I am today.

 

I am the owner of iAssist HR. I opened my virtual doors in May 2007. I am still working in the corporate world as a Sr. HR Specialist and can't wait for the day that I can quit my day job and focus solely on my virtual assistant practice. I have acquired one small client who has been keeping me pretty busy in my evening and weekend hours. My client is a realtor and I am fast becoming very interested in the real estate business.

 

The thing that I love most about being a virtual assistant is the diverse amount of businesses that are out there that can use our services (it definitely fits my ADD personality). I enjoy learning new things and stretching my skills and abilities beyond their limits.

 

When I'm not working (24/7), I enjoy quality time with my family, hanging out with my friends, cooking and grilling (with my Weber charcoal grill...my new favorite thing to try to master) going to the gym, riding my bike, lazin' in the sun at the lake, and once in awhile...sippin' on an ice cold cocktail.

 

I love this forum! I've gotten a lot of helpful information here and look forward to learning more. Ya'll have a great day!

 

 

[judyk 0]

Hi

I'm Judy Kovacevich with Southern Assist, located along the Mississippi Gulf Coast. I have been lurking now for about a month so I'm ready to jump in.

 

I'm in the process of getting my business up and going and hope to have my website and introductory mailing out within the next two weeks. I plan to focus on real estate professionals with a desire to learn other areas of interest too. (Right now I'm a sponge and can't get enough info). I currently work at an elementary school doing the registrations and data management. I plan to return next month to get the school year started again but I hope by January I will have enough clients to allow me to be full time at home.

 

Thanks for the opportunity to dive in, it wasn't so bad. I'll re-introduce myself when I have my website online.

 

 

 

 

 

[Kiwi Virtual Assistant 0]

Hi, I'm Joyce of Kiwi VA Services Limited, based in Auckland, New Zealand. New to VANA & new to VA in general. I'm in the process of writing up my business plan and still to decide a host for my web site. I'm very excited about this venture and feel enthused by the overwhelming support from experienced VA's like Lisa Taliga in Melbourne! I look forward to keeping in contact with all fellow colleagues of the VA world!! By the way, does anyone recommend goddaddy.com as a web & hosting site?! Or can you suggest any other hosting sites? Look forward to hearing from you all soon!!!

[Guest]

Hi, I'm Joyce of Kiwi VA Services Limited, based in Auckland, New Zealand. New to VANA & new to VA in general. I'm in the process of writing up my business plan and still to decide a host for my web site. I'm very excited about this venture and feel enthused by the overwhelming support from experienced VA's like Lisa Taliga in Melbourne! I look forward to keeping in contact with all fellow colleagues of the VA world!! By the way, does anyone recommend goddaddy.com as a web & hosting site?! Or can you suggest any other hosting sites? Look forward to hearing from you all soon!!!

 

Hi Joyce, and welcome to VANA!

 

As far as hosting is concerned, I've heard good things about GoDaddy. You might want to also do a search on the forum for hosting or a similar key word. I did a quick one here and came up with this thread: http://www.mediamage.com/cvaforum/index.ph...&hl=hosting.

 

Hope it helps.

[KatherineW25 0]

This post is for all those VAs who have not introduced themselves yet. Please do! Tell us who you are. It is okay if you haven't started your business yet and are just thinking about it. We still want to meet you. If you don't have a web site yet, that is okay too. If you have been reading posts here for a year and never posted anything, that's okay! But what are you waiting for?

 

If you have a question or some advice to offer, jump right in. You may be the one with the answer to that question.

 

If you are not sure where or how to start. Here is the place. Tell us your name, tell us about your business or about the business you are thinking of starting, tells us something about yourself. Just go for it! This is a supportive group.

 

Hello, my name is Katherine Wade. I am new to this, so I'm not really sure how to start. I live in east TN, and I am very excited about getting started in this venture. I do have a website, www.MKBusinessSolutions.net, which I just set up and went live with last night. I would love to learn more about networking on this site. Hello everyone!!

[kylie@tildavirtual.com.au 5]

Hi everyone, my name is Kylie Short and I am based in Australia.

 

I started my business 34 weeks pregnant with my third child and have just celebrated my 1 year anniversary about a month ago. Virtual Assistance kind of found me and since researching and finding out as much as I could, I decided to run with it to see how I went.

 

Instead of segmenting my target market according to the industry my clients are in, I segmented according to the services I wanted to provide. I network solely online due to my family commitments and as a result my niche appears to be online women business owners.

 

I LOVE what I do and I can't imagine doing anything else.

 

Welcome to the newbies

[Guest]

Hello to everyone! My name is Stacy and I live in the greater Kansas City area. I have 5 children. All girls ranging in age from 30 down to 6. This is due to a yours, mine and ours remarriage. I have a great and very supportive husband. I have been lurking for about a month, just soaking up information, making a few posts here and there, asking questions. I took some time off to read two books on the VA biz. I can't say enough as I got these books as recommendations from people in this forum.

 

My niche is doctor's who travel the world speaking as CE educators in their fields. I already worked for a doctor locally and was his administrative assistant and when I told him that I had run across this VA business info and gathered a lot of information, he stated he would be my first client and then he proceeded to pass my name to other doctor's in his industry, and since then has made connections with the Continuing Education Director of several associations he belongs to and who I have worked with since working for him. This all came about at the end of May and so I am in the startup process and am hoping to have everything up and going by Aug. 1.

 

I worked in the corporate world for many years, from law firms, insurance, staffing agencies, and the medical field. The corporate world was never my cup of tea. I love being available to my family when they need me and yet contributing to the well-being of my family at the same time. The fact that my employer was so open to my proposal for him to become a client and stop having me on his payroll was a HUGE benefit to me and I find myself blessed to have found this venue and having the support of my family to make my dream come true!

 

I look forward to getting to know all of you better. I have no photo at this time, probably more gray than everyone put together!! Have a great day!

 

Stacy

 

[KatherineW25 0]

Hello all!! My name is Katherine and I'm pretty new to this. I posted a blog yesterday inviting people to look at my website and give me some honest feedback. The response was wonderful and very helpful, so thanks to those who answered my plea for help. I did make quite a few changes, hopefully for the better, and would love if some more of you could view my site and give me pointers. It was really good to see how people are willing to help and encourage others on this site. I am very proud to be affiliated with this association, and can't wait to hear from more of you!! I am also offering my services to anyone who might need a little extra help, so if anyone is looking, just let me know! Goodnight all!