The short answer? Yes.
Odds are, if you’re reading this blog, you need a VA.
The majority of our blog readers are overworked, stressed out founders, CEOs and execs. They have too much to do in too little time. Modern life, right? I feel you.
Someone far wiser than me told me that what Uplevel really sells is time. We help you get your time back so that you can spend it on things that matter more than your administrative work; high level business development for example, or hanging with your kids (they’re only so small for so long…or so I’m told).
A strange myth that seems to have been perpetuated throughout the entrepreneurial ecosystem is that I somehow love admin work and that’s why I founded Uplevel. Um, no. I DESPISE admin work, and execution work in general. I built Uplevel to help save us all from the drudgery that is an exploding inbox, airline check-ins, research into the price for some piece of software we needed to implement yesterday and growth hacking the crap out of Instagram. That’s why I built Uplevel. Because I needed people to do the sh*t I didn’t want to do for myself. Because I didn’t want to continue drowning in product uploads and to-do’s and scheduling appointments. Because, frankly, I’m not super detail oriented, and I shouldn’t be trusted with overseeing minutiae.
So how about you, do YOU need a virtual assistant? Let’s explore this idea together…
YOU’RE RESPONSIBLE FOR REVENUE-GENERATION.
If your main gig is lead generation, marketing, sales, business development…you want to do as much of THAT as possible while avoiding as much of ANYTHING ELSE as possible in your working hours. Like why are you looking for a coffee shop near your prospect’s new office building? Why are you looking up the contact details for so-and-so to be inputted into the CRM system? Stop it. Go sell something. Delegate that sh*t to a VA.
YOU HAVE LOTS OF FOLKS CONTACTING YOU FOR APPOINTMENTS.
If you have important knowledge to share or pitches to attend, you can end up in high demand. This is a great problem to have…but it’s still a problem. Your popularity can quickly leash you to your phone and computer as you try to keep up with scheduling, rescheduling, questions about the location, questions about the meeting agenda, etc. Have a look at the average amount of time you’re spending not IN the meeting, but working in arranging the meeting. Stop the madness. Delegate all of these arrangements to a VA. Focus on being your best self for your clients and prospects.
YOU NEED A LIST OF JUST ABOUT ANYTHING.
A list of marketing agencies. A list of media contacts. A list of packaging supply companies. You name it. If you’re kicking around on the web and LinkedIn looking for this info yourself, you’re wasting some valuable time. My team probably does this faster that you can do it, and they’ve game-ified it so it’s fun for them. Tell me – do you find creating lists fun? Nah, I didn’t think so. (Me neither!)
YOUR INBOX GIVES YOU ANXIETY.
Those 350 messages probably aren’t going to be answered by you today. And maybe they don’t need to be. Let an assistant have at your inbox and go through an categorize them so that you can begin to make sense of it all. And once the categorization is done, have your assistant respond on your behalf to those she/he can. Boom! It’s like an anti-anxiety elixir.
YOUR INSTA/TWITTER/LINKEDIN/FACEBOOK ACCOUNT NEEDS TO BE UPDATED.
And you don’t want to update it. Because it’s fallen to the bottom of your priority list. You have photos, you have potential content to share, even. You just never get around to doing it because it doesn’t feel all that relevant until a client asks if you’re okay because they follow you and they haven’t seen anything from you for three months. Oops. And let’s not even get started on researching hashtags or relevant articles to share. Because who has that kind of time?! (Hint: the Uplevel team!)
Basically… IF YOU HAVE…
TIME SUCKING REPETITIVE TASKS + MORE IMPORTANT THINGS TO DO = YOU NEED AN ASSISTANT
And while having a virtual assistant or remote executive admin assistant isn’t a panacea for all that ails you as an entrepreneur, it’s definitely a great place to start freeing up some more time for the more senior-level work that only you can do. You owe it to yourself and to your business to find more breathing room.
Sound enciting? Jump on a call with our client success specialist, Shirley Srubiski, to geek out more about this stuff and see if a VA really is a good idea for you; send her an email directly at shirley@uplevelsolutions.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Katrina McKay is the quirky and charismatic founder and CEO of Uplevel Solutions; a remote administrative services (VA) company that helps entrepreneurs and executives get back more of their most valuable asset – their time. Katrina is a self-described “entrepreneurship nerd” and has worked with over 100 companies one-on-one as a business growth coach. She is passionate about leveraging entrepreneurship as a tool to do good in the world; reflected in Uplevel’s double mission of helping companies grow while creating sustainable working opportunities for women and LGBT+ folks in the Philippines. She has been an invited speaker at events all over from Los Angeles to Mumbai. For more info on getting started with a VA, email shirley@
