The home world at work is no different from corporate life. The more you know, the more attractive you are to potential clients. And often, the more you can charge for your services!
Virtual assistance is a growing industry. Demand is high and the diversity of skills required offers great potential for remote workers, regardless of background and education. There are some skills that will be needed, however, and some skills that are currently on the rise.
Today I’m highlighting a few virtual assistant training opportunities that will allow you to hone your skills from the comfort of your home. Even better news, these courses are available Skillshare Those who have been kind enough to extend Two months of their premium membership Free for readers of The Work at Home Wife! For those of you who don’t know, Skillshare is a great online learning community with over 17,000 classes across business, design, photography, productivity and more. Check out some of their classes below:
Introduction to Running a VA Business
If you’re new to virtual assistance, it’s good to have an idea of what to expect when working with clients. Things are not always sunshine and roses after all.
Rosie Shiloh has been a virtual assistant since 2004. Currently, he owns an Australian multi-VA firm of 170 VAs. In this course, he provides a lot of insight into what it takes to be successful and how to run your business efficiently and provide equal service to your clients.
One module in Rosie’s course that I particularly appreciated was on systems. Sometimes we’re so excited to get started that we put off some of these essentials, but let’s be honest, it’s not the sexiest part of running a business. Often, those are things we just want to stick our heads in the sand. Rosie is very good at accounting, contracts and more.
Introduction to your business social media strategy
One thing many new VAs don’t understand about social media management is that it’s more than just scheduling updates. Way more! Clients are paying you to get people to visit their site and buy their product or service.
This course goes over how to actually write for different platforms to gain more followers and generate more traffic. Dana also tells you how to schedule those updates so you’re not spending more time on these tasks than you need to.
I love Canva for creating graphics. And if you’re a VA today, chances are pretty good that you’ll be asked to create a graphic at some point, whether it’s for Pinterest, Facebook, Instagram, or a blog post. These are great skills and can greatly enhance your appeal to clients.
This course gives a great overview of what’s possible with Canva. It shows you not only what templates are available, but also how to work with things like filters and adding pages.
This course lasts approximately 1 hour 15 minutes. It’s definitely worth the time investment!
Social media graphics and ebook covers using Canva
Now let’s take a look at some of the more advanced capabilities that Canva offers. There’s a lot you can do here without investing in software like Photoshop or a graphic design degree.
This is another course from Indigo 29 Academy. Their courses seem really comprehensive with lots of examples. It walks you through creating Facebook Page Covers, Twitter Headlines, Facebook Posts and eBook Covers.
Getting Started with Email Marketing: Learn with Mailchimp
Another hot service offering of the moment is email marketing. Hot! And many bloggers and entrepreneurs are using Mailchimp for newsletter service.
I was delighted to find that Skillshare has several courses created by Mailchimp employees. Who knows better about the service? It was put together by the Product Marketing Manager. It gives a really soup-to-nuts overview of what email marketing is, what to send customers, and examples of great campaigns.
It also goes into Mailchimp’s more advanced features – and are actively sought out by clients right now – such as segmentation, design and analytics. These are the skills that will set you apart from the pack.
Make sure you check out some of Mailchimp’s other courses. They dive deep into writing, sales growth, reporting and more.
How to use Gmail to maximize your productivity
One of the things I always love about being a virtual assistant is that the skills you learn to make your business better can make your clients’ businesses better and vice versa. Email management is one of those skills.
We’re all inundated with our inboxes these days. Many clients are looking to offload their email to a VA. Learning the ins and outs of Gmail and some of the advanced features it offers can make you look like a rockstar.
This course is approximately 2.5 hours and includes many small tidbits that will greatly enhance your own email skills and allow you to pass those savings on to your clients with ongoing service or a one-time setup. You’ll find some of my favorite tricks here, like filters, labels, keyboard shortcuts, boomerangs, and inbox zero tips.
Privacy to be found by search engines and shoppers
I know what you’re thinking. I am a virtual assistant. Why should I know SEO?
Simply put, the more add-ons you can offer your client within your current service line, the better. If I hire a VA to upload my products to Etsy, I don’t want to hire an SEO to optimize the title and description. I am then paying twice for the same service. This course will allow you to be placed on your service list Upload products and optimize listings for search. It’s a much better offer than if you just offer one or the other.
These are just a few of the great virtual assistant trainings available on Skillshare to help you up your game. And don’t forget, Skillshare has been kind enough to extend The Work at Home Wife free readers two months of their premium membership! only Click here Redeem and start learning today.
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