Do you get overwhelmed by tracking information and contact details of everyone you meet or have contact with? Does this describe you and your business? Pieces of paper with names and addresses, phone numbers and/or email addresses written on them. Business cards in piles, or with rubber bands wrapped around them, or thrown in a drawer or box. Some entries in a spreadsheet or a database started but not maintained. Perhaps you have them all in your cell phone but they need to go onto your … [Read more...]
How many clients do you need?
A chance comment at a VA forum made me realise that a new VA was using the scatter gun approach to finding new clients and was, therefore, trying to prevent travelling all over the countryside and use cold calling instead. Except she was unsure how to go about it. She'd obtained (legally) a directory for her target market and wanted to approach them all to introduce her business and was seeking advise about this. I'd made comment that face-to-face was more personal and why didn't she just go … [Read more...]
Forum Etiquette
One of the VA groups I belong to was discussing limiting sales pitches to seminars or webinars and how did members feel about it? My response was: I think that people who come along to promote/sell something at a list that doesn't belong to them are being presumptous. I have a problem with it personally. You spend time building a list and then they come along and think it's their right to pitch to that list - without having anything to do with building it in the first place. My own opinion and … [Read more...]
McAfee not in my good books!
Imagine my dismay this morning when I checked my computer just before 6.30am to find that it had two error messages and the Start button was missing. Little did I know what was ahead of me for the next 10+ hours. Frustration, tears and wasted time and I nearly wiped my computer to start all over again! I did some research on the two error messages I had and it seemed to indicate it was a Windows error but it was a Dell file that wasn't operating in the gs_agentfolder. I tried to run the Dell … [Read more...]
Don’t give up!
Recent discussions at a VA forum were about how overwhelmed one member was feeling, trying to keep up with everyone else, but knowing she didn't excel in a lot of the things that others do. End result was she felt like she was beginning to burn out. Starting up a business is no simple thing. There is a lot to do and as the business owner you are now suddenly responsible for marketing, setting systems in place, making sure the bookkeeping is done, and working out what services to provide and … [Read more...]
Operating a VA business – Adding to the equasion
When we first start building our Virtual Assistant businesses we tend to concentrate on what we know best and it nearly always relates to word-processing, data entry, transcription work, book-keeping or similar. As we become more confident we start to find things we really enjoy doing and that often we can teach our clients about those things. For me in the past it has meant adding blogging to my list of services, websites and eventually setting up social media profiles for Twitter, Facebook, … [Read more...]
Virtual Assistant Forums – their benefits
I've mentioned from time to time the various VA forums I belong to. It's where some of my material comes from to share on this blog. Today I want to share on the benefits of forums like these. If you are a VA and if you are working alone, then becoming a member of 2 or 3 VA forums would be very beneficial to you. Don't mix up the forums with the networks. Many networks have forums attached to them but not all forums are attached to a network. The forums are usually free to join and some … [Read more...]
The blog has a new look!
If you receive this post via email or RSS you might just want to drop by the blog itself as it has a totally new look. The theme is the same as the main website but with some differences and the last 10 posts all on the front page. To view the full post just click on the title. I hope you like the new look - it will probably take a little while to get used to. Although it's easy to change from one template to another simply by choosing and clicking, it's another thing when you want to … [Read more...]
Change, the essence of life
“Change is the essence of life. Be willing to surrender what you are for what you could become.” The above was part of a promotion for AIOP's Annual Office Professional Breakfast held each year here in Australia. One of my team had posted an invite to the Sydney breakfast and wanted to know if anyone else at the forum was intending to go. Seeing the promotion took me back several years. It was 1993 and I attended the breakfast in Melbourne. In those days it was called "Secretaries Day" and … [Read more...]
