Here are just a few:

1. Advertise in Ezines.

There are online newsletters everywhere that accept advertising. The key is to purchase advertising in publications that reach your target market and to create your ad to showcase your expertise. Don’t try to be everything to everyone or you won’t attract clients.

Ad Example of what Not to Write: “Hire me to lighten your workload. I can do everything that you don’t want to do. Let’s talk!”

Ad Example of what works: “Are you ready to get more leads to your business? I will handle your ezine advertising campaign for you. No more searching for targeted ezines, no more writing and tracking your ads. I’ll handle it all it all. My clients experience a boost in subscribers after I complete my ezine advertising campaigns that will pay for my services. Check out my website for testimonials and free tips.”

2. Write and Submit Articles.

The key is to stay on topic. Don’t write and submit articles about health or pet care. Present a problem in your article and solve it. Make sure your author bio is very compelling to attract potential clients.

Recommended Resource: If you’ve never tried article marketing, I’d suggest this course to get started – www.EasyArticleMarketing.com

3. Network where *successful* people hang out.

A huge mistake that VA’s make is to hand out on forums where there are other people struggling to make money. Instead, join a membership site for your target market and you’ll find yourself in the "inner circle"

Recommended Resource: My favorite forum for masterminding and brainstorming is Lynn Terry’s SSWT Private Masterming Forum.

4. Advertise at Shelancers.com.

One of the easiest ways to get your name in front of business owners looking for help is to join Shelancers.com.

Again, it is crucial that you list your specialty in order to stand out from the other service providers. But, if you can find a problem that business owners face, and offer to handle it for them, you’ll attract loyal clients who will continue to work with you.

These are just a few of the ways you can boost your client base quickly. What are some of your favorite methods? Please share them below.

Have a great weekend!

Kind Regards,

I personally use Gmail as my email client and have everything imported or forwarded there. It’s easy, I can access it from anywhere any computer and it has lots of time saving features that I can use. One of those being the “canned responses” feature.

The next time you find yourself explaining one of those frequently asked questions I encourage you to save it as a “canned response” so you can just click on it and insert it the next time someone emails and asks the same question. It will save you a ton of time in the future and make your email answering time much more efficient in the long term.

I hope you found this helpful, if you have any questions about this or you find yourself stuck just let me know and I’ll help you get it set up.

Have a great weekend,

One thing I learned early on in my online career and something you’ll hear so many internet people say (including some of the big name marketers) is that the people around you are going to be negative, tell you that you can’t do it, it’s a waste of your time, that’s not a job it’s a hobby, etc, etc, etc…. You get the idea. That kind of thing is only going to sabotage any success you have early on and it’s going to make you feel miserable, and honestly, it’s the reason a lot of people give up and quit before they reach any success points at all.

I don’t want you to go through that and I’m here to support you, lend an ear whenever you need it, but what you really want to look for is a community of people, multiple people with the same kind of thinking, similar goals, and a bright shiny outlook on the world of virtual business. Of course you can comment and chat here on VAhelper.com, but there are several communities out there that you might find helpful as well. Here are just a few….

and I’m sure there are many more out there. If you have a favorite community that I haven’t mentioned, please post it in the comments section here.

I spent a lot of time thinking I could do things by myself, I didn’t need support, I didn’t need any of that, and because of that I spent a lot of time locked away from everyone, feeling miserable, feeling frustrated, and not getting anywhere. Opening up and joining a community helped my business flourish, relieved a ton of stress from my life, and improved more than just my business.

I hope you’ve had a productive week and have a fantastic weekend. Talk to you again soon.

Kind Regards,

Of course, you can go out and learn something new to offer your clients. That’s always a great idea and I definitely recommend learning new things all the time, whether they are services to offer or ways to promote your own business.

You can partner up with another virtual assistant that offers services different from your own to expand both your offerings and her offerings to clients. These sort of work swap relationships work out great in the long term and can be very profitable for both parties involved.

You can outsource the work. Hire an assistant of your own and outsource the work them playing the role of project manager. This is a great way to expand your business, because there are only so many hours in the day and you can’t work all of them every day.

This is just the tip of the iceberg on this train of thought! There are still many more ways to grow and expand your business as a virtual assistant and we’ll be talking about them a little at a time.

I hope you’re having a fabulous weekend and I’ll be back with more again soon,

But, the other day I wasn’t feeling very productive and wanted to relax, but at the same time I didn’t want to stop working. I’m sure you’ve had that feeling, right?

Now, I have a netbook and I can work from that well enough, but sometimes when I’m on there I feel more like I’m playing than working and sometimes I just need the big screen in front of me to stay focused. So, I shut down my computer, unplugged it, picked it up, and took into the living room. (Okay, not everyone can do that – I have a 25 inch all-in-one HP computer with wireless internet connection, wireless mouse, and wireless keyboard, so I can move it around super easy.)

I stretched out on the sofa, got nice and comfy with a pillow behind my back, and my little dog (Chipper) jumped up and laid down by my feet, and I worked while my husband played World of Warcraft on his laptop and we watched some TV too. This way I was relaxed, my feet were up, I was comfortable, I was working and still felt like I was spending time with my husband all at once.

It was probably my most productive night of the week and all it took was changing things around a little bit. I confess, I’m actually doing the same thing right now, minus the husband (he’s at work right now) and minus the TV. I could seriously get used to this working with my feet up thing. I think when we find a new house and I finally have an office to myself again I’m going to get a more comfortable desk and chair set up than what I currently have. Comfort is nice.

I’ve also grabbed my netbook and sat outside to work on writing articles, or gone to the park with the kids and worked on a short report while they played. Sometimes just a little change of scenery, a different view out the window, or some fresh air can make the difference in your level of productivity. So, if you’re having one of those days where you’re struggling to find your get-up-and-go try moving your workspace to a different location and see if things perk up.

Don’t tie yourself to the desk, or even to the office. One of the nice things about being virtual and working from home is that you have the freedom to move around, literally.

I hope this makes your workweek a little easier. Have a great day!

Kind Regards,

Today I want to ask you what you want to learn here at VA Helper. I’m putting together the first of many courses, lessons, and interviews here on the site and I’d love to start with your input.

Are you looking to learn a new skill? Do you need some help getting organized? What one thing can I help you with to make your virtual assistant life easier?

Just fill in your question here and submit it – everything is anonymous and there is no such thing as a stupid question. If you are wondering it, chances are someone else is also wondering the same thing. Ask away and I will try to answer as many questions as possible in the first few courses and lessons.

That’s all for today. I’m looking forward to hearing your questions and working together to find solutions for you!

Kind Regards,

This brings up a point of interest for virtual assistants and service based businesses in particular. It’s easy to get caught up in the work and wanting to provide excellent and constant service at all times and then forget to take some time off for yourself. I know, because that has always been me. I am getting ready to unplug for the entire weekend Friday afternoon through Tuesday morning and it will be the first time I’ve done for more than 24 hours in a very long time. I’ll just say that when my family went to Disney World in the summer of 2006 I checked in with work daily…. and I’ll leave it at that.

So, my question to you today is do you take time off for yourself and to spend time with your family? It’s something very important that we all need to do, even if it is only for 24 hours, heck even if it’s only for 12 hours. You need to unplug once in awhile, step away from the high speed internet connection and get back into your life once in awhile. The world isn’t going to implode, your clients are not going to hate you, and nothing bad is going to happen. I promise.

Now, depending on the services you offer you may need to make arrangements with your clients and give them some emergency contact information while you’re taking time off to recharge your own batteries. That’s okay, do that. It’s also a good idea to have an assistant that can handle anything that comes up while you’re offline. Yes, I strongly you to get your own virtual assistant even though you are a virtual assistant!

Partner up with someone you already know or better yet hire someone that doesn’t celebrate the same holidays as you so you can swap holiday breaks. This works out really well in the long term because then neither of you misses a holiday ever again, it’s fabulous. She works for you while you’re recharging and you work for her while she’s recharging and enjoying a holiday.

Find a summer business buddy so you can cover for each other while taking a week’s vacation! Plan your family trips ahead of time and make sure they aren’t the same week and then let your clients know in advance. This is a great way for virtual assistants to help each other, especially if you have kids and are trying to cram in some summer fun before school starts back up.

I hope you take at least one day off this weekend, recharge yourself, relax, maybe even have a beer or two and catch a fireworks display!

Kind Regards,

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The WordPress theme features…..
Top navigation for pages with dropdown list for subpages.
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A folder full of social media icons in the images directory that you can use in your sidebar to link to your favorite social media sites such as Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and more.
omment count bubble on the home page to show off your most popular discussions.
About section in the sidebar that automatically fills from the user settings info. (can be removed easily if you don’t want to use it.)
Easy to edit reserved spaces for banner or adsense advertising.
Post divider on the home page to visually break up the content.
Breadcrumb trail navigation on the single post pages for easy browsing.

To Your Success,

As a thank you for your participation in the survey I’ve included a little win-win scenario for you in the last question I appreciate your time, so I tried to keep things short and to the point.

Thank you for participating!