Getting Help Sooner Rather Than Later – 5 Steps to Take When Hiring a Virtual Assistant

Getting Help Sooner Rather Than Later – 5 Steps to Take When Hiring a Virtual Assistant

Getting Help Sooner Rather than Later – 5 Steps to Take When Hiring a Virtual Assistant

One way to make progress in your business a lot sooner, is to outsource some of the tasks that other people can take off of your plate. When you focus on the things only you can do such as work with clients, run your programs, show up on video and expand your circle of influence, you will feel less stressed, more productive and can actually earn more money.   

But how do you get started when it comes to hiring a virtual assistant?

In today’s episode of The Wellness Business Podcast, you’ll discover…

  • The 5 steps you should take when hiring a virtual assistant that will set that working relationship up for success right from the start
  • A list of questions you can ask past references to get a feel, ahead of time, if this virtual assistant is a good fit for you
  • Our very best pro-tips that you should consider when hiring a virtual assistant whether they will be filling an ongoing support role or taking care of one-off tasks for you

Karen and I both use multiple virtual assistants in our businesses. If we didn’t, we would never be able to keep up with the daily and weekly tasks that are demanded by our businesses.

As an example, for this podcast alone we have a podcast editor, someone else that posts our weekly episodes to the podcast blog, and then we each have our own VA’s that post our weekly podcast episodes to our individual websites, as well as we each have our own social media managers that create our podcast graphics and schedule our posts accordingly. That’s six virtual assistants between the two of us just for the podcast.

To be transparent, in the beginning of our businesses we both waited way too long to get virtual support. Knowing how that negatively affected our businesses and health we felt it was important to give you these 5 pro tips so you can hire help sooner rather than later.

Here are 5 Steps to Take When Hiring a Virtual Assistant

Step #1 – Determine your business needs – While it would be great to outsource almost everything in your business there are some things that only you can do. The flip side is that there are certain tasks that should be outsourced because your time is better spent elsewhere.

To figure out where you should begin, start by making a list of day-to-day or one-off tasks that you would like support with. This will not only help you get clarity about where you want help, it will also help you decide if there is overlap between tasks so one person could handle more than one thing.

Step #2 – Set clear objectives – In order for you to establish a win-win relationship with your virtual assistant, you need to set clear objectives from the start. When we first began our journey in hiring a VA we tried to find someone that could do it all for us. The idea of having one person that knew the ins and outs of our businesses felt like a dream come true. But we quickly realized that not only is it unrealistic to expect one person to be an expert in all things, it also set the virtual assistant up for failure. Not a great way to kick things off.

Now, when we hire someone, we look for someone that specializes in a certain area that meets the needs of our objectives. The clearer you can be about your job description, due date, and pay structure the more likely all of your objectives will be met.

Step #3 – Check their communication skills – Searching for virtual support is now a global opportunity. You have the ability to connect and work with people from anywhere in the world. That is a tremendous opportunity as long as there is clear communication between the two of you.

One of our favorite ways to make sure we’re a good match for a virtual assistant is to do a test project. As an example, when Karen was searching for a new social media manager she posted a job description, went through the applicants previous work history as well as the portfolios they submitted and then she chose her top 3 candidates. She reached out to each of them and asked if they would be willing to create 3 social media posts and graphics for her Instagram account. She offered to pay them 1 hour of wages based on their preferred hourly rate from their application and she gave them a due date.

Believe it or not, one gal missed the due date and never reached out to Karen. When Karen contacted the VA the next day, she offered a reason why she was late so Karen set a new due date for her. Once again, she missed the deadline. When she did finally submit her posts and graphics, Karen already knew that she was not a good fit because she could not meet a promised deadline. Communication is key and at no time did she take the initiative to let Karen know she was going to be late in submitting her posts. Not a great first impression.

Maria on the other hand, went above and beyond. She researched Karen’s social media and her website. Her trial posts and graphics were ideal client specific, and incorporated her marketing message, so she was hired. 

Step #4 – Ask for their portfolio and/or references – One of the easiest ways to find a great virtual assistant is to ask your colleagues. Karen and I have shared our virtual resources with one another for years and it’s always been a great fit.

If the work you want done is something visual, like social media graphics, pdf creation, or video editing, then it’s easy to ask them to provide a portfolio that includes multiple examples of projects they’ve completed in the past. If they are truly a professional virtual assistant they will already have this created ahead of time which means they can supply the link easily.

If you’re looking for general virtual support with things like email management, calendar bookings, organizing Dropbox, customer service replies, etc. then that’s not as easy to put into a portfolio. This is a great opportunity to ask for references. References are people that you can reach out to that have worked with this person in the past that will share their feedback about what they think of your potential hiring candidate.

Being prepared with a few questions ahead of time that you can ask the reference will make this process go more smoothly.

Here are 5 sample questions you can ask:

  1. How long did you work with the virtual assistant and what tasks did they perform? This question will help you understand the length and nature of the previous working relationship and the tasks the virtual assistant has experience in handling.
  1. Can you describe the virtual assistant’s communication skills and responsiveness? As communication is a crucial aspect of any remote working relationship, this question will give you an idea of how well the virtual assistant communicates and responds to queries and requests.
  2. How well did the virtual assistant adapt to new tasks and challenges? This question will give you an idea of the virtual assistant’s problem-solving skills and ability to handle new tasks and challenges.
  1. Can you describe the quality of the virtual assistant’s work and attention to detail? This question will give you an idea of the quality of work that the virtual assistant delivers and whether they pay attention to detail.
  1. Would you recommend this virtual assistant to others, and if so, why? This question will give you a sense of the reference’s overall impression of the virtual assistant, and why they would or would not recommend them.

Step #5 – Start small and build your skills as a project manager – In any good employer / virtual assistant relationship, both people need to bring their A-game to the table for it to be a win-win. I’ve found that oftentimes, the quality of the work being delivered to me is determined by how well I’m doing my job as the business owner and project manager. That’s why I like to start with smaller projects and progress from there over time as we build a relationship.

Here are some things to think about when hiring virtual support:

  • Are you clear in what outcome you want to receive by providing examples, clear specifications, due dates, pay structure, milestone check-ins, etc.
  • Are you meeting any expectations put on you by the project such as delivering sample screenshots, brand colors, user names and passwords for necessary platforms, etc. If you aren’t meeting deadlines you’ll be showing your virtual assistant that you do not put a priority on deadlines so why should they.
  • Rome wasn’t built in a day and neither will the relationship you have with your virtual assistant. It takes time to build trust on both sides so starting with smaller projects, getting great results, course correcting as needed, and moving forward in incremental steps is a recipe for success.
  • If your working relationship with your new virtual assistant is going to be ongoing, rather than a one-off project, let them know up front that you’ll start them off with a 90-day probationary period. After 90 days plan to have a meeting to see how things are going on both sides. Is it a good match? How’s the communication? Is there anything you can do to make their job easier? Great communication works both ways and this is a great way to set clear expectations and parameters of the first 90 days.

What is one task or project you can start outsourcing in the next 30 days? Once you get started with outsourcing, you’ll wonder why you didn’t start sooner!

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ChatGPT: The Ultimate AI Assistant 
for Wellness Business Owners

ChatGPT: The Ultimate AI Assistant 
for Wellness Business Owners

ChatGPT: The Ultimate AI Assistant for Wellness Business Owners

Imagine if you could cut your content creation time in half, quickly generate attention-grabbing titles, topics and outlines for your blog posts, free offers and have compelling copy for your sales pages.

The good news is that now you can and it’s only the tip of the iceberg of what AI tools can do for you.

Artificial intelligence online tools are here to stay and when you understand what’s possible and how to use them in a productive and ethical way, you’re going to wonder how you lived without it. We are focusing on one AI tool in particular, and that’s ChatGPT.

In today’s episode you’ll discover:

  • What ChatGPT is and how it’ll work for you in your wellness business, (it’s going to quickly become your favorite online tool).
  • A list of content creation ideas that ChatGPT will make easier and save you tons of time in reaching your dream clients.
  • How this new artificial intelligence platform will help you brainstorm ideas, outline and structure content, generate content, and optimize your content SEO.

ChatGPT is an Artificial Intelligence powered chatbot that uses natural language processing to communicate with humans in a conversational manner. It is a type of language model that has been trained on a vast amount of text data, enabling it to understand and generate human-like responses to a wide range of queries and questions.

There are many ways you can use ChatGPT in your wellness business and today we are going to touch on just a few. Truthfully, we know that we have only scratched the surface ourselves with its capabilities but we’ve been having a blast with it. We’ve used it to create new freebies, podcast episode titles, and sales page copy. In fact, to put it to the test we had it help us create the outline for this podcast episode just to see how easy it can be.

Our main focus today is to walk you through what ChatGPT is and how it can help you quickly and easily create content for your wellness business. This includes blog posts, new free offers, program content, keyword rich titles, topic-specific lists, social media posts, attention-getting email subject lines, etc.

We are going to demonstrate this by walking you through how we had ChatGPT help us draft this podcast outline.

Before we get into that, let’s talk about how you can join ChatGPT. It’s a simple as giving them your email address so you can create your own private login. The link to join is: https://chat.openai.com and you can join for free.

Once you sign up for ChatGPT you then get access to their platform chat page. Essentially, it’s a box with a blinking cue waiting for you to give it a command or ask it a question. It’s waiting to have a chat with you.

For outlining this episode, we started by asking ChatGPT the following question – “Please draft a podcast outline that explains what ChatGPT is and how it can be beneficial for an online business owner.”

In a matter of moments, we had a complete podcast outline, that after reviewing it included approximately 50% of what we wanted to share but it was a great start.

Next, we gave ChatGPT this command – “Please give me an explanation of what ChatGPT is and how it works.”

Within seconds we had this reply…

“ChatGPT works by using a deep learning algorithm that processes the input it receives from users and generates a response based on its training. The more data it is trained on, the more accurate and contextually relevant its responses become. This allows ChatGPT to provide personalized and helpful responses to users, making it a powerful tool for businesses to use in customer service, lead generation, and other tasks.”

Our next question was: How can ChatGPT be used to create content like blog posts, articles, and keyword rich titles?

The response said…

Here are some ways in which ChatGPT can be used for content creation:

  1. Brainstorming ideas: ChatGPT can be asked open-ended questions related to a topic or industry, and it can generate a list of potential ideas or angles for content.
  2. Outlining and structuring content: ChatGPT can help to structure a blog post or article by suggesting subheadings, bullet points, or other structural elements.
  3. Generating content: ChatGPT can generate content by using the input of keywords, phrases, or topics that are relevant to the content being created. It can also be asked to create a summary or conclusion of a piece of content.
  4. Optimizing content for search engines: ChatGPT can generate keyword-rich titles, meta descriptions, and other on-page SEO elements to optimize content for search engines.

As you’ve probably noticed, each question or command builds on the last and since we are staying within the same chat inside the platform, it is getting smarter and more specific with each response. Think of it almost like text messaging where the commands and responses are going back and forth between you and ChatGPT.

Next, we gave ChatGPT the following prompt: Please give me 10 keyword rich podcast titles for the above podcast outline

A few of our favorites from the list were:

  • ChatGPT: The Ultimate AI Assistant for Online Business Owners
  • From Chatbots to AI Assistants: How ChatGPT Stands Out
  • Maximizing ChatGPT’s Capabilities for Content Creation and SEO
  • Unlocking ChatGPT’s Potential: Tips and Best Practices for Online Business Owners

We ended up choosing the first title but switched out the word ‘online’ for ‘wellness’ so it was more specific for our ideal clients. In other words, rather than

ChatGPT: The Ultimate AI Assistant for Online Business Owners

We opted for

ChatGPT: The Ultimate AI Assistant for Wellness Business Owners


As we said, we are just scratching the surface with this. There are many ways to use this tool as a timesaver for your business. The more you use it the more you will train it to speak in your voice because it learns your language patterns which is so beneficial. It tracks your queries and gets smarter and more dialed into you and your business each time you use it.

It’s important to note that while ChatGPT can assist with content creation, it should not be relied upon as the sole source of content. Content created by ChatGPT should always be reviewed and edited by a human to ensure accuracy, relevance, and quality. Additionally, it’s important to ensure that content created by ChatGPT is unique and not plagiarized from other sources. Overall, ChatGPT can be a helpful tool for content creation, but it should be used in conjunction with human creativity and oversight.

We think you are going to absolutely love this tool for creating content for your wellness business. If you’re using any AI tools yet, let us know which ones and what you think of them so far.

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Managing Your Energy Vs. Managing Your Time

Managing Your Energy Vs. Managing Your Time

Managing Your Energy Vs. Managing Your Time

When it comes to your business, there is a lot to do. You are likely already busy in your personal life, so managing it all can feel a little overwhelming sometimes.

We are all familiar with the concept of time management, but there is also something else to consider which is managing your energy. 

When you’re conscious and intentional about how you’re spending your time and you’re aware of what is draining your energy vs what makes you feel happy and energized, you’ll notice a big difference in how you feel – your mood, your productivity and enjoyment of what you do.

Today, we are talking about managing your energy vs managing your time, and we’re having an open and interesting conversation to give you some ideas on what you may want to implement or try. 

In order to manage your energy, it’s important to start with the things you know tend to drain you, vs what doesn’t. Things that drain you can also be things you enjoy doing, but because it takes mental or emotional energy, you have to limit how much you do in a day or a week.

Kathleen: For example, I enjoy doing livestreams in my Facebook group, but after 30-40 mins, I need to take a break. I could not do livestreams every day or probably not even every week, and I’m aware of that and I schedule accordingly.

Also, because I know I will feel tired afterwards, I know not to schedule other appointments or tasks that take a lot of brain power. So, after doing a livestream, I wouldn’t plan to outline a podcast episode or do something that takes a lot of creativity.

Another thing that helps me manage my energy is not overbooking my calendar.  I spread out appointments during the week – whether it’s lunch with friends, doctor appointments, interviews, recording podcast episodes, I’ve learned that if I overbook my day, it wipes me out.

Karen prefers to work in longer blocks of time, so she can power through and get the most important things done by noon. 

We have some helpful tips to share to help you better manage your energy, and we’re going to cover 7 of them:

  1. This is obvious, but still important to point out – get enough sleep. If you don’t prioritize sleep, you are going to start your day feeling tired, and it goes downhill from there. 
  2. Tune into what gives you energy, so you can incorporate that, such as exercise, meditation, spending time in nature or whatever you enjoy.
  3. Arrange your schedule whenever possible to focus on maintaining your energy rather than overbooking and overscheduling yourself. If you notice you are wiped out by 3 pm each day, it’s a good sign to listen to your body and take a break or end your workday then if possible. 
  4. Take mini breaks during the day. This could be doing something as simple as stretching, doing some breathing exercises, stepping outside for a few minutes to get some fresh air and sunshine or it could be going for a quick 5-10 minute walk.
  5. Limit multi-tasking and focus on completing one task before moving to the next one.
  6. Limit distractions as much as possible – this means leaving your phone in the other room when you’re working or turning off push notifications.
  7. Look at tasks that you can outsource to free up more of your time and protect your energy.

When we focus on managing our energy, managing our time tends to fall into place because we will likely get more done while feeling better. 

Tune into the things that deplete your energy and decide how you can work around it, delegate it or break it up during the week.

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3 Common Facebook Group Mistakes to Avoid

3 Common Facebook Group Mistakes to Avoid

3 Common Facebook Group Mistakes to Avoid

If you have a Facebook group for your health coaching business but it seems like an uphill battle to get members to engage (and sign up for your programs) it could be that you’re making one or more common mistakes. 

The good news is that you can turn things around pretty quickly.  Once you know what mistakes to avoid, you’ll have more of the right people joining your group, and you’ll also have more members enrolling in your paid programs (instead of them only consuming your free content).

On this episode we’re sharing 3 Common Facebook Group Mistakes to Avoid, and here’s what you’ll discover:

  • The #1 reason why people are joining your group but not becoming clients
  • Tips for naming your group to attract the right members
  • One of the first things new members will look for as soon as they join your group, and if you don’t have this in place, you are missing a huge opportunity to build trust and connection
  • How to lead people to the next step to working with you in a non-salesy way

Let’s dive in!

Mistake #1: The group name is not directly aligned with or related to your niche.

One of the common mistakes made with groups is that the group name isn’t clear about who it’s for. This is a problem because if your group is pretty generic about health and wellness, you may have a lot of people joining, but they won’t necessarily be your ideal clients. This means engagement tends to be low and people won’t be enrolling in your programs because they aren’t a good fit for your particular area of expertise and your offers.

One way to know if your group name is specific enough is can people self-identify that this is an area where they need help and is it very obvious who the group is for.  Will people see the group and know right away if it’s for them or not?  Remember, you only want your potential ideal clients joining your community, so be bold about claiming your niche and go all in on it.

See if you can spot the difference in these two names and see which one is very specific:

  1. Abundant Health and Energy
  2. Thrive Through Menopause

The first one is general and could be for anyone – men or women at any age with any issue or problem. The 2nd one would be an option if your niche was helping women with menopausal issues, and the right people will be interested in joining and the wrong people will scroll on by, and that’s exactly what you want.

When you look at your group name, is it specific enough?  You can always fine tune it a bit to narrow it down more. 

Mistake #2: No welcome video pinned to the top of the group.

This is a really important element to include in your group because when people first join your group, they come in and take a peek around. They want to know who you are as the host of the group and the expert. When they see a welcome video from you, they instantly get to connect with you and get a feel for your personality and what you’re about.  Think about what you do when you join a new group – you want to see what’s going on and find out if it’s going to be a helpful community – or not.  By having a short 1-2 minute video pinned to the very top, it’s usually one of the first things new members will check out, and when they feel like they’re in the right place, they are more likely to come back the group, post questions and engage.

Mistake #3: No (or very few) calls to action to work with you. A call to action to work with you could be to book a discovery call or join your paid program. It’s easy to post content in your group, but it’s important that members know how they can take the next step to get support from you.  People are busy and they don’t want to have to dig around to find out what you do and how you can help them, so you want to post about it from time to time.

There are several ways to do this and one of them is during your livestreams in your group. You can share a story about a client and what problem they were having when they came to see you and what the result was after they implemented what you recommended.  This creates interest and curiosity about working with you. During the livestream, mention that you have a few spots open for discovery calls this month and how they can schedule one. 

Another way is to post occasional direct invites in your group to book a free discovery call. Be sure to include who it’s for and a link to your online calendar to make it easy for people to take action. 

Need more ideas for your Facebook group?

Be sure to download your free Facebook Group Audit Checklist, so you can audit your own group to help troubleshoot any issues you’re having and get the best results possible. 

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BEST OF: 10 Hacks To Increase Productivity and Skyrocket Results

BEST OF: 10 Hacks To Increase Productivity and Skyrocket Results

BEST OF: 10 Hacks To Increase Productivity and Skyrocket Results

It can be tricky to transition from being an employee to a health coach and wellness business owner because you now have total control over what you do and when you do it.  While this can be a really good thing, it can also lead to feeling overwhelmed with no clear direction on how to prioritize tasks and projects because it feels like there’s so much to do.  We’re here to help! 

We’re bringing back a popular episode we did a long time ago, and we’re sharing ten invaluable hacks for doubling your productivity and skyrocketing your results.

Tune in to this episode for a breakdown and examples of each strategy, so you’ll know how to implement what we share.   

  1. Start with a 30-day plan and break it up into weekly goals and action steps. 
  2. Know the number of hours you can spend on your business each week.
  3. Limit distractions and turn off social media notifications.
  4. Tiny progress each day, week and month results in big wins.
  5. Skip the bells and whistles until you have a solid working model.
  6. Get an accountability partner who will hold you accountable.
  7. Get away from the house to work in two-hour blocks (coffee shop, library or your favorite spot).
  8. Don’t do anything else, until you complete the 1 big thing each day that moves your business forward.
  9. Use Single focus instead of multitasking
  10. 10.Set expectations that are obtainable rather than focusing on a big end goal.
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