Virtual Assistant – THE Blog About Our Industry

About the Virtual Assistant industry for VAs and for clients

Category Archives: Networking Tools

New Virtual Assistant Forum

Over the past month I’ve been setting up a new board forum for Virtual Assistants. While it has been primarily built with ACS members in mind, there is a portion of the forum that is open to any and all VAs.  It is the VA Directory Forum and you are invited to come and check it out.  While the membership and number of posts are low there currently, I expect it will grow quite quickly once the word is out.

We have an active forum at yahoogroups (with over 1400 members) but there are some who prefer the board style of forum and with social media gaining an ever increasing hold on the web, this board forum is closer to that style, providing the opportunity for you to load your photo so other members of the forum can get to know you face-to-face, share your social media links in your board profile and follow the thread of each discussion in its entirety, rather than through a mix of emails like the email style of forums.

For those who are members of “A Clayton’s Secretary” (ACS) there is a section that is specifically for them and their membership of the forum is marked accordingly.  We also have a section for VA Trainer students and past students who can discuss the course.  Why not drop in for a visit?  VirtualAssistantsGroup

Being a VA does not mean working home alone

I saw an interesting ‘side’ comment from a VA at one of the VA networks this morning.  She’d commented about how unselfish and sharing the VA community has been to her and that although she works at home alone, as we all do, she felt she had a number of allies to call upon. And she is right about that.

Working at home alone day in and day out does require commitment and a resolve to manage on your own.  Many don’t succeed at this.  They end up suffering from feelings of isolation and depression and crave the company of others on a day-to-day basis.  They leave their VA businesses and return to a fulltime job because of this.

I’d mentioned in recent posts about the value of networking outside the home to help gain resources for your Virtual Assistant business as well as gaining new clients.  But there is another benefit – that regular face-to-face contact with others which can help alleviate the feelings of ‘aloneness’.  Getting outside your four walls on a regular basis is important – if not just for your own physical health but for your mental well being too.

However, when you are working at home there are other things you can do to help you not feel so alone. I have the radio on in the background all day long – it’s just nice having voices and music there behind me, although not directly interacting with me.  It gives me a sense of comfort.

And then enter the VA networks and forums. There are many online these days and they all have their own culture and way of operating.  Below I list those that I belong to and I encourage you to visit, explore and join.  Note – the forums are free to join, but the networks usually do have a membership fee.  One provides companionship and the ability to share and learn information, the other provides you, the VA, with services and benefits to help you with your business.

A Clayton’s Secretary (VA Directory)
Forum connected: Virtual Assistants International Group (VAIG @ yahoogroups.com)

Australian Virtual Business Network (AVBN) and forum

Home Secretarial Services and forum

International Virtual Assistants Association (IVAA)

VANetworking (they have a membership network and forum)

Virtual Assistant Forums

Virtual Assistants @ yahoogroups

Some of the above also have LinkedIn discussion forums as well.  So, as a Virtual Assistant, working in a home office, there is no need for you to feel alone and unconnected – join a VA forum or two or three and learn about the networks that are connected to some of them and join those too!  You’ll find a vibrant helping and friendly community available to you 24/7.

Twitter for Virtual Assistants webinar

If you’ve been wondering whether or not to provide social media services for your clients and where to begin, then this webinar will be very timely for you.

I met Keith Keller at a recent Networking World event and we found a perfect synergy with what he does and what I do.  I’ve been assisting clients with Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter for sometime and am well aware of the challenges clients have with respect to not just understanding how social media can help their businesses, but also how to find time to do it all. Enter the Virtual Assistant.

When Keith was presenting how to use Twitter for business the information he gave excited me – I could see a lot more potential growth for not only my own Twitter account but for that of my clients.  However, when the audience started to call out questions I got even more excited.  You see, we (Virtual Assistants) were the missing link for Keith’s clients.  People were asking if he could help them set up their accounts and how are they supposed to find time to tweet throughout the day or watch what’s being said on Twitter?  I responded with ‘that’s what VAs are for’ and got Keith’s attention.

We had a chat after his session and found that a working relationship would indeed be ideal for Keith and myself.  He can teach people how to use Twitter and we (VAs) can assist them in the daily use of it.

Enter the “Twitter 4 VAs” webinar which takes place on 27th of this month.  So, what are you waiting for?  Why not book now while I have your attention?  Click here for more details.

Twitter 4 VAs

Networking is such a useful thing to do. Less than two weeks ago I attended the 90 Day Networking Event in Melbourne, being held by Networking World. I met quite a few people (there were over 150 in attendance) and have connected with some of them since.

One of these people is Keith Keller, whom I like to nickname “Mr Twitter”. Keith is a Global Social Media Coach who focuses entirely on Twitter. He teaches you how to get the best out of your Twitter experience and runs sessions called Twitter 101, Twitter Kickstart and Twitter Intensive.

He teaches our (the VA industry ‘our’) potential client base how Twitter will benefit them and how to make use of it. What he doesn’t do is set up Twitter accounts and manage it for his clients. That’s were we VAs come in and what a perfect alliance this will be for our industry!

Enter Twitter4VAs.com.

Keith and I have collaborated to bring a 60 minute webinar to VAs teaching them how to get the best out of Twitter, great tools you can use for Twitter and suggestions on how to promote your Twitter services to potential clients. Sound like THE webinar you should attend? Good, I thought so.

This webinar will be held on Thursday 27th October at 10am AEST (Melbourne, Australia time) so that our fellow VAs in the northern hemisphere can also attend (Wed evening). Keith is an enthusiastic bubbly guy who will infect you with his love for Twitter. I found his presentation exciting and his enthusiasm contagious when I attended his session two weeks ago and was surprised to find that he wasn’t promoting VAs to help clients set up and manage their Twitter accounts. That has changed now :-) as you can imagine. I didn’t waste time in introducing myself and explaining what I do fulltime – supporting clients with their admin/secretarial and web based support needs. Keith had heard of Virtual Assistants but hadn’t had much direct contact with them.

So, set the date in your diary and head on over to Twitter4VAs.com to book for the webinar now. You will be so glad you did this!

The etiquette of posting on Facebook page walls

I logged into my business page last week and was surprised with a promotion for a service by someone else that I hadn’t put on my wall. What disgruntled me was that I also provide that same service (WordPress Training) and I thought that person had a cheek promoting on my wall to all my likers about their services.  I reported it as spam and removed the post.  I had tried to leave a comment on their wall however because they were an individual posting and not from a business page, and I hadn’t ‘friended’ them I couldn’t leave a comment on their wall.

This was only a day or two after a colleague of mine had complained that someone had been spamming on their wall doing promotions for their business and thought it totally inappropriate. I hadn’t seen who had done that but wondered if it was the same person now posting on my wall.

I really thought it was inappropriate to do.  So, what do I think they should have done?

Obviously this person is keen to promote their services however went the wrong way about it. What they should have done (in my opinion) was promote via their own business page, then asked their likers to share the promotion on their walls. That would then mean they were getting endorsement from their likers and they wouldn’t be seen as blatantly posting from one wall to another.  It’s all in the way it’s done.

So, if you want to promote something at Facebook to those who are connected to you – best you do it via your business page and then ask your likers to share with their connections.  We all know that things can go viral – it’s just important to start the process off in the right way.

By the way, that person has now apologised and said they hadn’t intended to be seen as spamming and will rethink how they do things.