Welcome To The Virtual Assistant Podcast!

Virtual Assistant PodcastThe Virtual Assistant Podcast is devoted to introducing small to medium size business owners to the possibility of becoming more productive and profitable through the principle of delegation.

I, Cliff Ravenscraft, hired my first virtual assistant in January of 2010 and it immediately changed the way I do business. Hiring a virtual assistant was one the best business decisions that I’ve made. I became so excited about my experiences that I decided to launch a podcast where I could share my virtual assistant journey and where I could answer other people’s questions about how they could benefit from having their own virtual assistant.

If you like this show, you may also like the Podcast Answer Man, Social Media Serenity, and Business Tech Weekly podcasts. Of course we invite you to please check out the complete list of our podcasts.

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Folks, this is it. This is the final episode of the Virtual Assistant Podcast. My goal when I started this podcast was to produce a show that would expose people in my community to the benefits that I have seen personally from hiring a virtual assistant, to answer people’ questions about this industry, and to lower the barrier of entry for those who might benefit from delegating tasks to a virtual assistant themselves.

I’ve spent months sharing my own personal journey and I feel that I’ve pretty much shared everything I have to share in this space at this point in time. I hope that you have enjoyed this podcast and I hope that you’ll check out http://PodcastAnswerMan.com and all my other podcasts at http://gspn.tv. Also, I’m sure I’ll litter this page with all sorts of other inks and buttons to all the other things I have going online.

I plan to keep the archives of these 38 episodes online as my gift to anyone who might benefit from them. If you think you could benefit from working with me in any of the services I provide in the field of podcasting, new media, and running a business online, please feel free to contact me at Cliff@Ravenscraft.org. Many Blessings!

This is episode is part 2 of 2 where I address the most common fears that people have when they consider hiring a Virtual Assistant. Below are the fears that people have expressed that I address in this episode:

- A little antsy about providing personal / financial information to some one out of my sight and possibly beyond extradition.

- Trusting someone with my confidential information.

- Trusting that someone else could learn my style and personality well enough to truly handle the work as well as I.

- Big mistakes. I feared that a VA would mess up in some terrible way damaging my business.

- Does the VA have a strong business background and technical savvy?

- Is the VA working full time from a professionally equipped home office or typing at the kitchen table while dealing with small children?

- Their website may look like they’re a dream VA, but anyone can put anything they please on a website and, if they’re in another country, who are you going to call to check them out? Even if they give you someone to call (unless it’s a senior partner in a large business or someone whose existence you can check) you could be calling their brother or aunt.

- The word “Virtual” is also scary as people cannot understand how it could possibly work. Most people are also unaware of the vast amount of technology that is available today which makes working with a VA a breeze and any experienced and skilled VA will have that technology at his/her fingertips.

- Anyone considering using the services of a VA must thoroughly research potential VA services until they find one that will be a good fit.

- I’ve been working with VA’s for 3 years. I suggest hiring from a company like contemporaryva.com. They have a boss to whom they answer as well as you. Plus they have a backup trained in case they out of town, get sick or quit.

- Experience has taught that VA’s go MIA for no reason at all at the absolute worst times like the middle of a launch or before affiliates have been paid . . . They tend to allow their personal lives to take priority and don’t have the safeguards in place that most business owners would.

- That they might divulge sensitive or proprietary information to others (i.e. competitors)

-That in the time it took to make arrangements with a virtual assistant, I could have the job done myself.

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Special thanks to Contemporary VA for sponsoring this podcast. This is the firm I, personally, use for my own business. I would not have had the time to produce this show without it making financial sense for me to do so. Their sponsorship has made this show possible. If you get a chance, thank them in any creative way you can think of. If you desire, this is the link to their contact page.

Please call TODAY with your questions on our voicemail hotline at 859-795-4067. Or use your voice memo application on your iPhone to record feedback or questions. Simply email it to feedback@gspn.tv.

Know someone else who needs to hire a VA? Send them an note with a link to http://VirtualAssistantPodcast.com.

Subscribe To The Virtual Assistant Podcast:
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This is episode is part 1 of 2 where I address the most common fears that people have when they consider hiring a Virtual Assistant. Below are the fears that people have expressed that I address in this episode:

- Paying for a virtual assistant.

- Having to re-do the work myself because the quality would not be what I would do myself

- Not using him/her for all the time I paid for.

- Not using my extra time to make more money to turn a profit and also pay for the assistant (i.e., working just to pay the assistant).

- Finding a VA with the requisite skills.

- Will they be responsive to e-mails and communicate regularly? (Every VA I’ve fired — 3 or 4 — have all been fired for being unreachable or unwilling to maintain regular contact…. never because they couldn’t do the job.)

- Will they adhere to deadlines?

- Having enough work for them to do or being able to explain exactly what you want and having them deliver it as well as you could do it.

-It also seems like the overhead of writing a description/instructions for some tasks might take longer than doing the task myself.

- As a small business person and entrepreneur, productivity and profitability are king. I think one of the biggest fears we have is that the time effort and money invested won’t pay off. It seems like a big effort to train someone and bring them up to speed.

- I worry I won’t have enough for him or her to do and that in the time I’ll have to take explaining everything I could’ve just done it myself, and done it better.

- That they’ll do it wrong, which will only frustrate and stress me out, not to mention misrepresent me.

- I will spend the time training them and they will leave.

- I hire virtual assistants to perform administrative tasks, but my biggest fear is hirng a V.A. to perform bookkeeping tasks. It’s something that I need, but I’m very reluctant to pass this along to anyone for fear of someone getting access to my account information.

- Hey Cliff, as an insurance agent (like you were in your former life), I’d really have to put some thoughts into what work assignments I could give them and not violate any of my state’s insurance licensing laws. All of our personnel that work with our clients are properly licensed. Not saying it couldn’t be done, would just have to be careful. You might have some unique insight into that since you are a former insurance agent and now use a virtual assistant.

-Another thought that comes to my mind immediately with a virtual assistant (or anyone on your payroll not working on your premises) would be the always subtle but recurring thought, am I truly getting “the work for the hours I’m paying/being billed for.” What accountability measures are/would be in place to ease that concern.

- Not sure of the cost, so no way to figure the return on investment.

Right Click Here To Download

Special thanks to Contemporary VA for sponsoring this podcast. This is the firm I, personally, use for my own business. I would not have had the time to produce this show without it making financial sense for me to do so. Their sponsorship has made this show possible. If you get a chance, thank them in any creative way you can think of. If you desire, this is the link to their contact page.

Please call TODAY with your questions on our voicemail hotline at 859-795-4067. Or use your voice memo application on your iPhone to record feedback or questions. Simply email it to feedback@gspn.tv.

Know someone else who needs to hire a VA? Send them an note with a link to http://VirtualAssistantPodcast.com.

Subscribe To The Virtual Assistant Podcast:
Zune iTunes RSS Feed

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- My New Virtual Assistant Aimee
- How much easier it is to train the second time around, already knowing what can be delegated.
- Coming to the end of the of this era?
- My thoughts on LastPass as a solution for keeping passwords secure.

Right Click Here To Download

Special thanks to Contemporary VA for sponsoring this podcast. This is the firm I, personally, use for my own business. I would not have had the time to produce this show without it making financial sense for me to do so. Their sponsorship has made this show possible. If you get a chance, thank them in any creative way you can think of. If you desire, this is the link to their contact page.

Please call TODAY with your questions on our voicemail hotline at 859-795-4067. Or use your voice memo application on your iPhone to record feedback or questions. Simply email it to feedback@gspn.tv.

Know someone else who needs to hire a VA? Send them an note with a link to http://VirtualAssistantPodcast.com.

Subscribe To The Virtual Assistant Podcast:
Zune iTunes RSS Feed

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035 Virtual Assistant Podcast – Interview Questions That Helped Me Discover My Next Virtual Assistant

December 14, 2010

In this episode, I share that I have made a decision on who will replace Andrea as my virtual assistant. I will share the list of questions that I used to interview virtual assistant prospects and what I was looking for as answers to those questions. If you want to download my list of questions, [...]

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034 Virtual Assistant Podcast – The Most Devastating News In My Virtual Assistant Journey

December 3, 2010

In this episode, I share that I just learned this week that Andrea, my virtual assistant, has given notice and after the end of the year, she will be leaving Contemporary VA to pursue another job opportunity that she couldn’t pass up. I share my thoughts on how I felt initially about this and how [...]

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033 Virtual Assistant Podcast – Benefits of Hiring A Virtual Assistant Over A Traditional Employee

November 24, 2010

I Hate Getting Forms In The Mail From Government Agencies! I hate getting forms from the government in the mail. My CPA handles most of my business reports and filings. However, occasionally, I will receive a form in the mail that says stuff like if I have more than ten employees within any given month, [...]

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032 Virtual Assistant Podcast – How Your Virtual Assistant Can Help You Survive The Holidays

November 18, 2010

How Your Virtual Assistant Can Help You Survive The Holidays 1. VA can set travel arrangements for you. 2. You can give your VA your holiday card list and the VA can mail out your cards/newsletter. 3. Your VA can have gifts sent to your clients 4. If you’re planning a holiday party, your VA [...]

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031 Virtual Assistant Podcast – Not All Virtual Assistants Provide Equal Value

November 11, 2010

* Not All VA’s Provide Equal Value * Administrative VA v/s Experience Web Help * The need to communicate expectations * Milestone Reports * Tracking Time * How to avoid going over the amount of hours you have on retainer * What to do when it’s just not working out Right Click Here To Download [...]

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030 Virtual Assistant Podcast – Can I Hire A VA To Do Things That I Am Not Able To Train Them To Do?

November 4, 2010

Topics Covered In this Episode: -How can my VA help with my podcast production? -Can I hire VA to do job that I know little about? -Tried out Manymoon.com. I give my thoughts. -I upgraded to Highrise Plus Plan -Andrea researching dental options for my daughter. -My use of Mindmapping with Mindmeister.com My Webinars: Thesis [...]

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029 Virtual Assistant Podcast – How Your VA Can Make You Look Like A Good Son

October 28, 2010

Killer Phone Skills: I share the story of Andrea calling the phone company for my parents’ insurance agency and how their Internet speeds got doubled without any additional cost! Want to learn how to do effective Mind Mapping? My friend and client, Jay Carter, is going to be doing a webinar on effective Mind Mapping. [...]

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028 Virtual Assistant Podcast – Internet Limitations And Hiring Five Virtual Assistants

October 21, 2010

Are you a VA who would like to learn how to configure the Thesis Theme for your clients? http://podcastanswerman.com/thesistraining Plan A Foiled – A Call For Plan B: Have you ever had a brilliant idea, of how your life can be simplified by having your VA take over one of those repetitive tasks that you [...]

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027 Virtual Assistant Podcast – Just Buy The Stinking Software For Your VA!

October 14, 2010

My New Show Notes Process: I’m back to using Google Docs to process my my show notes for my podcasts. Google docs has been improved a great deal with the real time collaboration and sidebar chatting ability. I’ve created a single document for my all my shows and simply give my co-hosts access to add [...]

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026 Virtual Assistant Podcast – How To Promote A Business From Scratch

October 10, 2010

This episode is certainly different from previous weeks. As I shared in the beginning of the episode, the original plans for this week’s episode had to be set aside. This episode was pretty much put together off the top of my head as I answered a question from Dawn Stratton from StrattonVA.com. I certainly hope [...]

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025 Virtual Assistant Podcast – You Have To Make Time To Train Your VA

October 1, 2010

In this episode, Cliff interviews Chris Ducker from VirtualBusinessLifestyle.com. Chris has more than ten years of experience in the world of Virtual Assistance and shares some valuable insights for businesses who are looking to delegate to a VA. Have you taken the time to ask yourself the questions that Chris brought up in this interview? [...]

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024 Virtual Assistant Podcast – What If I Run Out of Things To Give My VA?

September 23, 2010

I actually forgot that I had a virtual assistant and needed to be reminded by a friend of mine. Listen to this episode to hear the full story of how a very important task, that is certain to be extremely profitable, almost didn’t get done. Also in this week’s episode, I provide some ideas of [...]

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023 VA – How Do I Find A VA That Shares My Values?

September 16, 2010

In this episode, Cliff shares an update on how things are going in his own Virtual Assistant journey. One valuable insight that he shared was how he has communicated how he would like to budget 30 hours that he has on retainer equally among each of the weeks of the month and how each week [...]

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022 Virtual Assistant Podcast – The Independent Virtual Assistant Perspective

September 9, 2010

Virtual Assistant Podcast The Independent Virtual Assistant Perspective Right Click Here To Download Up to this point, most of the content related to virtual assistants has been from the perspective of hiring a VA associated with a Virtual Assistant firm, like our sponsor, Contemporary VA. In this week’s episode, I interview Diana Ennen to get [...]

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021 Virtual Assistant Podcast – ODesk As An Outsourcing Option And For Providing Your Services

September 2, 2010

Virtual Assistant Podcast ODesk As An Outsourcing Option And For Providing Your Services Right Click Here To Download This week, I’m delighted to bring yet another interview to provide a unique and refreshing perspective on the topic of delegating and outsourcing. Deborah Richmond, owner of TekkBuzz, is an internet marketing strategist and social media consultant. [...]

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020 Virtual Assistant Podcast – Try Until You Find The Right Virtual Assistant That Works For You

August 26, 2010

Virtual Assistant Podcast Try Until You Find The Right Virtual Assistant That Works For You Right Click Here To Download Today I am joined by Jacqueline Sinfield who is an ADHD coach. Jacqueline is a registered nurse, qualified counselor and has a degree in psychology. Jacqueline was diagnosed with severe dyslexia when she was twenty-eight. [...]

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019 Virtual Assistant Podcast – Should I Hire A Virtual Assistant To Blog For My Business?

August 19, 2010

Virtual Assistant Podcast Should I Hire A Virtual Assistant To Blog For My Business? Right Click Here To Download In this episode, I interview Holly Kile from Contemporary VA to investigate how she has helped business owners by creating a blog for their businesses. In the discussion, we discuss whether or not you should disclose [...]

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018 Virtual Assistant Podcast – What Does It Take To Become A VA?

August 13, 2010

Virtual Assistant Podcast What Does It Take To Become A VA? Right Click Here To Download We have received in and answered a great deal of questions about what a virtual assistant is and how they can can help you to be more effective, efficient, and profitable in your business. Please continue to call us [...]

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017 Virtual Assistant Podcast – Turning Customer Service Over To Your VA

August 6, 2010

Virtual Assistant Podcast Turning Customer Service Over To Your VA Right Click Here To Download In this episode, I have the privilege of talking with Aaron Dragushan. Aaron is an entrepreneur that creates web applications who has successfully delegated all his customer service work to a virtual assistant. Links Mentioned In This Episode: * Freedback.com [...]

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