Supporting You and Your Business
Ciao,
My name is Martina and I’m a bilingual Virtual Assistant (English-Italian).
I help business owners and entrepreneurs focus on what they love doing, by taking care of their administration.
Business owners like Laura
Laura is a yoga teacher. She runs a very popular studio in Oxford, and offers classes to children, retired people and busy mums, as well as professionals. She gets daily enquiries via email and her Facebook page, from prospective clients. She organizes a yoga retreat in Italy twice a year.
When she’s not doing ‘yoga stuff’, she goes rock climbing with her boyfriend.
But her yoga business doesn’t stop when her studio closes. All too often, when Laura is about to fall asleep, she has flashbacks of that email she didn’t reply to, that payment she needed to chase, the retreat location that she was supposed to book.
A feeling of overwhelm is the last thing she needs at bedtime…
Entrepreneurs Like Paul
Paul is a product development consultant. Whilst the majority of his work can be done remotely, he occasionally has to travel and meet his clients face to face. It’s not uncommon for him to be in Berlin one day, Milan the next and Paris the following one.
Paul cares a lot about getting to know his clients and making the best recommendations for them. He also cares a lot about coaching his nephew’s rugby team, which requires him to be present at two weekly matches.
It’s almost all doable, but Paul has to search and book his own flights and hotels , an extra hassle he could do without.
Clients like Amanda
Amanda is a scientist for a biotech company in London. Her official working hours are 9-5, but she often works late. She also commutes for two hours each day. She loves Tuscany and has spent many memorable holidays there with her husband. She particularly enjoys exploring wineries.
Amanda has a sideline which combines both her passions and over time she has built a website and blog that offer cycling wine tours of Tuscany
Her blog is full of free information, but it also has tailored cycle-wine tasting itineraries that visitors can download for a small fee.
Amanda would like to do more with her website, she would like to post more blog articles and put together extra guides. She would love to establish long-term partnerships with Tuscan wineries and local bike rental companies.
But Amanda also wants to enjoy quality time with her husband in the evenings and weekends. How can she offer more with her website, when there is so little time available?
“If you really want to grow as an entrepreneur, you’ve got to learn to delegate”
Richard Branson
Laura, Paul and Amanda are fictional, but outline the challenges faced by the clients I work with.
You don't have to do everything
There are many advantages to being your own boss, such as flexible hours, freedom to choose who you work with, full control over how your company is run and possible unlimited revenue. If things go as you hope, there is no limit as to how much money you can make.
But there are challenges too. Even though you have flexibility on how and when you work, you may find you’re spending well over 50 hours a week at your desk. You may realize that the freedom you wanted to spend extra time with your family or following your passions is not there after all.
The good news is that you don’t have to do everything. The temptation is there, especially when you first launch your business. But there comes a time when you realize that if you want to grow your business, you need to delegate some of your tasks.
Every hour you spend doing a task that you can delegate to someone else, is an hour taken away from growing your business
All budding entrepreneurs I’ve worked with start off wanting to do everything themselves. I have come across people who had brilliant ideas, and then got stuck at building their own website, designing their own logo, writing their own blog articles, creating a social media presence. That was before they even started to do what it is that they were supposed to do in the first place. That is, serving their customers.
I can help
If you feel bogged down by administration, time consuming tasks, and repetitive work that you hate doing, a virtual assistant may be just what you need.
I have over two decades of secretarial/PA experience, 15 years of which at Director Level, working in the IT, Academia and Research sectors. I have also supported clients from many other industries.
As I am bilingual (English/Italian), I also specialise in assisting Italian businesses in the UK.
What can you expect from your Virtual Assistant (VA)?
It’s very important that I get to know you and your business first, in order to understand how I can help you.
If we decide to work together, I promise to care about your business as much as I care for mine. This means that I will support you in the best possible way to reach the goals you want to achieve.
You may be the sort of entrepreneur who likes total control and is very specific on the kind of support you need. I am happy working my way through specific to-do-lists.
Alternatively, you could be the kind of business owner who takes a back-seat and lets his/her VA decide how to manage all the administration. I can do that too.
However much you want me involved, I am flexible and open.
The details on how I work and what I do are explained here.
Get in touch
I offer a free initial consultation (up to one hour) by telephone or Skype.
You can contact me on LinkedIn, or you can call me on 07941 431 732.
If you prefer email, send me a message at: martina@essenzavirtualpa.com
Alternatively, fill in the form below.
Let’s have an informal chat, and we’ll take it from there.