because it’s all about you!
AVBN Under New Management: Meet the New Team! Tools, Tips Ideas and Competitions!
Take Notes and Action:
tips for following through with ideas
Step Up! Consider your presentation when you step outside the office....
Virtual Angels:
Turbo-Charge your Service Offering todaysva.com.au
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FEATURES 8
Take Notes AND Take Action by Diana Pettie
10
Stepping Up Casual: by Suzanne Dekyvere
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There's Exciting Times Ahead for Virtual Business In Australia! by Monique de Groot
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Industry News by Renee Chapman
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What not to do when you start a Virtual Business by Rosie Shilo
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Virtual Angels by Debra Rhyon
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Virtual Assistants: How you can benefit by using one by Renee Chapman
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What I want Wednesdays A Virtually Yours Project
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Balancing Act by Chris Crowe
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Money Makes the World Go Round by Renee Chapman
editors note:
Hi and welcome to July’s edition of Today's VA! Magazine, that you all take time out, grab a coffee or cuppa tea and enjoy this Edition of Today's VA! Magazine! Welll as you all know it’s been a hectic 6 months or so and we have been busy with new business opportunties, business events, projects and everything in between. We are really excited to be able to share all of our news in the past six months and give you some much needed reading material so that you can relax, take a break and catch up onsome much needed helpful stories. We really are looking forward to making more editions and we hope you enjoy that articles and features we have in store for you in this edition and don’t forget the Virtually Impossible Competition for you chance to win a prize! Please feel free to contact us about any of the articles, competition details, stories or advertising and sit down in your fave chair, print a copy or read from your computer and just chill out, remember this mag is all about you, because you’re worth it! Cheers
Renee & Rosie 4
TODAYSVA.COM.AU
IN EVERY ISSUE
MEET THE TEAM
4
Editor's Note
5
Letter to the Gorgeous Editors
Managing Director (co editor) Renee Chapman www.theadminchick.com.au
7
Online Toolbox
11
5 Minute Profile
15
Industry News
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VA Congratulations!
25
Virtually Impossible!
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Trades & Services Directory
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Rosie's Revelations
30
Feel Good Factor with Renee
Design Director (co editor) Rosie Shilo www.virtuallyyours.com.au Contributors: Monique De Groot Monstar Documents www.monstardocuments.com.au Chris Crowe C Squared Virtual Admin Services www.c2admin.com.au Diana Pettie Hopscotch Coaching www.hopscotchcoaching.com.au Suzanne Dekyvere Air of Distinction www.airofdistinction.com.au Debra Rhyon The POWA www.thepowa.com Enquiries www.todaysva.com.au info@todaysva.com.au Find us on Facebook too! facebook.com/todaysva
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This whole page could be Yours! Contact our sales team for Cheap and Effective Advertising Options in Today’s VA! Magazine. info@todaysva.com.au
TODAYSVA.COM.AU
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TODAYSVA.COM.AU
To all the Virtual Assistants and business managers out there Congratulations for all your hard work and efforts in the last three months or so, we thought we would share your success with everyone out there to show others what you can do with a bit of determination.
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award or has just put in a mammoth effort in the last few months We want to hear about! Contact us at info@todays va.com.au
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Donna Brown, the Work From Home Queen, specialises in helping people become VA's, helping VA's grow their business and helping businesses to work more virtually in general. For more information on how you can best take advantage of the VA industry, call her office on 1300 451 944 for a free complimentary chat to see how her solutions can help you today. www.donnabrown.com.au
Are you looking for a Motivational Speaker to fire up your team? Do you need a secret weapon to get the results you want? Are you looking for ways you and your team can "Get More" in uncertain times? www.warwickmerry.com
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News from Virtually Yours With over 100 Virtual Assistants now members of Virtually Yours, we have a great pool of experienced and giving VAs who are helping each other grow. Working from a home based office can be a lonely experience. It can be easy to lose motivation or to get distracted by day to day tasks - especially when there are kids in the picture! So to realise that I very rarely lose motivation and passion for my business was a really lovely feeling, and one that I attribute to online forums for sole traders working 'virtually'. Members of Virtually Yours provide a variety of services but tend to categorise themselves as 'Virtual Assistants'. This simply identifies that they 'assist you remotely'. They work from their own offices. But it doesn't say much about what they actually do. We have sole traders on the Virtually Yours network who are qualified bookkeepers, website designers, event managers, medical transcriptionists, writers, formatting experts, tender writers, social media experts - and so much more. We can see that the concept of the 'Virtual Assistant' is so much broader now than it used to be, now that almost everyone has accepted the benefits of online service provision. The thing that is really amazing about the 23
Virtual Assistant Industry is that while the roles are so varied, the support and encouragement that VAs often show each other belies how different their skills and experience are. Where else would you expect a bookkeeper to willingly share information about GST to a medical transcriptionist, who is not on their books? And to share said information with 100 other home-based professional? And where else would you expect a social media expert to share a 5 minute chocolate pudding recipe to a web designer to cheer them up after a day of html horrors? - on a VA forum of course! So if you are working from home, and feel a bit isolated at times, I highly encourage you to join an online forum that has dedicated professionals in your field (usually a network of some kind) that you can turn to for advice, support, laughs and friendship. Virtually Yours! Rosie Shilo VA Network Manager www.virtuallyyours.com.au
Time Wasters
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HOW TO GET MORE LIKES ON FACEBOOK by www.theoatmeal.com
ANAGRAM How many words can you find in the scrambled letters.
COLEIMADSAI __________________________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________________________ 26
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A4VB Australia is the Alliance for Virtual Businesses’ chapter in Australia and its role is to provide a local support base for its Australian members under the umbrella of the US-based Alliance for Virtual Businesses. Any A4VB Australian Alliance members will have all the same rights, privileges and training opportunities that the host Membership Organisation has but with a local flavour and a local committee. The role of the host organisation, A4VB, is to provide appropriate information, education, coaching, training, networking and mentoring for up and coming and also existing virtual businesses. A4VB is about learning, sharing and networking to support each other in our business goals and needs. The A4VB is also about building relationships to enable us to work together to further grow and develop our businesses and help them to become strong and profitable. The Alliance is also a place where existing business owners can find their perfect match when looking for their virtual business needs. If you are an aspiring, emerging, or seasoned virtual business we invite you to join our community and share your knowledge, experience and expertise with other encouraging entrepreneurs.
Not a member yet? What are you waiting for! www.a4vb.com.au 29
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