Member Article

Celebrating ten years in business and reporting highest yearly sales in 2020

A Wakefield entrepreneur is celebrating 10 years in business in March 2021 and reported her best sales year ever in 2020.

Michelle Poole, 56, founded her virtual agency, Virtual Hand, in 2011 to support entrepreneurs who create their own business without support with the administration and marketing roles.

Now 10 years on she is celebrating her best year ever, during the pandemic which has left many businesses having to close but also when many people have created their own business due to being made redundant or pivoted due to the drop in demand of their previous business. This has provided a whole new market of opportunity for her business.

Michelle Poole said: “I am proud that we have continued to support businesses nationwide during this difficult time, by lightening their load and allowing them to do what they love. It’s a pleasure to work with inspired individuals who are sharing their talents both online and offline.”

Michelle started Virtual Hand in March 2011, having had a full career, over 30 years’ experience in the world of office administration and 15 years’ experience at Senior and Board level, with a variety of different companies; and then decided to branch out on her own and start her own business. The idea of working for herself, determining her own hours and lifestyle appealed to her and she never looked back.

Many people have great ideas and set up their own businesses in order to fulfil their own dreams however, the harsh reality of running your own business often comes to them down the line. All the admin, HR, Marketing and PR as well as accounts, that are involved, take up a lot of time, time that many entrepreneurs and solopreneurs would much rather spend on doing what they love, and focusing on their main reason for starting their business. For many business owners the cost of employing someone full time can be prohibitive and this is where the virtual support niche has developed. Virtual Hand set out to help businesses in their 3-5 year stage, to help them to grow as well as smaller, one man band businesses where a helping hand is needed from time to time. This is why Virtual Hand was set up, to assist small companies and solopreneurs to realise their dreams and goals without the overheads of taking on full time staff, to offer an advisory service and a sounding board. Overtime Michelle also realised that business coaching, strategising and planning and sometimes, simply being an accountability partner, is also valuable to small business owners. Many require assistance with both personal and business admin or content marketing and so her team grew so that Virtual Hand can service all these requirements. Together with her team, Virtual Hand are currently working with eighteen different clients on a retainer basis and in addition have several adhoc projects on the go. These are from various different fields including coaches, trainers, and consultants as well as trades, financial, the construction industry, digital marketing agencies, and SEO on both a local and national basis.

It is obvious that the pandemic has been incredibly hard for many people and Virtual Hand has been able to step in and assist on many levels. From the busy mum who now has to home-school as well as run her business to growing business ventures requiring support and advice. Virtual Hand offers an affordable, flexible and friendly solution. Finding solutions for people either on an ad hoc or retainer basis, or companies can buy blocks of time to get them through a particularly busy period. More recently Michelle uses organisational sessions to teach companies how to maximise their time.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Michelle Poole .