Category: Top Tips

October half-term is just around the corner, and with the kids home from school, it’s the perfect opportunity for some family days out or cosy days in. But if you have a business to run – and especially if you work from home – how can you balance the commitments of both work and family over half-term?

Fortunately, the Get Ahead VA team is here to help. Most of our Virtual Assistants and Regional Directors work from home, and they’ve got some great tips about keeping your business running during the school holidays – without missing out on quality family time!

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Just like a real desk, it’s easy for your virtual desktop to get cluttered. A folder here, an icon there and suddenly you’re wading through a sea of links, unable to find anything!

Luckily, today is national Clean Your Virtual Desktop Day, and we’re here with some tips to help you get your virtual workspace shipshape once again. And, as some extra inspiration, we have some photos of the (impressively tidy) desks of a few members of the Get Ahead VA team.

So what are you waiting for? Let’s get your desktop sorted!

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This month we’re delighted to be celebrating Get Ahead VA’s 9th birthday, and we couldn’t be prouder of everything our Regional Directors and Virtual Assistants have achieved over the years.

We also understand that big achievements come out of small actions, so we’ve put together a list of 9 things you can do over 9 days to develop yourself – your motivation, productivity or general well-being. Each of these should take no more than half an hour, but you might be surprised by what a big difference they make.

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September is Get Ahead VA’s birthday month, and this year we’re turning nine years old! Back in 2010, Rebecca Newenham founded Get Ahead VA in order to provide business and marketing support to business owners, and the company has gone from strength to strength since then. So, to celebrate our birthday, here are 9 top tips for starting a successful business of your own!

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When you run a small business, it can be tempting to do as much as possible yourself, but sometimes this DIY approach will end up costing you more than if you had simply outsourced the work to a professional.

This is especially true when it comes to photography for your business – if you’re not a photographer, taking your own photographs can be a risky move. In honour of World Photography Day (19th August), which celebrates photography in all its forms, we’re taking a look at how hiring a professional photographer could be the best decision you can make for your SME.

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Plastic is a hot topic – the buzz around it began in earnest thanks to the BBC series Blue Planet II, which raised awareness about the damage plastic is doing to our oceans and sea life. Earlier this month, people and organisations around the world celebrated World Oceans Day (8th June), an annual event which encourages people to protect our oceans against threats like plastic.

So how can you, as a business owner, get involved with this movement? We’ve gathered together a few ideas – big and small – to help you reduce plastic in your workplace.

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The Company Page is a powerful tool on LinkedIn – it gives a business a dedicated space to promote its products/services, post content and connect with its audience. It’s especially useful for B2B interactions and, naturally, the most effective Company Pages are the ones with the widest reach.

So how do you go about growing your Company Page on LinkedIn? Here are 6 quick tips for increasing your following and finding an engaged audience.

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This week is Learning at Work Week (13–19 May), and to celebrate, we’re talking about CPD – continuing professional development.

CPD is the process of tracking your knowledge and skills, and investing time in your own training and development at work. It is reflective – it requires you to think about the things you have learned, to reflect on what you would do differently next time, and to set goals and targets for yourself for the future. Most importantly, it involves writing these things down, so that you have a permanent record of your own development.

We’ve talked before about how to do CPD as a business owner, but today we’re focusing on why it’s important, and why you should make time for it.

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Are you a business owner on the lookout for new podcast recommendations? If so, have we got a list for you! We’ve talked before about how great podcasts can be, so today we’re here to share with you some of our favourite podcasts for business owners and women in business, as recommended by our team of virtual assistants.

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LinkedIn is a hugely important networking platform for business owners. By the end of 2018, the site was closing in on 600 million users,* so if you own a business and want to make connections with other professionals, this is certainly the place to be.

However, there are a few common mistakes you might be making on your LinkedIn profile that could be instantly off-putting to potential contacts. With that in mind, here are 5 things you should remove from your LinkedIn profile today to give it an instant boost.

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