The best (and worst!) moments since starting my business

How are you from the last time you read my blog?

If you are new, welcome to my blog!

Starting a business is not easy; it’s a lot of hard work. There will be a time when you want to share your wins and the not so wins that you are so scared of at times to share these losses. If you are like me, you might beat yourself up with such a loss.

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I am taking another approach where I want to share my wins and the not so wins with you.

From the time I started my business online I was always worried about if I would be able to do so much and yet still be able to achieve my goals. Mind you, giving up is not an option because I do like what I am doing and I have decided that since I do like this, this is where I want to offer my services.

One of my best moments was?

So here goes my best moment when I started my business: this might not be too large as yours or maybe a big one compared to you, but my win is that I have the freedom to choose whom I want to work with and how much I want to earn.

I must stress this because, as you can imagine, there is no boss telling me that this needs to be done, right now and how much I will be earning. Mind you because I do set my rates, I determine how much I will earn and how many clients I would want to work with.

Now tell me which job allows you to choose the freedom of working for yourself, setting your time and also choosing who you want to work with. I know that it must be scary when you do start your business but this has been my “why” from day one.

Ok, you might be thinking, “my win so far is too broad” but to narrow down my best moment and the one that took center stage for me, was when persons are interested in my services and actually pay for what I am offering.

Drum roll for the worst moment!

My not so best moment was when (where it might not be a very bad one to you) I did not achieve a particular goal in the specified timeframe. I considered it to be a learning lesson.

So out of all the losses I have experienced, I think it was time. I had to draw back from this mind frame and take a step back to view what happened in such a situation because I must admit I tend to beat myself up when a particular win is not achieved on schedule.

What I had planned to do when I experience a not so win was try the other rest of the alphabets. I know that this might not be the best advice for you and your business, but when I got stuck in a rut and needed support for such a case in going back on track with my goals.

I called in the big guns! This support may take the form for you as a business coach or a mentor; trust me, you will not know everything even if you try, on your own. Even if you do not invest in a business coach I am sure there is a coach out there to support you whether it’s through your mind, body or soul.

Now that you have heard my wins and my not so best moments for my business, what will you do differently to achieve your wins?

Psst, before I go I wanted to share how I always gain support when I am having one of those “blah moments”. I recently created a Facebook group for us women to network and share our expertise. I know that if we all come together and unite we can make a vast difference in helping someone else who was at our stage a day, week, month or even a year ago.

I know that if we all come together and unite we can make a vast difference in helping someone else who was at our stage a day, week, month or even a year ago. This is a closed group so at no time will your information be shared publicly outside the group; everything here is shared with confidence. If you are interested you can request to JOIN

It was nice of you to stop by.

Until then, happy hiring, and best wishes with your business.

Don’t forget to check the sidebar and footer of this website for awesome resources!

Photo Credit: Haute Stock

Solve your WordPress issues by 5 pm today!

8 / 10 / 16 6 / 12 / 18

How are you from the last time you read my blog?

If you are new, welcome to my blog!

You know that your website is the centre of your business. It helps to let prospective clients know more about you and what services you offer.

Yikes! One day you wake up and boom! You have issues upon issues and you cannot even reach your web designer when you need him/her.

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So please take these best practices I myself came across that as WordPress users, we might have overlooked. I thought this might be a good idea to share this with you if you have not come across this as well.

Secret tips for your website maintenance.

#1: So you have signed into your WordPress site and is wondering where to navigate to or what’s the next step to go from one tab to another.

Your dashboard is your friend, or simply put, your home for everything that’s happening on your site.

Make sure your dashboard is as fashionable as your style.

Your dashboard will normally have a summary of what needs to be done. For example, updating your WordPress site to the current version. Another notification could be updating your plugins or themes.

Always check what needs to be done and do this as soon as possible as the updates are available for your site to function at its utmost best.

Remember, your site counts on you to function properly.

Tip: Your first plugins should entail having ones where you can back up your site and having the current plugins that you choose for your site to use.

#2: I am sure you have heard before that not to choose passwords that are easy for hackers to guess.

Girl, you need to strengthen those passwords!

As a VA working with a number of different clients, it’s not easy for the human brain to remember every bit of information that is sensitive to use.

I recommend using a strong password that consists of numbers, uppercase, and lowercase text.

I have recommended LastPass as it’s one of the best password vault out there for you to choose from when storing passwords. LastPass has a free version to try right this moment.

Tip: I recommend using a password between 12-15 characters long.

#3: So based on tip’s 1 suggestion, it is always a good idea to back up your site.

Normally WordPress will display a notification of the current version available for you to update to the current version.

Backup your site regularly, as how you cleanse those makeup brushes!

Before you update, I would hope that you would be backing up all your information quite regularly or paying attention to the current plugins that you have installed. This can be done by using Dropbox to save your information that you have backed up.

Outdated plugins, run the risk of your site not operating at its full potential and causing hiccups that you would not want.

Remember if you are new to this I recommend choosing a plugin such as UpdraftPlus.

Tip: Do not solely depend on WordPress to notify you when to update your site; if you are pressed for time to keep track of these updates, it’s always a good idea to hire additional assistance for your WordPress maintenance. If not, I recommend using a scheduler to remind you of upcoming updates. This can easily be done using an app that has a reminder on your phone or computer.

#4: Anything that is not needed now, delete.

What I mean is, if you have out-dated posts, pages, or spam comments that are not useful to your current website, delete them.

Did you throw out your outdated makeup brushes of recently? Delete and throw out those outdated spam comments to the trash as well!

You want to have a website that is operating at its best.

When a visitor is seeing your site for the first time and sees spam comment on a post that is there for over a month, that can definitely be a turn-off.

Tip: Keep Hackers and Spammers away by having your site clean and fresh in the eyes of visitors.

#5: So you know the saying that a home is not a home without a dog sign? I did not make that up if it’s the first you are hearing about it.

The same can be said about your website. There are some basic pages that need to be on your website, whether or not you have an additional 8 pages.

Just like how you have the essential products in your beauty routine, you should have the same for your website.

These are what I recommend you have: home, about, product/service and your contact page.

I know you might have this because I might have created these for you. If not, you can share these page ideas with your friends and family.

Most people make the mistake of not having these four pages because they might be thinking that this is a personal website.

Some people might even have no pages at all with one of these suggestions or maybe two, but you do need a home page summarizing what this website is about.

You also need to engage your visitors by making them know that you are approachable to reach you (even though it’s online) through your contact page.

Tip: One way to reach your audience is through blogging. Maybe this is not for you, but you would prefer using tools such as a video, or an audio of you speaking to reach your audience. Don’t leave your website alone without making your audience know more about you.

If your site is always active, it’s best practice to always back up your site, update your themes and plugins.

Use these best practices and enjoy these tips. If you need a beautiful PDF guide to always reference back with these suggestions, you can Get it here by signing up for my newsletter!

It was nice of you to stop by.

Until then, happy hiring, and best wishes with your business.

Don’t forget to check the sidebar and footer of this website for awesome resources!

Photo Credit: Haute Stock

What task can you give to your Virtual Assistant?

8 / 7 / 16 5 / 5 / 18

How are you from the last time you read my blog?

If you are new, welcome to my blog!

So, you have spoken with a virtual assistant or need to hire one and do not know where to start in implementing which or such task to your virtual assistant.

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I recommend starting out small with a task that is somewhat not hard to do. When I came across some clients who first came to me, they were not sure how to give me access to their information and were at times confused how I could do the task with not being there physically or a phone call away to help solve their problems.

There are options to show your VA what to do on your virtual task.

My personal favorite in instructing a virtual assistant and you can’t go wrong is doing this in a video if you have the time. If not, you can have a step-by-step PDF or Word document guide on how you like things to be done in a specific way.

Please note that because business is mostly online based and your virtual assistant might not get it the right way (or your way on the first attempt), it’s always best to start on a trial basis.

An example was when I got my first task as a virtual assistant, A client wanted me to send out emails for them on their behalf. That client was a bit wary of trusting me with their password.

What I had suggested was creating a temporary password for me to access. If you are not comfortable with that method, you can go as far as creating a new email and giving that virtual assistant access to do your task. This does pose the issue for informing all your clients of the new email address that is being used.

What I have recommended from working with my clients is using the LastPass vault, it manages your passwords and you are felt more secure as in some cases when the password is shared you do not have to even know the password.

However, when you have moved on from that step, how do you go about tracking the progress of your work you have assigned your virtual assistant is up to what you agreed on. You can have a look at my previous blog with Tools I recommend.

Want to be updated about your virtual task?

I normally use a project-based platform by the name of Asana for both my personal and my business tasks. This is an easier tool to keep track of the progress and this is if your virtual assistant uses this project based tool or any at all. If he or she does, then the VA can grant you access to their email of the task being done at each stage and how long it will take to complete. This, again, is if the VA has this in place and has agreed to this when the contract was signed.

When you have done a trial and you feel comfortable about hiring your virtual assistant full time or part time, and you have passed doing the video tutorial for the task to be done, you can outline a job description on what you expect from the task.

What to look out for when you hire your Virtual Assistant?

Most virtual assistants mainly do a consultation before agreeing to a task, which, in most cases, is not free. So it’s best to have this information in place to outline what it is you need to be done and if the VA will be the right fit for your business.

Another option you can use when you have hired your virtual assistant to do your task is allowing the VA access to such information that you may use on a day-to-day basis in your business.

If you use any social media platforms and you know it’s time-consuming to provide such passwords for each of the VAs, you can grant access to your VA via Dropbox, Google Drive, LastPass or any other platform similar to this that you will be using.

So now that you feel confident in delegating a particular task to your virtual assistant, please make sure that you have read over the contract between your virtual assistant and you now have a detailed description of the task in place to be completed successfully. Also, make sure before a consultation that you do have questions in place to ask your virtual assistant.

After the consultation and you have way passed the confidential stage of hiring and you have met your ideal VA, here are some things to look out for before signing a contract.

Now, that I have hired my first Virtual Assistant now what?

Confidentiality plays a big role on the online platform, so make sure any and all tasks are kept confidential. Secondly, you do not dictate your pay base on thinking that you have hired a virtual assistant as an employee; they are an independent contractor (that is why the contract is there). In most cases, this will be outlined in the contract that the VA provides to clarify what a VA means.

You both will need to agree on how you will pay the virtual assistant, either if it’s full or partial payment upfront or 50 percent upfront and the other half after completion.

Finally, if the VA offers to price for hourly and or packages, either both or only packages unless the VA has stated otherwise. This is another requirement that you must understand and be clear on hiring before hand.

Most of my suggestions are what I have experienced for myself and or was educated on by other virtual assistants before me. You can, however, tailor your tasks base on what the VA has agreed to do.

You will know what task to assign your VA once you have worked with that VA and you are comfortable with the end result of the work that was produced. The funny thing is that, most times, when you hire a VA and you are so pleased with the work, even the task that the VA does not do, you are happy for him or her to learn to do, but this is if your VA has the temperament to learn to do so or can recommend someone for you.

Your VA, in most cases, can find the additional support for you if he or she is unable to do so. But please check to see that what you need is something your VA can offer. If not, he or she can research this information for you.

It was nice of you to stop by.

Until then, happy hiring, and best wishes with your business.

Don’t forget to check the sidebar and footer of this website for awesome resources!

Photo Credit: Haute Stock