Episode 094: How To Have a Successful VA Team

Hey, guys. How you doing? Gavin Timms here with REI Network. Welcome back for another episode. I’m back in Savannah. Back in my home office. It’s been a while. Maybe I already did, did I do one? Well, I think I might have the last one from the office, actually, but this one, I’m also coming in from Savannah as well. I’ve been traveling over the last four months. I have been in California, Florida. Two or three times. I’ve been to Georgia. I’ve been to Mexico. I’ve been to the U.K. It’s been a little wild, but it’s been good, you know, still work in the business, still operating in. And and that’s why I do what I do. So it gives me that flexibility to be able to travel and do all the things that I get to do. So hopefully some of you are doing that as well, or you’re trying to do whatever your goals are. Just keep plugging away, making sure that you’re following people and that you like and you’re implementing. That’s the main thing, right? Taking massive action, getting something that that you like. Stay disciplined to it. Take massive action. Get away from the shiny objects. Build a solid foundation to actually get results. And that’s what you should all be doing. Okay? There’s so many opportunities out there and they’re not missed, right? It’s all about turning opportunities down sometimes if you can’t fulfill and deliver, I have some opportunities, you know, come to me that I have to turn down. And sometimes it’s just because I can’t do it. I can’t fulfill on one as good as it is and the opportunity is great. Something else has got to give. Also, I just get busier and if it doesn’t align with what I’m trying to do, unfortunately I have to turn it down. So yeah, you know, you don’t want to be doing that. Okay. 

But what I want to talk about today I think is really, really important is how to have a successful VA team. A VA, a virtual assistant is going to be one of the first hires that you do and that you need in your business, especially if you’re a sole entrepreneur. You’re new to the business, whether your seasoned, whether you’re doing everything on your own, it doesn’t matter. The fact of the matter is, is that you’re going to need to start outsourcing. Right. I just did an event with Joe a few days ago. It was about we called it the Mad Bootcamp was about marketing, automation and delegation. And the first way to start that in that delegation process is hiring a good virtual assistant, and that could be for admin and it could be for cold call. And, you know, one of them two things. All right. And that’s why you need one, because it’s all about where is your time being spent in this business. It needs to be on a high dollar an hour activity, i.e. one of these, which is the phone you should be having marketing coming in. Okay, you should be outsourcing your marketing so it’s happening for you. Leads are coming in, leads being work from Vas, whether it’s cold calling or you got Dhamaal or whatever it is that you’re doing that is automated, that is happening for you. Then it comes into that into the system where you can then get on the phone, okay, make your calls, make your offers and get them on follow up until you get that contract and get it closed. Okay. So that’s where a good virtual assistant is going to step in. A virtual assistant probably going to cost you around five an hour if you’re going to hire them yourself. If you’re going to go to a company to do it for you, you’re probably going to be looking there at $8 an hour and up, depending on their skill level. Okay. Now, if you’re going to go and hire your own, which I do recommend, as long as you get the key things right that I’m going to talk about today, and even if you will get someone else to do it, you should still really be doing these things. So let’s say that I am going to go to Upwork. Okay, my accent, that’s U P work dot com. There is several other ones that you can you can go to. But Upwork is good because it tracks that time. They do take a percentage where you can run your ads, you can you in your job ads that you can hire from there you can pay through labor. So it is a good start. There’s also virtual staff finder, VA PH. I mean, there’s so many there’s so many that you could do and find that is insane. 

But when we get on there, let’s just say Upwork you’re going to go and run that. Your ad to me is very simple. It does not need to be complicated. Just list the things that you’re looking for. Now you might be going, I don’t know what I’m looking for. So when you’re in the business, you need to analyze as you go through all your tasks and say to yourself, Is this an activity that I should be doing or is it something that I can outsource? Okay. And that is how you’re going to build your list. So for instance, cold calling VA, right? If I’m going to run an ad, it’s going to say something like looking for an experienced cold caller. There’s been cold calling for 1 to 2 years. That’s got great English. Real estate is not a must. What would help? It could be that simple. And then people will apply. Okay, then what you’re going to do is people apply. You’re going to send another message back and say, Hey, could you send, please send me a one minute recording telling me about yourself. Okay, so that’s your message back to everyone. That applies. Let’s say 50 apply. 25 will do it. Maybe. Probably not even that. All right. Well, that does is that you actually get to listen to that voice before you actually have any further conversations with them. When you listen to the voice and they sound good because it’s a cold call and then you will narrow it down and then you go, hey, can we schedule a time to talk? And what you’re doing then is you’re listening from okay. And it sounded great on recording while on recording, we could do it 100 times to get it really good. So the next phase of that hire would be, how do they interact with you? Okay. And if it’s cold, call and they need to be a bit more on the fly, a bit more conversational, less robotic, all of them things. Now you’re going to get that in the interview, and then if not, and then you’re going to ask them. So you know what softwares. One thing I did miss on that, by the way, is that I want them to be able to use a dialer or been on a dialer before. And if they’ve been on one dialer, they can use them all. If your using batch OK, for instance, which is if you want a code with that for seven day free trial, you want to go to a batch dialer dot com slash Gavin. You get a free seven day trial to test out, or you could be using Mojo so you could list that in the ads as well. But once you get them and you listen to the recordings, you then set up an interview. If they sound good, they interact, then it’s time. Get a show on the road, let’s get them going and then let’s monitor them from there. And I’m going to come back to that in a minute. Same with the with the admin side. You’re going to list the tasks, hey, I need you to be in the you’ve got to be good with technology. I need you to update notes. I need you to send offers out. I need you to do this. I need you to do that. And you’re going to list all them things. And it’s the same process this time. On the admin side, you want to probably give them a little task in a challenge. You know, you could say something like, Hey, I want you to send me an email to this email address in the subject line. It wants to say this. I want you to put a smiley face in the subject line and then I want you to say something. I want you to tell me a little bit about yourself in the email. At the bottom of the email, I want you to talk. Give me another smiley face at the end. It could be as silly as that, but what that tells you is that they’re actually paying attention and they can follow instruction and direction doesn’t have to be a smiley face, but you get the point. Give them something in the subject line, in the email that they have to do, because you want to know that they’re actually reading this, paying attention to what you’re doing. So, again, these applications come in. What’s going to happen is no smiley face, no smiley face, no smiley face. You’re going to narrow it down to the ones actually pay attention. The other thing as well, and you could do with the admin is speed. How quickly can they do something efficiently as well? So you could test that in that interview process. 

But I wasn’t going to talk about much about the hiring because it’s then, hiring is one thing and you can only do so much with people out of the country where, yeah they sound good, they seem good let’s go. And then it’s what are you going to do with them moving forward is what’s going to get you the success. So once they come on board and they start on, the first thing you need to do is not spend hours with them trying to train them. What you need to be doing is go through your day to day, whether it’s you as a cold caller, whether it’s you and the cold callers are a little easier because you just inputting less. If they’ve already got experience, they’re ready to go. But it’s more on the admin, right? So let’s say you make the offer, you look at comps this way, this is how you send the offer out, this is how you update your note, all the things that you do, you need to record yourself doing it so you’re going to use loom dot com out our imdb.com you’re going to use loom you’re going to record your screen and you’re going to talk over what you’re doing, just how you would. Okay, so you’re not no fancy training. You don’t need to be on video. You’re going to share your screen and you and you don’t even need to reference the name because then this training is going to be used for further purpose. So you don’t have to go, Hey John, blah blah blah, hey Sally, blah blah blah. You just go and say, Hey, this I need you to do, and so on. So what you’re going to do, let’s say you’re in the CRM, you say, okay guys, so when the lead comes in, it’s going to populate here. When I made the call, send you a voxer and give you the notes. When you’ve got these notes, if you click on this tab, Hey, I want you to pop the notes in and then save them. Then you’re going to after whatever I said in the box, you’re going to have to create a task for me. Here is the task forward and this is how you do it. And then the last thing you must do is change the status, because you can see here this is a new lead. And then I need to know you’re going to whatever I told you in that box, are you going to go to a follow up or make an offer and so on? Okay. So that’s how I want you to do it and then let me know if you have any questions on this and I can go further detail done. 

So on that section, you have a two minute video saying exactly what they need to do. That is part of their training next. The next thing that you have to do, hey, when I send an offer, I go here, I go to DocuSign to load it. I put the numbers in whatever it is. You create that video done that is now your training for your VA. And the good thing is, is that we have trained if you’re part my group, you can have our training. There’s something to be said to do it the way you want to in your system with your leads. Okay. And they’re doing exactly how you want. And that’s really, really important. So make sure you’re doing that. Now, what’s going to happen is when you hire the VA, they’re going to go through that training. And then the key is, is they need to then show you how to do it. So I would say, hey, Dave, look, I’m going to say you’re trained to go over a couple of times, way to practice it, and then let me know when you’re ready and then we’ll go over it. Okay, cool. I’m ready. We get on Zoom or Skype or whatever you’re going to use. And then I say, Right, here’s another lead. I want you to show me what you’re going to do and here’s the details. Show me what you’re going to do. Right, and then go from there and then see, see if make sure they can do it. Now, if they can show you how to do it, you know, they understand it. So the thing is, especially in the Philippines, there are a pleasing culture. So they want to please you. So they will say yes, they understand when they don’t understand. So you need to make sure that they can explain that back to they can they can explain it back to you so you understand that, right? So you know that they understand it. So you’re going to be able to then move forward. All right. So that’s really, really important to make sure you do that. Then what happens is now you’ve got these training videos, so you hire the next VA, you have the training videos that VA doesn’t work out and you hire another one. You have the training videos. So you’ve already logged your training in one time, so you can’t do it where you’re sitting at the computer for 3 hours a day showing them what to do. It doesn’t work. You haven’t got time. You’ve got to be on that phone. You’ve got to be making money. You’ve got to be putting deals together and getting checks to keep the business right. Now, our 3 hours, my VA, it was really good session no. No, no, no, no. And start now. Maybe you’re watching. Listen, you don’t have a VA and you’re working. Start recording your stuff, okay? So you can be prepared and it’s done. And then once it’s done once, unless anything changes, there’s the training. All right? So that if they leave now, let’s say that you’ve got one solid cold caller, you got one solid admin. 

Now, what you need to do then is the next time that you bring someone on, if they’re good and they’re going to be assisting them, you get your current VA to train the other VA, okay? So you can now start start to tier people up and you have to have the right VA first, right for this to work. Well, you’ll start to elevate your VA and then the other VA will sit under that and then they will kind of be like the manager, right? And then they will report and accordingly then your manager will then track their hours, make sure that they check on them, check their dials, check look, they’re doing their work on the admin side. Whatever it is that you’re doing, they’re going to be checking. Now, the biggest thing where virtual systems don’t work, okay, this is really important and it’s very simple is communication. All right. You have to be at a minimum, at a minimum, communicate with your VA at the start and at the end of the shift at a minimum. Okay. Ideally throughout the day, especially your admin code calls, not so much because you can track the numbers. So actually admin. How’s it going, do you need anything? Very simple, simple communication skills. This does not take a long time. However you’re communicating with them pick whatsapp, skype, voxer, text message, whatever it is. Right. Pick one slack, one communicate there. Hey, good morning. How you doing? Have a good day. You have any questions before you start? Now you know what you need to do. Yep. Perfect. Hey, how’s it going today? How’s everything going? Is great. Thank you all. Hey, I could say, hey, update me lunch time. Let me know if you need anything. I’m busy today, but if you need something, make sure you reach out to us. We’re moving forward again. That communication piece. The other thing that I always do as well that builds fantastic rapport with the VAs is let them make decisions. So I will say, like for Rod, for instance, my lead VA Rod. Amazing. I will say to him, Hey, Rod, what do you think we should do? Is there anything that you think we should change? Is there a better system that we should be using? Is a better process that you see the I’m not saying I give them a voice. It doesn’t matter of their pay. Give them the voice, because if you give them the voice, they’re going to be honest with you and you’re going to know when you need to pivot, change, do more training, whatever that may be. And it’s going to change the game because they will not do that. So and sometimes have to go, if you were me, Rod, what would you do? And sometimes I’ll refrain, I’ll phrase it like that. Well, I would do this. Okay, let’s do that. I’m in. And then he’s made the decision. You’ve gave him the power to make the decision, and it sometimes is silly things. I could do a spreadsheet how we do it, this, this, this. And I’ll say, What do you think? And then they’ll say, No, yeah, we can do that. And I say, Hey, real quick. Is there a better way we can do this to get the same outcome? Well, maybe. Well, what would you do? Well, you know this here and this. And if we change that, it’s going to work this out, and then we’ll get the same out. But it’ll just be faster. Right. Done. Let’s do it your way. I’m in. Right. Because what happens, guys, is that if you’re controlling in the business, you are the bottleneck. If you make all the decisions, you are the bottleneck. So guess what happens? Everyone downs tools because they weigh in on you because you are the decision maker. If I’ve got the VA to build the spreadsheet, if I’ve got the VA to do this, this and this, you’re not going to come to me to fix it because it’s your spreadsheet. So you build it so you don’t have to figure it out. Make sense. So you can. As long as I’m getting the results and the numbers and the figures or whatever it is that I need. We get that doesn’t matter to me. All right. Because these guys are small. The small they have degrees engineers. They run circles like Rod on the admin base runs circles around me. Like circles. Guys, honestly is absolutely unbelievable. And he now runs in my business. He runs all the other VAs. So under him, I have like four cold callers. They work with a couple of partners as well. A lot of my coaching clients and he runs it all. And he has the decision. So I meet with him and he makes the decisions on everything. If he wants to get rid of someone and I’ll say, okay, sure. Yeah. All right. Will you do it then? Right. I’m good. I’m good. Relax. You’re running it. I’m not coming in and stopping people, hiring or firing because you have the pulse on it. Because I’ve built that trust over the years, he’s been with me to make them decisions. Okay. 

And if you get this right through communication, training, okay. Giving them authority, letting them have a voice, don’t shout at them if they make a mistake, because then you’ll lose everything very quickly and they’ll shut that down because that’s how they’re normally treated. So even if they make mistake, it’s no problem. Hey, next time, why don’t we do it like this? Let’s do it this way. Right. Let’s have a conversation about it. A good job. Give them praise. Bonus them. Right. Give them bonuses. All these things that make a massive difference. People like loyal people, they are loyal. If you’re loyal to them, trust me. My VAs some of them five over five years ago which is insane and why? Because I treat them right no one’s no one’s higher than others. I’m on the same level as that when I’m in a conversation. It’s not me as the owner, the boss, whatever. It’s not. And that’s through my whole team. I give my my team, my US team authority to tell me, no, we’re not doing it like that. We’re going to do it like this. Because this is why I tell them that, because I know how I am. I am a action taker. I make decisions very quickly. I don’t want to overthink it. I don’t want to look at ten different things. I don’t want to do it all official. I want to go now. Let’s roll. And sometimes that’s great. And sometimes it’s like, Nah, we can’t do that. We’re not going to do that, and this is how we’re going to do it. And then I’ll be all right. Fine, we’ll do it your way then, right? Because and then I tell them to do the things. I go, look, when I hire people, I’m like, Look, if you don’t agree with me, you tell me, like, and because I and I’ll say, like even to Lauren, sometimes I will be like, I got to get something done with the accounts. I hate doing accounts and taxes and all that. No who does like doing it right. So we’ll have a day that we need to do something on. And I am when it’s I’ll tell her I’m going to be honest with you. If I can move that call or do anything about that at that time, I’m going to do it. I need you to make sure I’m telling you now that I’m on that call, under no circumstances can I move that call because I know when I get near it, I’m going to try and was busy. I got to do this, I got to do that and I’m going to try and get out of it. I know myself and we’ve got to get it done because it’s important. Make sure I’m on that call right. That’s probably a silly example. But you understand that you have to give that authority out because I’m on the same level, right? They don’t work for me. They work with me. All right? That’s how I treat all of them. They work with me. Okay. And it’s just different ways. And if you can be a good communicator, I’m telling you, you can have a badass VA team that runs the show. Very affordable, right? Like I said, I’d probably work with five, six, seven VAs doing different things over two different businesses and they’re all great, you know? And then if you look at the cost, it’s like for one, one and a half American full time. You know what I mean? To have seven people is insane. If you get it right, you’re going to explode your business. And that’s what we do in the coaching, right? We, we put them together in the coaching. We do life for you. We are your admin, we are your your cold call as we help make sure they’re trained to fast track that. And then you need to need to focus on. Communication for moving forward. 

All right, guys. Were a lot. Hopefully this helped. I thought it was good. Drop me a line. Give me a like. Make sure you subscribe if you’re interested in working with me. Sent me an email support at REI network dot com, support at REI Network dot com. Let’s have a conversation, see how we can help you. If not, keep watching. And I appreciate you. And I’ll see you on the next one.