The holidays are fast approaching, Halloween is a little over a week away! Like many other entrepreneurs and small business owners, I’m sure you’re looking forward to them. After all, who doesn’t love spending time with family, enjoying the change of season, and attending celebrations and holiday dinners? Unfortunately, this is often also a busy time for small businesses, and all the extra workload can keep you from enjoying your holidays. Entrepreneurs, especially those working solo and/or from a home office, need to carefully protect their work-life balance. Do you need a vacation or some time working fewer hours in order…
It doesn’t matter what industry you work in; challenging clients are something every entrepreneur will need to deal with at one point or another. (I am lucky, all of my clients are pretty darn wonderful!) It can be frustrating when a client assumes you can read their mind, or changes their expectations on a daily basis. This can especially become a challenge when you only interact with clients online, with no chance to meet face-to-face. Having run a virtual business for years now, I’m very well versed in working well with clients via online means. Even before I owned a virtual…
One of the best reasons to partner with a virtual assistant is the growth potential it gives your small business; that growth in turn drives your income up substantially. Think of how much time you will be able to spend on bringing in new paying clients instead of doing the “busy work” of running a business. It’s a pretty simple calculation: when a virtual assistant is doing half of your work each day, you can double your efforts on the parts of your business that matter most. I know this first hand! As a virtual assistant who was always busy helping…
One of the biggest challenges facing small business owners is staying organized and finding a system that works for them to keep all those projects under control. Without some kind of organizational system in place, deadlines get forgotten, clients feel neglected, and it’s easy to waste time on less important tasks. The solution to all of these problems is to use a project management software—it helps you by dividing up tasks by client and project, setting deadlines, and providing reminders about work that needs to be finished. Modern project management systems are usually web-based, with mobile or desktop applications available.…
For an entrepreneur working with a virtual team to run a small business, communication is the single most important factor determining whether things run smoothly. It is absolutely critical to be able to communicate with your team members in an instant as things come up during the course of a work day. When there is seamless communication between your team members, you can set a more productive pace and get more accomplished. Email and phone calls have their uses, but for instantaneous communication, there is a popular new tool, called Slack. Slack is a platform for team communication that can be…
Being an entrepreneur and a parent is always a balancing act! I know this well. my business and my son both turned fifteen this summer. Yesterday was the first day of his sophomore year, so finding my work/life balance just got real! Since most businesses start booming again in the fall (mine included), the best way to handle this change of season and workload is to alter the way you work. If you want to be around for dinner, to help with homework, and be there to listen to your kids talk about their day at school, getting up early might…
Many small business owners first try out the services of a virtual assistant when they want to take a longer summer vacation and need someone to handle client care and social media while they’re away. While this is a completely legitimate way to utilize a virtual assistant, there are so many other things they can help with after the summer is over! [Tweet “A virtual assistant can free up large blocks of time, so you can focus on expansion.”] With September comes more business, and more work on a day-to-day basis. For a “solopreneur”, that can mean long hours and…
Things tend to slow down for a lot of small businesses during late summer, but the smart entrepreneur knows this brief respite from constant client care and project work is the perfect opportunity to really work on improving systems and making changes to the way their business functions. When there’s less daily grind to get through, you have the chance to take a look at how your business is performing, plan for the future, and set new long-term goals. Last week we talked about how to use the slow period to integrate a new virtual assistant into your team, and…
The slower summer months are made for taking on new employees for your business, such as a virtual assistant. While many folks are on vacations, and most customers or clients are too busy enjoying the nice weather and the many activities that come with it, you can take the time needed to help a virtual assistant become acquainted with your brand and business goals. Instead of waiting around, looking at your empty inbox, and wondering whether there’s anything more productive you could be doing than taking your third coffee break of the day, why not use this time to train…
So you’ve started your own business and things seem to be going well so far. That means you just need to keep doing the same thing to achieve long term success, right? Unfortunately it’s not quite that simple. Becoming established and initially experiencing short-term success does not guarantee you’ll be able to sustain long-term success with your business. Getting a business off the ground and running it over a longer period require two different skill sets—both of which good entrepreneurs will develop. Running a small business is a marathon, not a sprint. You’ll need to look beyond the present and…
