Although many Virtual Assistants are offering event planning services, when Virtual Assistants are able to team up with Event Planners, the events that they can produce together are phenomenal. Rather than viewing Virtual Assistants as “competition”, Event Planners need to realize what a valuable asset they can be to the success of their event planning business. By having a Virtual Assistant working on the administrative tasks, it frees the Event Planners to focus on the actual event and co-ordinating all the components necessary to make event day run smoothly. Here are samples of some of the ways that Virtual Assistants and Event Planners are able to work together:

1. Mailouts – A Virtual Assistant is able to handle all aspects of your event mailouts including creating the invitations, coordinating the printing, preparing the documents for mailing and ensuring the documents are mailed on time.

2. Database Creation and Management – A Virtual Assistant can prepare a database and maintain that database including organizing the data by event and/or by client and can also maintain your personal contacts as well as business contacts. They can input all the data in one location so that you no longer need to shuffle through several spreadsheets trying to find just the right information.

3. RSVP Tracking – Once the invitations have been sent, a Virtual Assistant can track your RSVPs and call those that do not respond so all you are left to worry about is the actual number of attendees at the event.

4. Research – A Virtual Assistant can research any and all things that you might need researched including possible locations, data for handouts, possible attendees, and the list goes on.

5. Compilation of Giveaways/Gifts – Not only can a Virtual Assistant make phone calls to collect items for you to give to your attendees, but he/she can also put those together and make them look awesome!!

6. Attracting Sponsors/Speakers – A Virtual Assistant can make calls on your behalf to potential speakers or sponsors and take care of sending them information packets about your event.

7. Preparation of Materials for the Event – From information packets to handouts and other materials, a Virtual Assistant can not only prepare the documents, but can also arrange for printing and compilation of the documents.

8. Follow Up – A Virtual Assistant can take care of following up with your attendees, speakers and sponsors with thank yous and surveys.

9. Marketing Assistance – As an Event Planner, you not only have to worry about the events you are planning, but also about your business and attracting new clients. A Virtual Assistant can help you with preparation of marketing materials such as newsletters, blogs, a web site, marketing packages, etc.. He/she can help you attract the clients so you can concentrate on impressing them and landing the next deal.

10. Writing/Editing/Formatting – A Virtual Assistant can be a second set of eyes for all the materials that will be provided to your attendees. He/she can make them look nice, check for errors and omissions and make sure that you are putting your best foot forward.

Once you begin to see a Virtual Assistant as a team member as opposed to competition, you will soon see how your business can blossom and thrive.

Recently I met with a photographer friend and we were discussing my Virtual Assistant business. I had never thought about the benefits that a photographer could gain from partnering with a Virtual Assistant until I spoke with her. Our conversation opened my eyes to a whole new market I had never considered, but the more I thought about it, the more excited I became by the prospects. I started to make a plan and make a list of the ways that such a partnership could be best utilized.

1. Website Maintenance

Utilizing a Virtual Assistant to upload recent photographs, set up client galleries and maintain pricing and availability schedules on a photographers’ website is an invaluable service. Many photographers spend so much time maintaining their website; time they would much rather be utilizing behind the camera. Other photographers utilize their web designers and find that the prices are much higher than a Virtual Assistant’s price and the turnaround time is often longer than a Virtual Assistant’s is.

2. Blog Maintenance

Many photographers have begun to blog about their experiences and share their personalities with prospective clients. Virtual Assistants could easily upload articles, photos and stories to the photographer’s blog and also insert links to helpful information for the photographer’s prospective clients. For those photographers that are not as computer savvy, but realize the advantage of the personal contact a blog can provide, can use a Virtual Assistant that can provide services to, not only maintain your blog, but install a blog as well.

3. Client Contact and Follow Up

Virtual Assistants are a great asset in maintaining client contact on your behalf. A simple greeting, sent in the photographer’s behalf, on a wedding anniversary is one of those touches that not all photographers have the time to provide. Your Virtual Assistant can keep track of the important dates and make sure that your clients are never forgotten. Christmas cards, thank you notes and birthday greetings are just a few other contacts that your Virtual Assistant can make on your behalf. Perhaps you have always thought of sending a survey to your clients. Wouldn’t it be great to have this taken care of for you? Your clients are more likely to provide honest feedback to your VA and your VA can provide you with a summary of the survey results for future marketing and business operation decision making.

4. Email Management

Many photographers would love to have someone reply to the many inquiries they receive via email. Simple messages of unavailability, directing potential clients to online portfolios and a thank you for inquiries are just some of the emails that could easily be answered on a photographer’s behalf. Imagine only having to deal with one email each day with a summary of the emails received and how they were handled on your behalf.

5. Scheduling and Appointment Setting

Virtual Assistants can maintain a calendar on your behalf of availabilities, bookings and appointments with potential clients. By allowing someone else to schedule your appointments, you can spend more time being creative. Your Virtual Assistant would simply work with an online calendar of which you would both have access and would also provide you with daily, weekly, monthly and yearly agendas. Reminder calls are just another way that your Virtual Assistant can assist you in making sure that potential clients are never left waiting and appointments are never missed.

6. Marketing Materials

A Virtual Assistant can work with you to create a portfolio, promo package or other marketing materials required for meetings with potential clients, trade shows and networking events. Virtual Assistants can also create and maintain a newsletter to update past clients and provide potential clients with great information on what is happening in your business.

7. Basic Administration and Research

Typing of contracts, filing, proofreading services, formatting documents and voice mail management are just a few of the many secretarial type tasks that your Virtual Assistant can provide on your behalf. Your Virtual Assistant can also conduct market research to see what your competition is up to and find out what potential clients are looking for.

8. Database Management

A Virtual Assistant can not only create a database of your past and present clients, but they can also maintain this database. They can track important dates and maintain contact with your clients. They can also track prospects and leads, as well as referral partners and potential joint venture partners. Other things that can be maintained in a database are inventory, pricing and promotions. Any data you would like to maintain a list of can easily be accomplished by your Virtual Assistant.

9. Bookkeeping

Even those Virtual Assistants that don’t specialize in bookkeeping services (and several do), can still provide bookkeeping services such as creation of invoices, tracking of deposits paid and accounts payable management. Your Virtual Assistant can work hand-in-hand with your accountant or bookkeeper to ensure that your financial matters are kept up-to-date and worry free.

10. Organizational Tasks and Business Support

Just having a partnership with a Virtual Assistant provides you with the ability to bounce ideas off someone for future development and growth of your business. Your Virtual Assistant will be open to offering you feedback and suggestions in how to better organize your files, time and business for even greater success. After all, if you don’t succeed, neither does your Virtual Assistant.

Remember, the single most important thing about partnering with a Virtual Assistant is that you are gaining an invaluable member of your team. Your new partner will be there only when you need them with invaluable expertise and a drive to succeed and make your business thrive.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Yvonne Weld is the owner of ABLE Virtual Assistant Services and offers administrative and bookkeeping support to busy solopreneurs. She is also the author of The Ultimate Guide to Creating a Thriving Business and Managing Your Thriving Business for Success. For more information and for your free downloads, visit her Web site.

Many business owners of thriving businesses describe their experiences with subcontractors as disappointing and frustrating. Although their thriving business could continue to blossom and grow, they choose to step back and halt their growth rather than deal with the issues of employees or subcontractors. So what is a business owner to do to ensure that their subcontracting experience is positive?

Do Your Homework
Take the time to get to know potential subcontractors. Conduct interviews and obtain references before agreeing to work with them. Never, ever be afraid to test the waters with a “test project” to ensure that the outcome is in line with the standards you have set for your business. Even more importantly, find someone that you feel comfortable being a representative of your company.

Get it in Writing
Even more important than getting a signed contract (which of course I knew that you would do), each and every project should be outlined in detail with no room for interpretation. Make sure that you provide clear and concise instructions and do it in writing. Have the subcontractor review the terms of each individual project and return an acknowledgement to you. Don’t be afraid to ask them to summarize the project in their own words to you and ask probing questions to ensure that they understand what is required of them.

Set Deadlines
When setting a deadline for your subcontractor to complete a project, be sure to allow yourself enough room to correct any errors or omissions that may be made. Many times business owners fall victim to cleaning up subcontractor “messes” at the eleventh hour. Also, don’t be afraid to check in periodically for an update as to the progress of the project and, if at any time you are concerned, let the subcontractor know and never be afraid to “pull the plug” on the project if things are not living up to your expectations.

Set Quality Controls
The most important key to a successful relationship is to set good quality controls. Although it might seem like more work for you, from time to time, ask your subcontractor to show projects to you prior to submission deadlines. If your subcontractor is dealing directly with your client, have them send you copies of the projects when they are complete and, if they are to have no direct contact with your client, make sure that the work is proofed and approved by you.

Honesty is Important
Don’t try to hide subcontractor relationships from your clients and potential clients. In many cases, potential clients will respect you even more if you can admit you can’t do it all. After all, isn’t that what they are admitting by contracting for your services?

Treat Your Subcontractors with Respect
Ensure that you always treat your subcontractors with the same respect you expect from your clients. Give them adequate deadlines and pay them within their payment terms. Once you find quality subcontractors, you will want to do everything you can to keep them.

By putting these six keys in place within your subcontracting model, I am sure that you will quickly see that subcontracting can be a wonderful opportunity to grow your business into the thriving business it is meant to be. Good luck!!

Congratulations! Your thriving business has been so successful that you can no longer keep up with the demands of your clients. You now have two choices: 1) start turning clients away or 2) start looking for subcontractors that you can honestly depend on. As small business owners, we invest ourselves into our business so how could we ever find someone that will have the same qualities and work ethics that have made our businesses so successful?

Develop a Model
Just as any successful business or product needs a working prototype, so too do you need a “prototype” of what your ideal subcontractor will look like. Start writing a wish list of the qualities you want that subcontractor to have: honesty, solid work ethics, skills, etc. If you are having problems with determining which qualities are important to you, take a different approach and start by deciding what it is you definitely do not want. For example, I don’t want someone that is lazy, turns in below par work and misses deadlines. From determining this you will know that you are looking for a subcontractor that works hard and produces quality projects on time.

Interview Your Candidate
You wouldn’t think of hiring a new employee without an interview, so why is it that many business owners don’t feel it is necessary when hiring a subcontractor? By interviewing your candidates, you have an opportunity to ask those tough questions that probe into the qualities of the candidate. Ask probing questions that are based on real-life experiences and ask the candidate to provide examples based on situations they have dealt with. Describe a situation where… Tell me about a time when… How would you handle…? These are all examples of probing questions. Another good idea is to have a trusted colleague interview your candidates on your behalf as well and offer their opinion. They don’t have as much at stake and are likely to give you some real honest opinions.

Give a Test
Don’t be afraid to test the waters by providing your new subcontractor a small task or project to see the results. Perhaps you have completed a project in the past that you know what the results should look like and the approximate time it should take to complete. Maybe a project needs to be complete for your business that you can have them tackle. Before you have them work on projects for your clients, it is good to have a solid understanding of the quality of work they are capable of providing.

Personality Clashes
Personalities are the key reason that most subcontractor/contractor relationships fail. Take a good long hard look at yourself and figure out what is going to work for you. If you are the type of person that finishes projects well ahead of deadlines, how will you work with someone that works better under pressure? If you are a morning person, can you work with a nighthawk? If you are single, can you work with a mother of young children? For many it works best to find someone with similar personalities and values and for others it works to find someone that is the polar opposite to you.

Get References
Last but not least, the most important step to finding a good subcontractor is to get lots of references and follow up with those references. Look at past projects they have completed and talk to others that have worked with them. The best indicator of future performance is past performance so it is very important to know how they have performed on similar projects, in similar situations and for other clients.

Now that you know the best approach to finding subcontractors, you can truly take your thriving business to the next level and ensure it continues to thrive. Don’t look at success with fear and trepidation. Look at it as the honor and joy it is meant to be. Good luck!!