Properly Trained Virtual Assistants – also known as Administrative Consultants – Can Be Powerful Small Business Resources

Guest Post by Vernessa Taylor

Virtual Assistant vs. Administrative Consultant

It is virtually impossible to provide small business customers the level of service they expect if you lack professionalism, an appropriate skillset, and real-world practice doing things the right way. It doesn’t matter your nationality, ethnicity, or socio-economic background. All that matters when you present yourself as the virtual assistant of choice is that your skills are up to par. There is a baseline that should be the plumb line of any VA business endeavors. Your clients will (or should) expect you to measure up.

Virtual Assistants can step up their game with education, training, professionalism, and the right tools of the trade. Here are some suggestions for making the role of virtual assistant a true game changer and not a monkey wrench thrown into the workings of already cash-strapped small businesses. This starts with education — formal or informal — and training.

The Language

If Virtual Assistants were seen less as “secretarial support” and more as professionals in their realm of expertise, would the bar be raised, the standard level of service set higher? Danielle Keister seems to think so and has built an entire cottage industry around what she terms “administrative consultants,” totally eschewing the very notion of a “virtual assistant.” She makes two points that virtual assistants could use as foundational, taking the essence and adapting as a kind of personal mission. [1]

1. The best way to describe administrative support is that it is the collection of ongoing tasks, functions and roles that keep a business organized, moving forward and humming along smoothly. …
2. The “virtual assistant” term only confuses people. It creates misconceptions that make establishing a business-to-business relationship much more difficult than need be and causes a whole host of misunderstandings and misalignment of expectations. The word “assistant” itself inherently puts you in a subservient role in the eyes of clients.

Perspective

While it is unlikely that Virtual Assistants will forego their titles in favor of the one Keister prefers, the industry could undergo some changes that ensure the type of quality control that helps beat this small business recession. Pete Ekizian makes this connection when he reminds business owners not to surrender their responsibilities in the name of outsourcing.

Virtual Assistants are small business resources. Because of this, Internet Marketer Stella Anokam recommends small businesses outsource tasks to freelancers — like those found inexpensively on Fiverr — but also teaches those businesses how to qualify virtual assistants — before they engage them. Business owners peek under the hood, looking in every corner, which doesn’t leave any place for unprofessional, unqualified workers.

Education and Training

Study to show yourself approved . . .

Knowing the difference between education and training is a good place to start. Here are some simplified meanings that show the distinctions.

Education involves strategic planning, critical thinking, problem solving, analyzing, understanding, and grasping general concepts.

Training involves acquiring knowledge of how to perform a specific task.

Back to the Basics: Reading and Writing

Are the basics a no-brainer? Not according to Marcie Hill who just compiled a set of startling facts on literacy that, unfortunately, holds true today for a high percentage of adults. Not to imply that today’s Virtual Assistants are illiterate; the point is that a strong grasp on the basics is foundational and a key to ongoing success.

Writing

1. Take a refresher in grammar usage. Text messaging, 140 character brevity, and communication shorthand have stunted the use of grammar in personal communications. It returns to its rightful place in business communications. In other words, it just won’t do to not know how to “speak correctly” and translate correct speech to a written form.
2. Keep the links to your favorite online dictionary and thesaurus handy. Fanciful spelling and license with words goes out the window when your client asks you to take his cryptic notes and write-up his recent meeting with his client.
3. Brush up on (or gain mastery of) writing skills, including composing letters, writing reports, and preparing documentation.

Resources such as the Purdue University Online Writing Lab (OWL) offers tips, techniques, and even podcasts that will move you in this direction. The OWL has remained one of my all-time favorite resources over the years.

Reading

Educate yourself by seeking out opportunities (online or offline) to gain knowledge in key areas related to working with a diverse clientele. Examples include:

• communication
• project management
• relationship building
• customer relationship management
• negotiation
• contracts
• document management
• interactive web technologies

Go for depth and breadth;, you can gain the training to specialize in an area as interest is piqued or the times demand that you know (which they do, already).

Invest in Your Own Training

Indisputably, these are tight economic times. Every dollar has to count. Even so, training is an investment that should yield a return when the training received is put to good use. Not all training costs a lot of dollars or rupees or drachmas or shillings or euros or . . . This entertaining but informative slide show highlights the types of training Virtual Assistants need in order to be competent and competitive.
Virtual Assistant Training

Investing in your own training means
developing related skills or “skillsets.”

One such important skillset is research.

• How to perform it
• Where to find relevant sources
• How to analyze it
• How to cite it
• How to write it up
• How to present it

Related to conducting research when requested, it is also important to know where to find research that has been conducted by others. That is, how to find answers relevant to your field of work that have already been packaged in a ready-to-use format.

Lastly, develop new skillsets by finding out what is in demand, then acquiring the training you need.

Gain Virtual Intelligence

In order to gain virtual intelligence about what small businesses are using to carefully weed out the unqualified, look in the places where the clues are scattered. Reading up on the recommendations made to those who will hire you about will yield rewards for the diligent.

• One such place is Anokam’s Fiverr Outsourcing Guide.
• And fellow Virtual Assistant Alicia Jay offers sage advice to her business clients — The Three C’s to Consider When Hiring A Virtual Assistant — which is appropriate for business owners everywhere thinking about hiring extra virtual hands.
• Don’t miss finding out what NOT to do, either. Some tips on how to avoid infractions that harm, more than help, small business customers can be found in Virtual Assistant Comment Spam; and GrowMap shares many tips on why it is important to comment the right way.
• TIP from Gail at GrowMap:  Make it a point to pay attention to what niches others operate in and what their specialties are. Connect with other virtual assistants and researchers via Skype, IM, email or phone so you can share quick suggestions and resources.

Numerous other sources scattered around the Internet will clue you in about what small businesses desire in a Virtual Assistant.

Final Thoughts

Education and training position virtual assistants to serve as qualified small business resources. Virtual Assistants can step up their game by acquiring solid, in-demand skill sets and striving for professionalism.

Thanks for reading today.

Any lessons you’ve learned and want to share?

• Are you a virtual assistant?
• Have you engaged in formal training?
• How have you taught yourself?
• Are you a small business owner who uses virtual assistants?
• What have been your experiences?

References

[1] Danielle Keister is the Founder of the Administrative Consultants Association.
[2] Virtual Assistant Training Slideshare Presentation by Virtual Assistant Inc.

Image Credit: Re-commercialization Therapy for Hikers by Frits Ahlefeldt-Laurvig/HikingArtist.com via Flickr, licensed Creative Commons.

As a Technology Consultant, Vernessa Taylor works with both online and offline business owners. She writes about small business systems such as project management and customer referral systems at CoachNotes Blog. Follow her on Twitter @CoachNotesBlog. More articles by Vernessa here on GrowMap.

Click image to Buy Frugal Living eBook - Don't forget to use Discount Code GrowMap10 to Save 10%

More people than ever before are having to tighten their belts and find ways to save on their expenses so they can lower their cost of living.

Since this is completely foreign to many people, when I found out that Rene @BudgetSavingMom was launching her new frugal living guide today, I asked her to let me share it with my readers.

Click link for more about Budget Saving Mom’s new >> Frugal Living eBook

Here is Renee to tell you about her new ebook:

I recommend reading her book as a way to see that there are very different ways of looking at life. Many may find what her book describes as “normal” for her family is very different from what “normal” may be for yours.

Priced at a very reasonable $4.99, Rene has generously offered to give you a 10% discount. Just enter discount code GrowMap10 when you order.

Rene is one of the bloggers in the couponing blogging collaboration I’ve been mentoring and writes about living frugally at Budget Saving Mom. You can find a category on her blog for each of these topics she shares her expertise in:

• How to start couponing
• Finding store deals with coupon match-ups
• Freebies
• Organic gardening tips
• Homeschooling tips
• Budget recipes
• Canning recipes
• Restaurant deals

Although they try to live very frugally, she also feels that her family’s health is very important, and they try to eat healthy foods. She also makes many of her own toiletry items, such as soaps and lotions, and homemade household cleaners.

I ask you to go even further and question every expense you have that exists because of conditioning. Most Americans believe that “modern” medicine, insurance, and health care are essentials while I personally do not. Each individual must make those types of decisions for themselves.

As I mentioned in my post about Food Rights, the healthiest people and animals I have known in my over fifty years are those that choose to eat natural, healthy foods and avoid treatments that relieve symptoms short term but result in long-term poorer health.

• If you have children, be sure to see her tip on page 28 about how she buys new kid’s clothes for less than GoodWill prices.

• Anyone who uses a cell phone should pay special attention to tip #17 on page 59 in the saving on cell phone costs section.

Disclosure: The links to Rene’s book are affiliate links, but that is NOT why I am recommending her ebook. I have personally read the entire ebook cover to cover and found tips I did not know about that I consider valuable. Other bloggers interested in offering Rene’s book can join her eJunkie affiliate program.

The first challenge anyone who wants to freelance or work for themselves will run into is the difficulty of juggling marketing themselves with focusing on what they do. Many sell one job, set to work on it, and then don’t seek another job until they’re done. This results in periods of  feast or famine and excessive stress between jobs.

While you could split your time between marketing and working, a better solution is to collaborate with others who can refer work to you. Once you get sufficient clients and build a substantial portfolio you will stay busy all the time. The other advantage of having someone else recommend you is that they can offer their honest opinion and reasons for recommending you.

The best recommendations come from someone you have done work for because they can comment on your communication skills, timeliness, ability to translate their idea into a deliverable, conflict resolution and about their overall experience working with you. These are important factors when hiring someone and they are not easily conveyed by your portfolio. Many are highly talented but difficult to communicate or work with.

The very best Web sites require a collaboration of individual specialists. Each brings different skills to a project.  Derek Semmler and I have launched several new blogs. We work well together because he has the technical skills installing and upgrading WordPress and working with data feeds I lack. I have the marketing experience and usability background he hasn’t developed yet. We constantly learn from each other.

We have an opportunity to offer someone more talented than we are in creating logos and adding more compelling, advanced graphics to WordPress blogs. The greatest benefit they will receive is our ability to recommend them for future work. I am always on Twitter, FriendFeed, cliKball, send my Tweets to Del.icio.us and when my new PC arrives hope to be active again at StumbleUpon.

I am often in a position to recommend the very best specialists directly to clients and to answer online requests with specific recommendations and timely responses complete with links to portfolios. Business owners often do not understand the importance of logos and design and are reluctant to pay for quality work. That is where I come in. I know what is important and who is the very best. I also know who to recommend if they don’t need the very best or spending that amount is not economically feasible for them.

The more I know about a consultant’s prices, way of working, and talents the better I can match them with a particular client. It is rare for someone I have personally recommended not to be hired at their desired rate because I only recommend the best fit and ensure potential clients clearly understand the benefits of a particular offering and why it is worth the cost.

Besides the personal recommendations and mentions and replies on Social Networking sites, anyone collaborating with us will have a link placed in the footer of each site they have worked on with appropriate anchor text. Each footer could eventually have a separate link for Hosting, WordPress, Logo, Graphic Design and Graphics used within Posts. These links provide incoming links to your site from every page of ours. The faster our traffic grows the more that will benefit you. Here is the most recent Compete site profile showing our unique visitors:

Compete Site Profile for GrowMap Unique Visitors

I know this graphic is not easy to read. The latest period shown highlighted is for April 2009 and shows 13,478 unique visitors.

All of our blogs use the Thesis Theme on the WordPress platform. Except for this one our blogs are brand new and have no incomes. Derek still works for an employer and I give away almost all of my time promoting others so there is no budget for hiring graphics work done. I believe that ongoing promotion and recommendations I can offer are far more valuable than the equivalent money would be and hope one or more talented graphic artists will be interested.

I also have extensive experience in usability, ecommerce, and Web design which I will gladly share with anyone – and especially with any graphic designers interested in collaborating with us. Imagine having an Internet Strategist handy to consult with on an ongoing basis. Would site review skills come in handy? Have you ever had a question while designing a site and weren’t sure where to find the answer? Now you do.

As you may notice this blog needs a Logo suitable to be used as an Avatar  / Gravatar and Favicon. It should probably resemble at least in general concept (the upward trend line) the Avatar I am currently using. This blog has the most traffic and is in the best position to recommend your work. That is only real need here; however, I am open to any other ideas a designer may have and have some of my own you’re welcome to consider. One idea is a map theme – possibly a variation of the parchment look posted by Curious Cat Creations.

Our new blog PSPLiving (PSPLiving) is about living healthy for less and will include anything related to that subject including:

• Specifically what to avoid (food and personal products such as shampoos, soaps, etc.)
• How to acquire organic produce locally for less than you spend now
• Product recommendations and how to determine what products are truly healthy and which are just standard toxic-laced products jumping on the bandwagon to make money off the unsuspecting
• Cooking tips that save you time and money

Another brand new blog is GrokHorses (GrokHorses) Grok means to understand profoundly and intuitively.  This blog will cover anything related to horses and share three decades of knowledge. I highly suspect it will expand to have writers passionate about their sub-niche of the horse world.

We also have a Gift related blog at ExecGiftsBlog (ExecGifts) that we use to communicate with buyers and affiliates of Executive Gift Shoppe. There are so many gift blogs and stores that I include this blog here in case a designer would like to establish a clientele in this niche. We are actively recruiting affiliates and there is likely to be related design work as they build new niche gift stores.

All three of these blogs have Thesis installed and are a beautiful white palette just waiting for a designer to really shine. Although I have some ideas the designer will have freedom of expression as long as their design does not detract from the substance of each blog. The same designer is welcome to do an entire design including logo or one designer can provide a logo and another other design elements. One designer could work on more than one or different designers could be chosen.

They will be fully optimized for SEO and community building and already have associated Twitter accounts.  People do tend to hire consultants who operate in the niche they know best so if you’d love to become “the” designer for any of the many sub-niches these two sites will incorporate here is your change to show off.

If you’ve seen my work here and elsewhere you know that I research and bring together enormous amounts of information. This means sites I create become huge attractors for everything in the niches in which they operate. They end up being highly trafficed sites with many incoming links and very high visibility – all good things for the designers who collaborate with us. I hope they’ll read this and we’ll hear from them. If you or anyone you know might be interested please do pass our proposal along. Thank you.

Are you looking for a great logo or graphic designer too?  Here are some whose work has caught our eye:

• David Airey – (DavidAirey) – considered one of the best for those with the budget
• The Design Cubicle – Brian Hoff – (behoff) – his site provides an impressive amount of research on this subject
• Difference By Design – Synergy Logo – click on logos, promotions or illustrations to page through their portfolio
• Just Creative Design – Jacob Cass – (justcreative) – understated designs for serious businesses
• Logo Perfecto – Philip Brunner (LogoPerfecto) – click on the link that says random to see 37 designs
• LogoPond – Identity Inspiration – a showcase collection of logos from different designers
• LogosforWebsites - Bargain priced logo and graphic design
• Nick Pearson – recommended by app103 – creator of the really cute DonationCoder mascot at wtfCody.
• Nineteen Eight-One – Joshua Geiger – (_1981_) – logo portfolio, testimonials, get a quote
• RussoGraffix – April Russo – (app103) – April creates graphics, has programming skills and creates applications

LOGO and GRAPHIC DESIGN:

• Logo Design Love – extensive reference information and resources for logo designers – see their popular posts including 85 of the best logo design resources
• 15 Logo Design Tutorials with Illustrator (Integrity Lance)
• Constructing the Perfect Logo (devlounge)
• How to Design a Logo (JustCreativeDesign)
• 16 Unveiled Logo Design Processes (The Design Cubicle)
• When is a “bad” logo design actually “good” (Logo Design Love)
• 40+ Amazing 3D Typographic Designs (childimar.com)
• What’s Your Logo (Jayme Passiotive)
• 16 Useful Blogs for Web Design and Inspiration (Jon Bishop)

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• 14 Ways To Juggle Freelancing While Working Full Time (sitepoint.com)
• A few essentials for the freelancer (tc.eserver.org)

It wasn’t so very long ago that most people worked for themselves. There is no reason we can not start again. Some may do it for additional income; others may choose to earn all of their income the old-fashioned way – either by choice or because they have been laid off or can no longer find work.

There is no special magic required to do this. There are infinite ways to make money online or off. Here are just a few with many more to come. We will even provide you with step-by-step instructions for many ways to make money so you don’t have to do it alone. If you get stuck do not give up. We can help you or find someone who will.

Key to increasing your income is getting the word out. One way is through free online listings. We have already posted statistics on how people find businesses and links to the major Local Search Directories. We have provides everything someone needs to offer this as a service or use it to promote their own business. Many can use what is already posted and get started now.

Anyone can make money even if they do not know how to use the Internet. If any ideas you find here would be perfect for friends, family or acquaintances, print it out and give it to them. If they run with the idea you can help them with fliers or listings. Those who help others are always rewarded.

Here are the first of many EXTRA INCOME IDEAS to come:

1. Offer to help existing businesses to get listed in Local Search Directories – see Special Offer which explains why someone would want to do this and has reasonable prices to charge for this service. In the future we will create fliers you can edit and downloadable spreadsheets to track your work. We will also teach how to research keywords and the basics of copywriting. We can provide free tutoring and assistance to get you started.
2. Love to sew or know someone who does? Here is the perfect idea that requires only the tiniest of start-up funds. Read Oklahoma Prairie Mom’s post on Sewing Clothing for Free and Recycled Flannel Bed Sheets to get that idea. Expand that to making patterns from your favorite clothing that is too worn to wear. There are used clothing places, swap meets, and yard sales most everywhere. You can often buy whole sacks of material for a few dollars or even less. Watch for discarded clothing or anything else made of a beautiful fabric and turn it into a copy of your favorite clothes or needed household items (pot holders, hand towels, etc.). [NOTE: If you don't sew hire someone else to do it.]
3. Share your knowledge with others. Do you realize how many people never learned how to sew, or bake, or cook from scratch? Many are just now getting into gardening. Some people have always wanted to learn to play an instrument. Many more could use additional computer skills. While not everyone is cut out for teaching, many have the skills and would love the work.
4. Start a co-op to share the work. If you don’t have time to do everything neither do the other people you know. Instead of everyone working outside the home some could stay home and provide meals, housekeeping, gardening, yard work – anything others need. This benefits both those who are still working and those who elect to stay home.
5. Quit your job if the cost of working exceeds your take-home pay. I am absolutely positive that many people are actually going into debt because of their job. Have you calculated the cost of commuting, clothing, eating out, packaged and fast food for home consumption, taxes, and anything else you spend money on because you work? As much as these costs have risen there are bound to be many who are actually losing money by working! If this is you, you’re better off giving notice right now. Keep working and you’re just digging a deeper hole!
6. Don’t know how to figure out if you’re losing money by working? There is a perfect service for someone to offer to those who don’t know how!

Use your imagination. Follow your passion. Ask for help getting started. Learn to cook from scratch, sew your own clothing, or plant a garden. Learning to grow food is especially important. With the falling value of the dollar income is not keeping pace with increases in food costs. Remember this: you can’t eat money! Food equals security and freedom – and most importantly – health.

BLOG POSTS WORTH READING ON THE SUBJECT OF BEING AN ENTREPRENEUR:

• More on the Fierce Urgency of Now – Francine Hardaway

Your comments and favorite links are always invited. Please feel free to drop links and express your views in the comments field. Links will periodically be moved up into the bodies of posts. They also allow us to find you and share what you write in future posts. Thank you in advance for being part of improving the world.