Looking forward to a long weekend?

What a lovely week it has been - many of our clients have used their retainers so I have had a little time to work on my business instead of in it, which has been lovely.?Some big changes coming soon, which I am very excited about ... more details as things evolve - I'm keeping it under wraps for now, as I don't want to jinx anything!

It's also been a great week as we've onboarded not one, not two, but three amazing new clients!?And the diversity of these clients just shows how VAs really can work with any industry.

We're excited to be working with:

• A luxury eco holiday retreat, we're helping with bookkeeping and marketing
• A fast growing construction company, helping with diary management, introducing a new?CRM and other admin tasks
• A successful, busy professional couple who have enlisted our lifestyle support to help them get back on top of the day to day admin

If this sounds like the sort of help you, or someone you know needs, you know what to do!

In my world

This week for me has been all about covid!?And I can tell you it's been really frustrating, as although I have largely felt OK in myself I've stayed in.?I have missed out on some fab networking events, family days out (with it being half term last week) and even on my monthly self-care treatments! (The only positive about being +ve has been locking myself away in the spare room and catching up on trashy TV, guilt free!).

The good news is that yesterday I tested -ve!! Hurray, so will be back on it again next week all being well!?Check out the events where I'll be at the end of this newsletter.

Entrepreneurialism

The best examples of entrepreneurialism I have ever seen

6 years ago this week I was exploring India with my husband, for our honeymoon.?We'd actually got married the year before and had saved up to spend 3 weeks in India.

Whilst we were there, I witnessed the most astonishing examples of entrepreneurialism I had ever seen.?The saying of one man's waste is another man's treasure could not have been more true.?Anything left by the side of the road was taken by others, and made something of.?There were entire shops selling metals, tyres, containers and anything else they could lay their hands on, truly inspiring.

As a new VA having been freelancing for only 7 months I was in awe of the incredible resourcefulness of these business owners.

One day I will get around to sorting the photos of that life changing trip and getting them all into an album, I definitely need one up on the wall to remind me that we really don't have it that hard.

What's the best and most inspiring example of?entrepreneurialism you've seen? Do share.

(pic: The UNESCO world heritage site at?Mahabalipuram)

30 Ways To Use A VA : Data Entry

30 ways to use a Virtual Assistant video series

Check out this week's video on Data Entry?or download the full resource.

Next week sees the last video in our series, and we finish by looking at the added (and unexpected) value that working with a VA can bring to your business.?

TOP TIP FOR THE WEEK

Bookable Schedule in Gmail

We all know of the headache of trying to co-ordinate diaries, especially if there is more than one other person involved!

And there are a million and one tools you can sign up for to help you manage your diary appointments, from Calendly, Acuity, to YouCanBookMe and more. Many of these offer a free plan with limited functionality, but you need to pay to access more appointment types, more initial questioning etc.

This week I discovered that Google Workspace has introduced a booking tool which is already integrated into your Gmail, so no need to have a separate system!

Called Bookable Schedule, you can set up one block of times once, and then share it as many times as you like! When you share a Bookable Schedule to a recipient, a set of available times to choose from will show up right in their email - an easy and respectful experience for both the sender and recipient. For your convenience, any schedule can also be embedded or shared as a link, if you ever need to use it outside of Gmail.

It even has dual time zone support, zoom and google meet integration, personalised invitations and you can add buffer time and other helpful options.

Read more and try it out

I hope you've found this week's content useful, thank you for giving me a little of your time to share my tips with you.

I hope that you are taking time off to enjoy the bank holiday this weekend (for those of you in the UK), and if you are working please try and find some time for some R&R!