What is a Virtual Assistant (VA)?
A Virtual Assistant, otherwise known as VA, at the basic level is an independent contractor who provides administrative, marketing, technical and/or creative support to clients remotely. VAs each have their own specialities, skill sets, and experience levels.
Here at Joyfully Organized, we’re a woman-led, strategic team of virtual assistants who partner with coaches, consultants, and other service-based business owners. We specialize in simplifying, streamlining, and helping to organize your business, by assisting with administrative, technical, and marketing projects.
While for some, it’s a newer concept, as work becomes more remote (especially given the current pandemic) it’s only growing with popularity.
How can a Virtual Assistant help me?
As you likely know, there are many different facets of running a business. You started your business to provide a service to your clients. That’s what you’re good at and like to do. But as you’ve likely learned, there’s also a lot to do in the backend of your business in order to keep it running smoothly.
As a fellow business owner, I can speak from experience, it’s hard to balance it all. That’s why as your partner, we can collaborate with you to strategically figure out what (and how!) to delegate key things within your practice. This will help you to be able to focus on the key areas of your business that you want to focus on, while knowing all the other parts are being expertly handled.
As VAs, we can work with new business owners to help them determine which platforms are the best for them - from email marketing, to social media scheduling, to document organizing, to project management, you name it. On the flip side we also work with established businesses to assist them in keeping all of those things running smoothly, so they are able to provide the best service to their clients. Our goal is to help you feel more at ease and in control of your business.
Is a Virtual Assistant the right fit for my business?
If you’re new to the concept of hiring a VA, you may be wondering if they are the right fit for you. Recently I’ve had two clients referred to me who had no idea that a VA could help them. They were both small service-based businesses who assumed that VAs only provided assistance to larger businesses who needed a more intense level of support.
Let me let you in on a little secret …. VAs can help any business owner, you just need to find someone who is the right fit for you.
How do I know what to delegate?
When you first start working with someone in your business, the hardest question to figure out often is, how do I know what to delegate? Figuring out exactly what, and how, to delegate can be a learning curve. After partnering with over 50 small business owners, it’s still the question I get the most often.
I have a signature process I walk my clients through in our kick-off strategy meeting that helps us to narrow down where we should start.
And the first step I recommend is determining all the things that you’re doing on a daily and weekly basis in your business. By knowing which pieces you don’t like doing, you have a start in figuring out which things to hand over. Because you started your business to provide a service that you love, and that you’re good at. You can bring others in to help with what you don’t love to do, don’t know how to do, and aren’t good at doing.
tip: start small
When working with someone like a VA for the first time, I recommend starting with 1 or 2 projects. Figure out the best way to communicate, each other's working preferences, and any of those little things before diving in too deep. This will help reduce frustration and help get everyone started on the right foot.
Still feel like there’s too much swirling around in your head and don’t even know where to start. Book a “Sort it out with Sarah” one hour strategy call and we can work on a plan to get you started!
