Work at Home
With a little help from my Friends
Paul McCartney is playing in Halifax this Saturday, his only show in Canada too! He’ll be playing on the Halifax Common – a green space meant to be open to share for use by all residents and I believe they are expecting 60,000 people.
Anyhow, in my attempt to win tickets for my brother-in-law, I have been listening to News95.7 and the Beatles & Paul McCartney have been playing over and over in my head. I won’t describe to you the horror I put so many people through today as I sang my song (made up by me) to the listeners of the show - you had to go on air and sing to be in the draw to win.
That’s my segue to, the title of my blog post today! I chose this song to showcase my social media experience this past week to my readers. Social media is more than a marketing channel/tool, it is also about networking and connecting with others.
Last Friday I had a client run into some issues with her Facebook fanpage. I was asked to figure out why it wasn’t working properly. After much searching, I found myself stumped. So… I started putting out my ‘feelers’ to see if anyone else could help figure it out. I used Twitter, facebook and some blogs all weekend and through until yesterday.
Finally this morning, 5 days later, I found the answer with a little help from a friend of sorts; but many ‘friends’ were trying to help me figure it out. These were not people I have ever met, yet they were attempting to help me just the same.
What was in it for them, you might ask? Nothing. So why would they bother? Simple, to help out a ‘friend’ who happens to be someone they have never met and probably never will. Being helpful is the only reason why any of these people made contact with me. Connecting and networking… that’s all it was about and I am so grateful they took the time to help me, and ultimately my client.
The next time you are talking about social media and Twitter and Facebook and don’t seem to get it all… try thinking of it as the water cooler or staffroom in your office. When you are sitting at your office stumped on a problem, where do you turn? To your co-workers in the office… well, social media works in the same way sometimes; the only difference being that the ‘office’ of each party involved most likely spans a great distance and they may never meet face to face.
The ‘bug’ was noticed by Salman Ansari, with Involver . Salman, I really appreciate your help. It was a simple solution, but one that took an extra set of eyes! Involver is a company that has some great Facebook Applications for Pages – definitely check them out! I use them with many of my clients. Salman, you also helped out someone else having the same problem, she contacted me after seeing the posts, and once I found the fix, I passed on the info to ehr as well!
Thanks to everyone else (I hope I do not forget anyone) who helped by retweeting my posts or commenting back on a blog or sending me a message on Facebook or Twitter. I am grateful for the time you gave to me and my problem.
Interested in Social Media?
As many of you know I have been doing some additional training in order to become “certified” as a Social Media Specialist – my kids actually refer to the word “certified” in a much different manner. “Oh there’s Mom, on that Twitter thing” … anyhow, the point of my post today is that many people are jumping into Social Media, even if only to try it out, as truly it may not work for all types of business and people.
If you are looking to do this type of work and want to learn more or even get into social media for yourself , then you may want to try out VAclassroom’s Social Media course .
The course takes you through 8 modules and covers Strategy and Planning, Profile Management, Marketing on Twitter, Facebook, Video and other Social Media channels. Reporting and Online Reputation management is also covered in the course. Read the rest of this entry »
Networking… what method do you prefer?
I have been doing a lot of networking in the past few months. As a new business owner, it’s a real good way to get the word out about your business and services, especially to the local business community. I also do quite a bit of online networking, and I must say both have paid off.
So far I have landed one client from online networking, one through Twitter, and participated in a very interesting “Looking to Hire a VA process” also through Twitter. Local networking has seen more understanding and interest spread about virtual assistants – and I have also landed a client through word of mouth/referrals. Read the rest of this entry »
Why join an online group?
Many fellow Virtual Assistants probably run into this same situation; I have several times lately while networking and discussing my line of work with others.
Recently, when talking to someone about how she can investigate becoming a virtual assistant (VA) herself, I referred her to the online group, VAnetworking. Once she had a chance to look it over, we talked – and she told me she didn’t understand why I would belong to it.
My answer was simple… support! Then I added to it; access to loads of information, meeting other VAs, and learning tips and tricks from them during the weekly networking sessions were a few of the first things out of my mouth. After giving some specific examples, she understood better my reasons. Read the rest of this entry »
A Thank You for my business
2008 started off as a challenging year for our family and has ended on a much better note. We had just moved to PEI from Yarmouth, Nova Scotia in September 2007 and then in March we started the process of moving to Dartmouth, Nova Scotia.
My husband’s job was the reason for all the upheaval, which was hard enough in 2007, but to do it again months later was worse. The kids (ages 12, 9 & 8 years) really took this last move hard, but now that we are here in our old stomping grounds of Dartmouth things are much better.
If you had asked me this past January what I would be doing at the end of the year, I certainly would never have guessed that I would have my own business. A business that enables me to do the work I love, while still allowing me to be around for my kids when they are not in school! It’s my dream job! Read the rest of this entry »
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