What an honor to be invited as a featured guest by Jasper Blake and Meredith Eisenberg of “Paycheck to Passion” podcast. I am pleased to share the audio (click here for the link) as well as the entire transcript within this post. Jasper and Meredith were gracious hosts and I appreciated their thoughtful and insightful questions. Enjoy!
Welcome to the Paycheck to Passion podcast where we share stories of everyday entrepreneurs who are making a living from their passions and how you can too!
Today we’re interviewing Jaimie Skultety of Upscale Your Business. Jaimie is one of those people who helps online businesses succeed. She’s a virtual assistant.
She spent 20 years in corporate America, and she rapidly advanced from secretary to senior administrator, and she’s done everything as a secretary and as senior administration, every single task possible, and then finally, hung out her shingle in 2009, as a virtual assistant.
She’s been featured in Savvy Business magazine, Forbes.com, in the South Florida Business Journal, and the South Florida Business Spotlight in the Gables home page.
She is an expert in how to work with a virtual assistant to get the things done in your business that you need to get done. In this call, she gives a lot of tips and tricks for outsourcing better. It’s definitely worth a listen.
So, Jaimie, you’re known really for providing virtual assistant services to other businesses, and also some social media marketing, and even in respect to helping them to automate some of their systems. Perhaps you could tell us a bit about how you came to do that and some of your background. I understand that you came from like 20 years experiencing corporate America, and then left to start this business up, so perhaps you could tell us a bit of that story.
Yes, I’d be happy to do that.
I have over 20 years of executive office experience. I’ve worked for large companies and small companies.
My last position, I actually worked for my parents. They had two furniture showrooms, and I ran their internet sales division. I was fortunate enough that at the time, I had an infant son, and I decided to leave the job that I was currently at. Once I had my son, they asked me to come and work for them. Terrific. Fabulous. Thought I’d have job security the rest of my life and maybe take over their business. Unfortunately, when the economy hit in the U.S. where everything was a problem, my parents ended up having to close their businesses, and I was faced with having to find another job.
A couple of people that I knew had recommended to me to become a virtual assistant, years prior, actually. And I said, “You know, I’m really comfortable. I have a great job. I’m making good money. I work for my parents and I get to have my son at work with me.” I had a crib and a nursery all set up, but I lost my job, and was faced with having to find another one. So I decided I’m going to actually go in, with my friends’ advice, (a friend and a business coach I consulted with) actually suggested I should be a VA, and I went ahead and started my own business. And within two days, I had my website up and one of my friends actually became a client. She started referring business to me and it grew from there. I was able to market my services and find clients rather quickly.
Throughout my journey though, I learned about social media for being able to market my own business and that was strictly the purpose. I would do a Google search and find out how to set up a Facebook page and one thing led into the next. I found myself hitting some really great strides in learning about social media. I then started sharing ideas with my clients and found that that was another way that I could offer these additional services to them. So that whole component sort of elevated the income earning opportunity for me and I’ve been able to help my clients as well.
So how long have you been doing that as a business?
Since June of 2009. It did take a while to get to a certain level, but I’ve gone through all the pitfalls and stumbled my way through it; found what worked, what didn’t work. I found new ways to innovate my marketing, and now I have a lot of referral business, so much so that I’m really at a waiting list point for that type of business, for my regular VA services.
I’m starting to transition more into actually being a coach for other new or struggling virtual assistants. I’ve learned all of my lessons and I’ve had a lot of virtual assistants actually contact me. They find my website, however they get there, (probably through social media), and I have a lot of interest from other Virtual Assistants who contact me and say, “Could I get some advice from you? Can I pick your brain?” And I’m always happy to give out free advice, but what was happening is I found myself spending a lot of time on the phone regularly dispensing advice. I would find myself a couple hours in going, “I really need to get back to work.” So I decided I have a lot to say and a lot to share so I first wrote a book and I’ve developed a coaching program all around what it takes to have a successful VA business, because I have been there and done that, and I can help to shortcut the path for other virtual assistants who are embarking on this journey.
So do you see that there’s a growing need for virtual assistants? Have you seen that grow over the years?
Yes, absolutely. When I first started, people were having a hard time figuring out how to delegate to somebody that is offsite and understanding the value of having a virtual assistant. Could they justify the expense? I would argue that it’s a necessary investment for your business, and these days I have found people to be a lot more receptive to it.
My niche market is actually business and life coaches, that’s who my ideal client is. A lot of those coaches have had coaches themselves who have actually suggested to them that they need to have a virtual assistant. There is no way that you can run all of your empire by yourself, it just can’t be done.
So more and more people, not just coaches, but people in general, small businesses, solopreneurs, they need that help and the support and they don’t necessarily have the office space or extra equipment. Having someone in their house on a regular basis doesn’t really work for them, so the virtual component is actually becoming much more widely accepted and sought out. People are being coached also, if they have business coaches themselves, that a virtual assistant is an absolute necessity for their business.
Right. And explain to our listeners the kind of tasks that you’re asked to do and sort of how many hours per client that you generally operate.
Personally, most of my clients fall within about a 10 hour a month time period. I offer my services not on an hourly basis, but more of a retainer package, but within their package, they get a certain amount of hours that are included. It ranges from social media to just general admin, as far as scheduling, setting up their TimeTrade link, which most of my clients use.
One of the other valuable items that my clients really value is I offer a business operations manual. So from the time that we start working together, (and I always feel the earlier the better), so if people are just starting a business, a virtual assistant is someone who can help you with an operations manual right from day one, and it’s very helpful. It’s where we start documenting all of their processes, their procedures, the step-by-step, the templates, the emails so that every response is documented and it’s updated on a regular basis. An Operations Manual makes it easy to get your hand on just the right script.
When people land on a company website, they typically have some questions, and they may send an email to have their question answered. So it’s how you respond to those questions, and when you get the same ones over and over again, it’s really good to have that all documented. It’s a simply copy, paste, customize, and send.
So that’s one of the really valuable tools that my clients really do get a lot of value from. I put that document into a shared collaborative workspace, for example, Dropbox, so they have access to it. They can have access to all of their templates and scripts 24 hours a day, so if my client wants to respond to an email on their own, they certainly could.
Another way that I help my clients is setting up an email address with their domain, so it might be assistant@, or it could be Jaimie@; my clients all have different preferences, but where I respond to their potential clients or their clients directly. Their clients have no way of knowing that I’m actually virtual for my client. It has the appearance that I’m actually sitting outside of their office. So it sort of elevates their reputation in just having an assistant, period, whether I’m virtual or not. So that’s another very helpful thing is that I manage their follow-up and their pipeline, so when a prospect contacts them, it typically takes about three touches to actually turn that prospect into a client or to actually get them to schedule a consultation. They reach out to my client to say they’re interested in their services. I will respond and say I’d like to schedule a time for you to speak. Then I don’t hear back from them. Most people, at that point, especially without a virtual assistant, they kind of let it fall off the radar. They’ve reached out once and that’s it. I would argue that, and I know for a fact, two times, and even three times is the charm.
So by the time you’ve written to them the third time and you say, “You know, I’m not going to be a pest, but I do want to make sure that your request is followed up on properly. At this point, for our final contact, would you like to schedule that consult?” And they might have gone off in the time since they initially reached out, figured they don’t need the support anymore, but by the time I’ve reached to them for the third time, they’re like, “You know, I do need to speak to that person. Yes, let me take that appointment,” and then typically, they’ll become a client.
That has been the case for many of my clients. So a virtual assistant, if they’re handling your follow-up properly, they will actually help get business for you.
There’s virtual assistants who I consider task-based, where you know what you need to have done. You provide them the steps for what you want to have completed, and they will carry out your mission. And a lot of people actually have that in their head that they’re going to have to hold a VA’s hand and that can be a deterrent to hiring a virtual assistant. But if you have someone who really can look at your business on the whole, understand how it should flow and work and they have knowledge of business processes, and all of that, it generally just gets handled and they can help you to actually increase your income and your client base.
Presumably, your clients come from all over America, maybe even Canada as well. How do you juggle the whole time zone thing? The last thing that you want to do is have somebody calling you at 9 o’clock at night and say, “Oh, I need my website fixed.” How do you manage that?
I have very clear parameters. When a client starts working with me, I send a welcome kit both online then I actually do go the extra step and drop it in the mail. I think that’s just a nice touch that they don’t expect since I’m virtual. So they receive an email copy and a hard copy and one of the things I include in that welcome kit is a client guide, which is really my business policies and procedures, and I clearly outline here’s all the ways that you can contact me. I give them my phone numbers, and all of my contact information, including emergency contact information. My clients are very respectful of my time. They understand that I have other things in life. I have a family and most of my clients do as well, so they are very respectful of that.
But to address your question about time zone issues…I have found with the feedback that I have gotten is that it works for all of my clients. I have a lot of clients on the east coast, where I am, and so those are the clients that I’ll deal with first thing in the day for my workload, and then I’ll start addressing things for clients on the west coast, unless, of course, there’s an urgent project that needs to be tended to. And my clients on the west coast always appreciate waking up and having my responses in their inbox by the time they get up and start their day.
So everybody is satisfied. Nobody feels that they are being overlooked. I’m very good at managing my time, monitoring what I’m putting in for them and prioritizing. That’s very important, especially when you have several clients. You do have to juggle a lot. You have to multitask. But if you’re organized about it, and you structure your day properly, it really is fun to click-through all of the projects and check off the To Do list.
How has working virtually like this made a difference, in terms of your daily life? There must be a big difference to working in that way than say back in the days of the corporate jobs where you had to be there from 8 till 5 everyday kind of thing; how has that made a difference?
Well, a lot of times, I tend to wake up pretty early. I’m just an early riser. I have a child we get off to camp or to school, so I’m up pretty early, and the beautiful thing is that I can just step right out just a few feet away from my bedroom is my office, and it’s sort of a blessing and a curse.
Actually, for me, it’s a blessing. Because if I can’t sleep, let’s say, or I wake up early and I things on my mind, rather than thinking about them, writing them down, and waiting until I get to the office, it’s right here. So sometimes I might want to wake up at 3 in the morning and do some work, and maybe it’s not for clients, maybe it’s to help me grow my business, and that’s a very positive thing for me; maybe some people would not agree, but I think that that’s a benefit.
I think about my friends who wake up very early, have to get showered and fully dressed in business clothes, and get into the car, get gas, pick up their coffee, get to the office an hour or two later, and then they have to leave and do it all over again. I can’t even remember how I did my life when that all was going on. It’s just a great thing. Honestly, I can go grocery shopping in the middle of the day, if that’s what I so choose to do.
And so it’s just a much better lifestyle. I work in shorts and a t-shirt, if I feel like it. If I go out to a networking event, or a business meeting, or a mastermind group, I will doll myself up, but it is kind of nice to just throw on a pair of shorts or jeans and sit at my desk and look at my window and see the beautiful palm trees and all of that.
Yes, absolutely. That was going to be my next question. Do you work in your jammies?
I’ll be honest on that, sometimes yes, I do, and that’s not a bad thing.
Now we have a major section in the show where we ask people about their favorite book and how it’s influenced their business. And I know that you have just brought out your own book, in terms of really teaching people how to become virtual assistants, so I’m quite happy to let you talk about that as your favorite book, but if you have another one as well, then by all means share.
Thank you very much. Yes, I guess I’ll talk about my book and I’ll give a little thought to my favorite book; I have several.
I’m in the middle of one right now actually called ‘Launch’, by Jeff Walker. It’s all about launching a book, or a program or a product, and that kind of thing, so I’m kind of in the middle of that, so I’ll say that that’s my favorite at the moment, but there are tons of business books and magazines that I read on a regular basis.
And thank you for letting me share about my book. It’s called ‘Upscale Your Virtual Assistant Business’. My regular business, my virtual assistant business is called UpscaleYourBusiness.com, so this is sort of that play on words Upscale Your Virtual Assistant Business.
It’s really for new and also struggling VAs. You know, it certainly could be for people who are considering possibly becoming a VA, maybe to understand what all goes into developing your business, and doing your marketing, and all of that, and for them to decide if they feel it’s a good fit for them, but it has it all. It’s about having joyful workdays (when you want to work), and make more money than you ever thought possible, and that is the truth. There’s a lot of ideas and strategies in the book.
I’m not really teaching how to become a virtual assistant. I mean, I give ideas of what kind of things are required, but it’s heavy on what kind of character and traits are desirable for clients to want to work with you in the first place, and then how you’re going to keep those clients is equally as important. Getting clients is a challenge, but keeping them is just as important. And it’s important in the way that you come across, your integrity level, and all of that, so I address specific things you can do to ensure you keep your clients and have consistent referral business so you are not always in the cycle of having to find new clients on your own.
My book is a pretty quick read; pretty simple and straightforward. There are lots of ideas that people could take and adapt for themselves. I also have a self-study coaching course where I go a lot deeper into a lot of the concepts and share a lot more information and detail, specific things that people can do to really upscale their virtual assistant business.
Right. Very cool. I’m sure you have to be a very particular type of person to be able to juggle half a dozen clients at once like that. You’ve got to be very organized, I would think. Do you sort of go into how people can sort of self-determine whether they are right for that kind of work?
Yes. There’s a whole section in the book about character and traits, and those are kind of the things that I highlight, what it does take. You’re absolutely right, it’s not you can just say, “I feel like I’m going to do a home-based business and I’m going to be a virtual assistant.” If you really don’t have some inherent traits, you may not succeed. It is very important that you are organized and that you are somebody who is passionate about this type of work.
I struggled a long time. My story about this is most of my adult life working in offices, although I was good at what I did, and my bosses all valued me, and I loved the work, I felt passionate about it, when somebody would meet me at a party and they would say, “What do you do for a living?” I would kind of almost minimize myself and say, “Well, you know, I’m a secretary. Just a secretary.”
And so to now have this real proud feeling of wisdom I’ve gained, and all of that and to say, “I’m a business owner.” And I love what I do. I am passionate about it.
I meet other people who are in the administrative field, and a lot of them are feeling sort of iffy about whether or not their job is still going to be there. They’re not feeling appreciated. They’re not feeling valued in the pay that they are making. So I always say if you are passionate and you are really good at this type of work and you love it, you can really upscale how you feel about yourself. All around, it’s just a fabulous career choice, if this is something that you’re passionate about, it really is.
Yes, I get that. I can certainly hear the passion in your voice as you describe it.
Thank you.
That’s good to hear. That’s definitely good to hear. Now you must have some favorite resources to share. There must be lots of different tools that you use on a regular basis.
Funny you should ask, because absolutely, I actually offer that as one of the bonus items in my program is a resources rolodex, and I think it’s 3 or 4 pages long. It has all the hyperlinks, and it describes all these programs and online services and tools that I use in my business, how they work, why they work, and why you should use them. There are certain things that are absolutely vital.
Email marketing newsletters, there’s AWeber, there’s ConstantContact. You have choices, but I talk about the ones that I’ve used, and I also share some of the ones that I just know about, and I do offer that in the program.
So, yes, I absolutely do have tons of resources that I love to share. I share them with my fellow business owners, I share them with my clients, and I share them with friends who have businesses, and all the time, they’re going, “Oh, my gosh, you just are so full of resources for my business.”
So what is your absolute all-time favorite one?
That’s hard to narrow down, there’s a few of them, but I’m going to go with this one called Todoist. It’s To Do List, but without the “L”. So Todoist.com.
Unfortunately, it doesn’t work with Microsoft 365, at least not yet, but the standalone version of Microsoft Office in Outlook, and it’s also web based, so you can access it with Google Chrome and Firefox.
What it does is when I have a client that sends me an email and they have a project they want me to work on, I’m able to take that email and actually turn it into a scheduled task. So I could say this is something I want to do today, or maybe I want to postpone this one till tomorrow, so it has all those features. My day starts off with me reviewing my emails, and kind of ‘shooing’ things over Todoist, and it sort of maps out my day for me. You can prioritize. You can say priority 1, 2, 3, 4. You have flags that are red, dark blue, light blue, and then white, and so you can really prioritize your day. And it also sorts it by client. So if you just want to work on a particular client’s project, and they have several, you can group it that way.
And when you go to that Todoist task, and you click on it, it actually will bring you right to that email so that you don’t have to go digging for the email and say where was that project again? It’s all right there. So that’s my absolute favorite tool.
Very cool. We have a regular segment in the show that we call, “The Time Machine.” If you could go back in time and talk to yourself when you first started out, what advice would you give to yourself, know what you know now?
Hmm. Okay. So my favorite piece of advice for myself if I’m looking back on when I first started my business, the time machine, I would say don’t be afraid to fail.
Every challenge that I’ve had has actually forced me to innovate; things that I never thought that I would do. I always say if I had business just knocking down my door, I would’ve just stayed complacent and comfortable in that, and so I’ve been able to really upscale my business. What’s next on the marketing agenda? I always sort of saw my business from day one as I’m going to have sort of a mini empire. That’s how I envisioned it, and I’ve always lived in that thinking.
Like I said, if business came to me very easily, I probably would’ve remained very comfortable, so I’m very grateful for all of the time that it was a struggle, if I had to take new programs, or join a mastermind group, or be involved in different programs, read more books. So I’m glad that it was not as easy as it could have been. I’m actually grateful for the times it was a little difficult because of that.
Very sound advice. Now if there’s somebody who is interested in the idea of becoming a virtual assistant and earning a living online, what 5 tips can you give them to really get them started?
Just to start this type of business? Five tips. Creative name for your business would be one.
A creative website that answers your potential clients’ pain points; to really demonstrate right on your website how you can help your clients to alleviate any stress in their lives. My tagline on my business is stress relief for overworked entrepreneurs, and I think that really says a lot.
So the next point, point number 3, would be to have a scheduling link and a needs assessment form right on your website. Make it easy for clients to get to speak with you.
I also recommend more so than an hourly plan, is a monthly retainer with your clients. If you’re trading dollars for hours, it’s going to be a bit of a struggle, and you kind of never get out of that cycle, so that’s another piece of advice.
And lastly, learn for yourself. Learn to do social media. There’s tons of programs and free resources out there. Do a Google search how to set up a Facebook page or how to use Twitter effectively. Learn for yourself, and everything that you learn for yourself you can then share with your clients, and your clients will be very grateful. They’ll never want to leave because you’re always full of great ideas for them. I think that’s 5.
That’s great. Fabulous. So if people want to learn more about you, or maybe work with you, what’s the best way for them to get in touch?
They can actually download a free chapter from my book via UpscaleYourVABusinessBook.com.
If they’re interested in some private coaching, or even doing my self-study program, they can visit the website which is actually UpscaleYourVirtualAssistantBusiness.com. They can learn more about private coaching, and also, my self-study program which really encompasses a lot. So all the details will be there. And certainly, they can email me directly, and I just want to spell out my name because Jaimie is a hard one. J-a-i-m-i-e@UpscaleYourBusiness.com.
Fabulous. Well, thank you very much, Jaimie. It’s been really interesting. And I think, as you say, it’s a growing profession. It’s great especially, I guess, for women who’ve got kids to bring up as well. You’ve at least got an element of flexibility to your day.
Yes, absolutely.
I think it’s very informative and I think more power to you for helping others do what you’re doing.
Thank you very much. I appreciate your time and the interview. I’m very grateful for the opportunity.
I’m very passionate about this work and I am passionate in trying to help upscale the VA community, so if I can address that too.
I have a lot of clients who actually come to me after hiring a VA, or several different VAs who sort of disappointed, so if I can throw some information out there that might actually help people to understand what it takes to, as I said, get and keep, that’s the most important part, keep your clients, and then get referral business on top of that, then I will have accomplished my mission.
Although your VA business model may not be the same as mine, I hope these examples have provided some helpful ideas for you to consider and that I have provoked you to think of ways you can enhance your own cyber-clientele relationships. I would love to hear your feedback, so please leave a comment below.
Contact me so you can find out more about how you can take your VA business to the next level.