We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Stephanie Fritts. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Stephanie below.
Alright, Stephanie thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. We’d love to go back in time and hear the story of how you came up with the name of your brand?
For over two decades, I served as an executive assistant, supporting some of the busiest leaders in Silicon Valley’s prominent startups. Among my fellow executive assistants, we jokingly referred to ourselves as “cat herders,” which it felt like most days. When it came time to choose a name for my own company, I realized that “cat herders” might not be clear to everyone. After brainstorming in a spreadsheet, “Exec Wranglers” really resonated with me because it encapsulated the spirit of managing chaos for busy leaders and it lended itself to some fun branding. The inclusion of “Wranglers” is a nod to being based in the Austin, TX area.
Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.
After being laid off from my remote position as an executive assistant, I did a quick internet search for “freelance executive assistant” and a local business called Admin Boutique was at the top of the results. I applied for a position and the founder reached out to me and said I was overqualified (they hired college students to run errands for local executives), that she was looking to sell the company, and asked if I knew anyone who might be interested. Um YES, me! It really opened my eyes to the possibilities of business ownership. Ultimately I didn’t buy the company, but I did manage the business for a short time which allowed me to gain more insight into how a business like this operates.
I founded Exec Wranglers in March of 2018, but it wasn’t until I joined a community of women entrepreneurs called Ellivate Alliance (https://ellivatealliance.com/) in April of 2019 that I really learned how to scale and grow my business. Joining Ellivate was like getting an MBA, but a thousand times more affordable and far less time-consuming! I honestly don’t know where I would be without the ongoing support of this amazing network of women entrepreneurs.
At Exec Wranglers, our mission is to bring harmony to impactful businesses. We provide virtual assistant services to entrepreneurs and executives who are making a difference in the world – either through their business offerings and/or their support of one or more charitable organizations. We call them Impactful Leaders. We free up these Impactful Leaders from their day-to-day operations, allowing them to focus on their “zone of genius” – at Exec Wranglers, we call this their Zone of Harmony. We help our Impactful Leaders with tasks ranging from everyday tasks like payroll and database management up to high-level social media marketing, and everything in between.
By facilitating their growth and enabling them to make an even bigger social impact, we are creating a ripple effect of goodwill and humanity in the world.
There are a couple of factors that set us apart from others in this industry. One is that our team works collaboratively, typically behind the scenes, to better serve our clients. I’ve often said that there is no “unicorn” virtual assistant who knows how to wrangle all “administrivia”, but collectively our team is a unicorn VA. And the second factor is that we offer what we call Spur-of-the-Moment Wrangling services, meaning the task turnaround time is same-day or one-day whereas most virtual assistant agencies only offer 2-3 day turnaround.
We support businesses that are making a difference in the world – we only take on clients who are making a positive impact through their business offerings and/or the support of one or more charitable organizations. Our Wranglers take on the work that is weighing down our clients, freeing them up to grow and scale their businesses to do even more good, and thus creating a ripple effect of goodwill. I’m the co-founder of Final Frontier Project, an animal rescue that gives dogs a last chance that otherwise would not have one. The company also supports a number of nonprofits as our clients, and we plan to do outreach to support many more. We also have an initiative where our Wranglers (virtual assistants) are encouraged to post donation and/or volunteer opportunities for the causes that matter to them.
We also give opportunities for people to work remotely, allowing them to have the freedom and flexibility they need to live their best lives. The majority of our Wranglers have disabilities, physical and/or mental health conditions that make traditional in-person employment difficult. We are currently investigating more opportunities to intentionally attract more veterans and people living with disabilities to our team. By offering flexible, work from home opportunities, our Wranglers are able to support our clients while also being supported themselves.
Our greatest accomplishment is hearing from our clients and from our Wranglers that we are achieving our mission – making a positive difference in the world.
Here are some quotes from our clients:
“Exec Wranglers frees us to invest our efforts and energies in the important work of counseling and coaching. We are at ease knowing that the details of website life are so well taken care of. Thank you Exec Wranglers!”
“My Wrangler brings compassion and heart to the table, so whatever is going on for me, I know I’m in a safe place working with her.”
“Most importantly, Stephanie and her colleagues really care about their clients’ success as if it were their own and this makes all the difference in the world when working with Executive Wranglers as a partner.”
“After nearly 2 years of working together, I can confidently say that hiring Exec Wranglers is one of the best things I’ve ever done for my business.”
“I had a health scare and it made me realize that I no longer could do it all by myself. My Wrangler keeps my email streamlined, handles inquiries for my business, handles my invoices and creates a connected team with other Wranglers as we need them for special projects. I am able to handle my business and grow with Exec Wranglers.”
One of our Wranglers felt compelled to post this on their facebook page not long ago:
“I just want to give a shout out to Stephanie Fritts because the moment I started working for her company (Exec Wranglers) as a Virtual Assistant, I felt validated as a *person.*. I cannot express how deeply I appreciate feeling safe and comfortable “at” work, even though it’s 100% remote.”
Can you tell us about what’s worked well for you in terms of growing your clientele?
The most effective, and really only, strategy for growing our client base has been networking and referrals. There are so many great virtual networking opportunities like LunchClub (https://lunchclub.com/?invite_code=stephaniel21), Virtual Networkers for women entrepreneurs (https://www.celestialuniversity.com/virtualnetworkers/), Mission Matters (https://nas.io/missionmatters), and joining educational/coaching communities like Ellivate Alliance (https://ellivatealliance.com/). Additionally, in the fall of 2020 I reached out to people I worked with/for previously on LinkedIn. Fun fact: one of the executives I supported in the early 2000s is now a client due to my reaching out to him on LinkedIn! Did it happen the day we connected? NOPE! Six months later, he was in a position where he needed our services – but he wouldn’t have thought of Exec Wranglers had I not reached out to catch up with him.
Networking is not about going for the immediate sale or finding people who will buy your services or product; it’s about building relationships (cliche, but true!), finding synergies, and finding referral partnerships. My advice is to give (referrals, resources) more than you take when networking. We are just starting to do social media “marketing” this year, but there’s no substitution for a prospective client who already trusts you because they were referred by someone they trust.
How do you keep in touch with clients and foster brand loyalty?
At Exec Wranglers, we meet with each of our new clients around the 5 and 10 week points of working with us. We have found this to be of great benefit to our clients. Through these meetings, we are able to clarify our processes, answer questions, and suggest enhancements for their Wrangler partnership. A couple of brief meetings at the beginning can really go a long way to helping our clients make the most out of their investment with us. We also check in with them every quarter to ensure we’re still exceeding their expectations.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.execwranglers.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/execwranglers
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/execwranglers
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/execwranglers/
- Youtube: https://youtube.com/@execwranglers
- Other: https://linktr.ee/execwranglers
Image Credits
Headshot credit: Leandra Blei, https://www.leandrablei.com/, IG: https://www.instagram.com/bandlcreative