Sick of losing your to-do list? Fed up with going from meeting to meeting with no break? Never sure if you’re working on the latest version of a file?
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There are many ways to make running your small business easier. This month’s blog looks at five areas where online tools can help to make your business more efficient and increase productivity.

Hiring a VA to provide holiday cover for your business is a novel idea for a lot of small business owners. The work culture in the UK leans towards the “more is more” approach, with many of us accepting that if you’re a business owner holidays are something other people have. This year with most of us staying in the UK, rather than travelling abroad, the temptation to have a working holiday is even bigger than usual.
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But the last 15 months have been extremely stressful, meaning it’s more important than ever to take a break. Work culture is changing. We see more about self-care being an important part of working life and we are starting to recognise the need to take a break from our businesses, both for personal and professional reasons. After all, if we burn out it’s not going to do our businesses any good at all.

The decision to hire a VA is not always an easy one for a small business owner. Making that first step to paying out your hard-earned cash can be difficult. You’ve built up your business from nothing, so handing over parts of it to a complete stranger can feel daunting, particularly if you’re struggling to see how spending that extra money will benefit you.

However, if you’re finding that you’re spending your evenings catching up on paperwork and client emails, you never seem to have the time to review your business and you’re starting to worry about when you’re going to be able to concentrate on bringing in new clients, then a VA won’t just be beneficial, they are essential.

Read on to find out how a VA will save your business time and money.

OK, it’s not the sexiest headline in the world but stick with me. If you run a business, even a small one where you’re the only person in it, you need to be using templates. If you’re not you’re almost certainly wasting huge amounts of time and energy every time you onboard a new client or send out quotes or invoices, not to mention creating all the other documents that businesses need on a regular basis.

Creating templates is a key thing that I undertake for lots of my clients and it benefits them hugely.

​Here’s why…

April is stress awareness month. With most of us having just lived through the most stressful 12 months of our lives I imagine we’re all feeling the strain right now. As a VA my professional purpose is to reduce stress for my clients by taking on a myriad of tasks so that their day-to-day lives are easier. It’s not possible for everyone to hire a VA though so this month I’m sharing my main tips on how to reduce stress whether you’re a small business owner, corporate CEO or a swamped employee.

It’s National Grammar Day this week. It will come as no surprise to anyone who knows me well, or has ever worked with me, that I love grammar and all things language-related. I’d go so far as to say I’m a recovering grammar-obsessive. I’m one of those people who tuts when they pass the greengrocer’s sign advertising “potatoe’s” and winces when someone writes “I could of done that” on a Facebook post.

Now, I understand that language evolves and the world won’t end if we all end up saying ‘could of’ instead of ‘could have’ in 100 years’ time. Misspelling potatoes isn’t going to make a difference to how many vegetables that greengrocer sells.

But if you’re a small business owner producing documents for your clients and social media channels, how important is it that you proofread and check for good grammar?

Answer: it’s hugely important and here’s why.

As small business owners and sole traders we all wear many different hats. As CEO, Finance Director, Marketing Manager and Customer Service Lead we plan for growth, ensure our business is on a healthy financial footing, work on attracting new clients and ensure that our existing clients’ needs are recognised and met. And we put the Admin hat on to take care of the essential tasks needed to provide our business with structure and underpin everything the other departments do.
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This all mounts up to a lot of work. And while a lot of small business owners will happily outsource to an accountant or social media manager, they can be a lot more resistant to hiring someone to take care of the admin.

“I must get more organised next year.” Needing to get more organised is a common theme among many small business owners and never more so than when we’re heading into a new year. The good intentions and resolutions that we make in January are the perfect context to start putting those systems and processes in place to make our businesses run more smoothly and efficiently. And there’s no better place to begin than your inbox.

It’s the first thing we look at in the morning and most of us dip in and out of our inbox throughout the day. An overfull, disorganised inbox can create feelings of overwhelm more quickly than almost any other area of a small business and the time wasted trying to find past emails is immense – you can waste up to half an hour each day re-reading old emails while trying to find the one you’re looking for.
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Luckily there are some very simple, quick fixes that can help you to break your old email habits and create a beautiful, streamlined inbox (and get you back all that lost time).

You know you’re overwhelmed and struggling with the amount of admin on your plate. And you know you need to outsource some of it to a professional. But when you’re so busy it can be difficult to identify which admin tasks you should outsource. Plus, a lot of small business owners get used to doing everything themselves and get into the mindset of “I can do that, it only takes 5 minutes”.
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The thing is, all those “just 5 minutes” add up to a lot of time in the long run. Leaving you with even less time to decide what you are going to outsource. Luckily for you I’ve come up with a quick guide to 20 easily outsourceable admin tasks that you could hand over to a virtual assistant tomorrow.

Adoption UK is a national charity supporting around 20,000 adoptive families each year through membership, community activities and groups, and other events. Founded in 1970 the charity employees around 100 staff, plus a large number of volunteers.
 
Moving from face-to-face to online
Following the national lockdown in March 2020 Adoption UK were forced to cancel their in-person community support groups. In April 2020 they hired Helen Leach VA Services to assist with moving their community support group services online. Rob Langley-Swain, Director of Membership, tells the story.