Episode 317: 5 Things I’ve Learned in 5 Years as a Virtual Assistant

Full Episode Transcription:

Y’all, I cannot believe that it has already been five years for me being in the virtual assistant world. I always just think about it, and I just go back to that day of when I was in labor with my daughter and I still hadn’t really figured out what I was going to do that was going to allow me to be home with her and that was still like a big worry. In the back of my mind, even when I was, you know, about to have this baby and then literally the day that I went into labor with my daughter, I found out about the virtual assistant world.

And now here we are, five years later, I’ve got a thriving business that allows me to be home with my kiddos most of the time. It’s allowed us to pay off so much of our debt, and I’ve been able to help other mamas just like you do the same thing. So, I’m so incredibly grateful, and if you had asked me five years ago if I thought we would be here, I would have said, you’re crazy, no, that’s not possible, but it absolutely is, and I’m just so thankful to God for everything that he’s done for my family, and also all of the families of the women who I’ve been able to serve over this time. So in this episode, I just wanted to share with you five things that I have learned in my five years as a virtual assistant. Number one is to always, always, always pick a service that lights you up. It’s really easy when you jump into the virtual assistant world to just pick a service that you already know how to do.

But if it doesn’t make you happy and if it doesn’t get you excited to work for your clients every day, then you might find yourself in the same feeling of burnout that you might be feeling in your nine to five. And I don’t want that for you. I want you to pick a service that you absolutely love doing. You know, some things, some parts of the service might be a little tedious and that’s okay. But overall you should really love Most of the service that you are offering. Okay. So don’t just pick something that’s easy that you already know. If it doesn’t light you up, then it’s not the service for you. I started in the realm of social media management because I thought, you know, this is what I already have experience in. This is what I think I would be good at. And yeah, I was good at it, but I did not like it one bit. And so when I finally designed a website for myself, I was like, this is It’s really, really fun. What if I just start doing this for clients? And it was very quickly that I pivoted into just being a website designer.

And I am so glad I made that choice because I don’t think I still would have been doing this if I had stayed offering social media management as my main service. All right. The second lesson I’ve learned in my five years as a virtual assistant is to make sure that you set firm boundaries. It’s really easy to. Give a little here and give a little there, and before you know it, your clients are able to get a hold of you at all hours of the day, even when you’re with your family, and you might be working on the weekends, or in my case, you might find yourself working on Christmas, and that should not ever be a thing, unless you want it to be, which I think most people do not. My first year of being in the virtual assistant world, you know, I had gotten out of teaching, I wanted something where I could be with my daughter, and then I had a client who I was offering services for, and she still expected me to do that service for her on Christmas day. It was a time specific service.

Couldn’t skip that day. Couldn’t like, couldn’t move it to another day. She wanted me to do the work for her on Christmas day. And I was like, Nope, this is not what I’m here for. This is not what I’m trying to do. And I very quickly set more firm boundaries, ended up letting that client go. Cause it just was not a good fit for me. And I made sure from then on that I set really clear boundaries up front of when I would be able to work, what holidays I would not be working at all, no matter what, how clients could get ahold of me. You guys know, I say, never give out your phone number to your clients. Always use like a texting app. That way you can like mute notifications during certain times of the day or certain days you’re not working. Setting all of those boundaries up front. And being firm about them and not letting your clients step over them is going to allow you to have the space to serve your clients better because you’re able to sit down and focus when you’re working on their stuff instead of like seeing it in the middle of being with your kids in the chaos and trying to juggle both and it’s just a mess.

No. Set those firm boundaries. Have firm times where you’re working. And make sure you uphold those boundaries so nobody can walk all over you and you actually have a business that you love. All right, the third thing I’ve learned in my five years as a virtual assistant is to streamline and simplify everything you can. Once I actually made like a process for how I offer my services, it became so much easier for me because I wasn’t trying to Like, I wasn’t missing doing things for certain clients and doing them for others. I wasn’t trying to flounder and be like, okay, what am I supposed to do next? I don’t remember. It’s been a little bit since I did this. No. Once I actually sat down and literally made a checklist of all the things I do for the services that I offer. In the exact order that I do them, it made it so much easier. So now I can duplicate my project board for a new client. I just tweak a few things that are custom to their service or their package that they purchased.

And then I just go through that checklist and it’s so much easier for me. It’s so much easier for my clients because they can see exactly what I’m working on. And it’s just a really, really beautiful process that I actually enjoy now. Kind of like tied into this and this is kind of a bonus tip for you is Make sure whatever service you’re offering you’re not making it super custom for every client It should generally stay pretty similar and you might just have to tweak like a few things like for me I do website design So the process is mostly the same but the number of pages might change or Somebody might have to add on like a shop for their website. So I would set that up, but most things like getting the domain purchase and all the website settings and all of that stuff stay the same. So I really have that streamlined and simplified all in a checklist for me to work through when I do a new project. So I really recommend that you do that for whatever service you picked to offer as well.

All right. The fourth thing that I’ve learned in my five years as a virtual assistant is to make sure you’re picking a service that businesses are willing to invest in. I mentioned this back in the last episode, but if you’re just offering administrative services, yes, clients often want to get that off their plate because they’re tired of doing it. And that does open up room for them to focus on new projects. But if they get tight on funds, you’re probably going to be the first person that they let go. Okay. So you want to make sure you’re picking a service that actually helps the business grow, reach more clients, get more sales. So something where they can actually reach more customers like social media management, podcast management, you’re building that trust with people who are listening to you. They’re more likely to buy things like that. Where. Your clients get to actually reach more people. Okay? So make sure you’re picking that service that businesses are willing to invest in that actually grows their business and makes them more revenue. And then tip number five, or I guess less than five of the five things I’ve learned in my five years as a virtual assistant is to only work with clients that you love.

Now sometimes it’s hard to tell that right up front when you first start working with a client, but if you get any red flags with a client on the discovery call, it is 100 percent okay for you to let them know in an email after the call that you don’t think you’re going to be the right fit, and you can point them in the right direction to find somebody who would be. But I don’t want you to work with clients who You don’t adore because then you’re going to just have like a more strained relationship with them. It’s going to take more mental capacity for you to do the work that you do for them and you’re not going to have a business that you enjoy. Okay. So make sure you’re working with clients that you adore, respect and appreciate all that you do for them and you will be amazed at what kind of business you can create if you focus on. All of these things, all five of these things. Let me recap them for you. Number one is picking a service that lights you up. Number two is setting firm boundaries. Number three is streamlining and simplifying your processes. Number four is picking a service that businesses are willing to invest in. And number five is only working with the clients that you love. If you need help with any of these things, I walk you through all of this in my free workshop, The Number One Way to Start Working From Home. You can register for that at ariannavernier.com/free-workshop. And I would absolutely love to help you figure this out for yourself so that in five years down the road, you can look back and see, wow, this business has completely changed my life. So go register for that. I can’t wait to see you in there. And as always, I love you guys so, so much, and we will see you next time.