Those of you who receive my newsletter or visit my website regularly will by now have seen our new look website. This blog will be undergoing a similar change very soon so stay tuned. The new look has been several months in the pipeline and this is partly due to research regarding membership software. I wanted my Virtual Assistant team to be able to login and update their own profiles as they wished and as has often been requested. Time to move on with current trends for membership sites. Do … [Read more...]
What is a VA and where do you find them?
I've been invited to be the Guest Expert at the Business Forum of Experts starting from tomorrow and we will be discussing the above topic. If you're an Aussie business you might like to join this forum and explore what there is to offer. One of the things that I find in my industry is that all too often people who have heard of VAs do not seem to know where to find them, and they will have a vague idea of what we are and what we do, based on what they've heard or read from someone … [Read more...]
5 years of blogging
In 2007 I wrote a blogpost about 2 years of blogging. I came across it the other day and thought, really? Funny what you forget you've written. I won't repeat my journey of how I came to be blogging, you can read the original post linked above. But I can tell you some of what has occurred since then: I've published two printed books based on two separate blogs I've written. Both are available in bookstores in Australia and through Amazon.com I've travelled to Canada to speak at a Virtual … [Read more...]
VAs – Looking for long-term relationships
The excitement of getting that first client soon passes and you start to wonder how much work is going to come through and how often. If you're a new VA, or a client looking to engage a VA for the first-time, I encourage you to look at the relationship as something that is going to be for the long-term and not ad-hoc or one-off jobs. I know that some clients like to 'try us out' to see how things go. I expect some might do this with Accountants and Lawyers too, and perhaps tradespeople as … [Read more...]
Hiring a Virtual Assistant
Welcome to the readers of Sarah Wilson's blog where she recently explored engaging the services of a Virtual Assistant (VA). Below you will find an interview of one client in Australia using VAs for her business but if you check the Client Interview category you will find many other client interviews listed. We also have a Client Case Study category in the menu on the right and a list of some clients who have been using VA services for many years. Kathie Thomas … [Read more...]
Clients Using VAs Part 9
In another of this series, here is an interview I did some months ago with Wendy Moore. Please tell my readers a bit about who you are and what you do. With over 14 years experience in the IT industry, I understood the amazing potential available to women in business who knew how to use the internet. What astounded me was the absolute lack of knowledge amongst fellow business women about the internet. Basic fundamentals were just not understood by women and so many were missing golden … [Read more...]
Flattery won’t get you everywhere
I'm amazed by the amount of 'VA' spammers out there, who are desperate to get their comments posted on this blog. Regular spam is bad enough but VAs doing this? Your flattery and use of big words will not impress me, nor the html coding you leave in the comments either. However, if you add value to the article and simply leave your name and URL in the relevant fields, your comments will get published and people can visit your site if they wish. Spamming on a peer's site is not the way to get … [Read more...]
Engaging a VA?
Then it's important to remember: There is no 'standard' rate for engaging a VA. Their cost of living, location, currency, experience and skillset vary considerably. First you will have to weigh up whether you need to engage someone who is local to where you work, or whether virtual is what you need. We find that most work can be carried out 100% virtually, unless you need for that VA to be onsite (Minutes of Meetings for example) or to do research that requires local geographical … [Read more...]
16 years ago today…
It was 16 years ago today that I walked into a govt building in Melbourne to register my business name "A Clayton's Secretary". I was both scared and excited. Scared - would it work? Excited - New horizons. For a long time I felt like I was on holidays at home, getting to play with my computer. Don't get me wrong, I was working and earning, but it didn't feel like work because I was in charge, I was doing what I enjoyed, and I got to make the choices about how things would work. It did … [Read more...]
