Category: Networking

Tell anyone who knows Fiona Ibbetson that she’s just won a major industry award, and their reaction is likely to be “Well, of course she would. Obvs”.

And it’s easy to understand why. The owner of Get Ahead in Leeds and Wakefield made her business profitable in the first three months, created work for 22 people, and expects to triple her revenue this year.

She’s also taking on the additional territory of York and Harrogate which will generate work for many more people as well as making life easier for the business owners she serves by providing outsourced virtual assistants.

“I’d not had my own business before this,” says Fiona, who’d worked for Morrisons supermarkets for 20 years. “That’s why I went down the franchise route.

“The franchise model offers flexibility and leverages the skills of my team to help local businesses. That’s my passion.

“I’ve grown the business really well during the pandemic, despite losing three clients which halved my revenue overnight.

“I’ve had a great mentor in the franchisor, plus I use two business coaches, one for my personal brand.

“I thought networking would be a completely new skill to learn until I realised I’d been networking naturally with peers and colleagues for years.

“My husband’s still working from home as well, and I’m working on my business around my family as well as home-schooling two children. Everybody’s had to adapt.”

Despite the face-to-face networks she relied on for new business vanishing overnight in the pandemic, Fiona built the business up to a team of six plus 16 virtual assistants, and she’s taking on a Business Development Manager to help with the new territory.

“Winning the award is amazing,” she says. “I’m thrilled to be recognised and it puts me up there with other great franchisees which is fantastic.”

The Great British Franchisee Awards recognise franchisees’ exceptional performance and business experience, ability to drive business growth, staff retention, customer satisfaction, community involvement, inspired leadership, and franchise involvement.

The awards are run by whichfranchise, supported by Lloyds Bank, BDO, AMO Consulting and Chantry Group.

• Read more about the awards at https://www.whichfranchise.com/awards

• For over 25 years, whichfranchise has promoted ethical franchise opportunities in the UK. Learn more at https://www.whichfranchise.com/

Strategic networking is an important part of the toolkit of our regional directors. Get Ahead is well established in its hometown of Guildford, and the first job our new franchisees face is to spread the word in whatever new locality we are expanding into, from Leeds, South Yorkshire and the Wirral to the branches in the Midlands and the Home Counties.

Here is how strategic networking works for Get Ahead – could it work for your business too?

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LinkedIn always goes a bit quiet over Christmas, with many of us closing for business until New Year. When we all reopened for business, however, Get Ahead hit the ground running and we were pleased to see our first posts of the year getting good traction. Our social media managers are always encouraging Get Ahead clients to be consistent in their posts and we’ve seen for ourselves that it works in practice. In this blog, we look at why it works and how to achieve it for your business.

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Get Ahead is proud to operate as a franchise, meaning that we have branches around the country, each run by an independent, entrepreneurial Regional Director, all under the umbrella of the Get Ahead brand. 

If you’re considering trying something new in 2021, perhaps the Get Ahead franchise opportunity will be right for you – it gives you flexibility and control over your working life, and the satisfaction of providing administrative and marketing support to businesses in your local area. In fact, there are several key reasons why next year could be the perfect time to get started! 

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Here are four points that are on our January checklist – we hope they’re on yours too!

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How will you be celebrating Christmas with your team this year? If you usually organise a party or a meal for your employees, you might be wondering how to mark the end of the year in a pandemic-friendly way – and you may be lamenting the loss of the traditional Christmas party this year. 

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Thanks to the pandemic, we are all using Zoom and online meeting platforms far more than we used to. There are many applications for online meetings that we’d never thought of until this year, and holding networking events online is one of them. While many of us prefer real-life networking, we have also seen the advantages of online networking – not having to travel makes networking more cost-effective, and we are also able to attend events that are outside our usual patch. You never know – even when the working world returns to normal, we might carry on networking online.

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In any other year, businesses would have booked their Christmas party back in August or so – big room, catering of some sort, maybe a magician visiting your table doing some close up magic. If you were really (un)lucky, someone might even have hired a karaoke machine.

But this year, it will all be different. Lockdown didn’t just introduce new restrictions; it introduced a new way of working. So many businesses have noticed how much easier remote working is that it’s looking like it’s here to stay, even when restrictions are finally over. What’s certain is that we’ll be having our works Christmas parties remotely, and we’re proud to report that our VAs with Zoom expertise are already receiving bookings to provide tech support during the virtual party season.

Here are some ideas for virtual Christmas parties!

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Hiring a virtual assistant (VA) can be a really smart move for your business – they can provide skills and support when you need them the most, and they’re totally flexible so you only hire them for as long as you need them.  

If you’ve never worked with a VA before, you probably have lots of questions about how it all works. As a virtual assistant agency, we know the most common queries that people have about VAs, so we’re here to help you learn more. Here are the top 5 most frequently asked questions about VAs.  

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It’s safe to say that, for most people, this year hasn’t exactly gone to plan – perhaps you started 2020 with big dreams of finally starting your own business, only to have to put those dreams aside in order to make it through the crisis. But the pandemic doesn’t have to stop your entrepreneurial aspirations forever. In fact, opening a franchise could get you back on track sooner than you think. 

There are all sorts of fantastic benefits to opening a franchise, but today we’re looking at four key advantages that could make this a great career move for you, even in all the upheaval of 2020. 

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