You may or may not have heard the acronym VA tossed around. So what is a VA? I’ll start by clarifying that a VA is a Virtual Assistant.

If you’ve been in the entrepreneur space there’s a good chance you’ve heard of a Virtual Assistant however if you haven’t, you’re not alone! 

Most of the time when people ask what I do and I tell them I’m a Virtual Assistant, they don’t know what a Virtual Assistant does.

Well, a Virtual Assistant is basically your right hand. We are here to help with almost any of your business tasks. And we don’t hesitate to dive head first into it!

For me, I help entrepreneurs and small businesses to the next level through exceptional virtual assistance and strategic partnerships. This looks like partnering with you on what’s working and what’s not working. Then we look at why it’s not working and make a plan to change it. We also talk about your vision and goals and how I can support you to reach those.

It’s good to meet with your VA each week for just 30 minutes to go through all these things and touch base on what you need from them and what they need from you especially if you’re thinking through something together and planning anything in the coming weeks.  

So, why should you hire a VA? 

Well, as a business owner you do all the things. You’re the social media manager, bookkeeper, graphic designer, CEO, administrative assistant, email strategist, and the list goes on and on… 

As a business owner myself, I know it gets exhausting, overwhelming, and way too time consuming. 

This is where a VA comes in. We’re here to help with all these tasks that take up so much time and take you away from doing what you do best. The reason you started your business in the first place!

Your VA is also your partner, talk through ideas with them if and when you need suggestions. We get to know your business very well and are here to strategize with you. Our goal is for you to thrive and succeed! 

What tasks can a VA help you with? 

This really can be whatever it is that you don’t like to do but still needs to get done. Some tasks could include: 

• Calendar management 
• Client onboarding/offboarding
• Content repurposing
• Email management
• Email marketing
• Graphic creation
• Invoicing + billing 
• Project management
• Social media
• Video editing
• Website updates and maintenance

This way you start freeing up your schedule to either take on more work or have more free time. Yes, I said it. Have more free time! And it’s certainly possible. 

You also can hire a VA for tasks that you haven’t started to do but want to… such as content repurposing or your email marketing. 

So what are the first steps to hiring a VA? 

First, if you’re looking to take tasks off your plate, make a list of what you want or could potentially want to outsource that would help you free up more of your time. If you’re unsure what takes up a lot of your time or how much of your time, track your time on the things you do. I like to use Toggl, it’s a free time tracking site.   

This way when you start looking for help you know what skills you want someone to have and how much time it takes! Keep in mind that if it’s something you’ve been doing, it will take someone else longer than it takes you, especially when they are first starting out and learning the ropes. 

Next, create a task or project management system with all the tasks then delegate out what you want/need help with! My favorite project management tool is ClickUp. This is also a good time to think about whether anything can be automated if it’s not already like invoicing and follow up with past due invoices. 

Third, I would recommend creating your standard operating procedures (SOPs) if you haven’t already. This just lays out your tasks you do step by step so your VA can jump right into the flow of things. It’s good to have SOPs created for everything even if you don’t think you’ll want to outsource it at least not right away that way if you ever need your VA to jump in and help with something it’s there and you don’t have to do a ton of explaining. 

If you have a particular way of doing things, I highly recommend creating videos on Loom where you can share your screen and record you doing the tasks so your VA can follow the video while they’re working on it later. This saves you and your new VA time in the long run because your video will answer a lot of questions that might come up! 

This however, won’t be necessary if you’re looking to outsource something you haven’t done or been keeping up with and don’t have a particular way of doing it, such as your social media. We all know keeping up with your social media is a HUGE task!

If you have any questions or are looking for a VA, feel free to reach out to me here!