A Different Kind of Business Builder
There is a certain kind of entrepreneur who does not chase the spotlight. He does not post about his morning routine or shout his wins from social media rooftops. Instead, he quietly builds systems, connects people with opportunities, and gets things done. Lael Sturm is that kind of entrepreneur.
Lael Sturm is the founder and driving force behind two companies that are genuinely changing how small business owners and growing entrepreneurs think about building their teams. The first is Long Play Strategic Solutions LLC (LPSS) — a strategic business development firm built on long-term thinking. The second is Ogmentor — a managed virtual assistant service that connects entrepreneurs with skilled, trained, and fully managed marketing and sales assistants for a fraction of what it would cost to hire locally.
Together, these two businesses reflect everything Lael stands for: smart strategy, real value, and systems that actually work.
"The hard part is not finding someone to help you. The hard part is finding someone trained, vetted, and ready to add value on day one — and then knowing they are being managed well after that."
Where It All Started: The Foundation of LPSS
Lael Sturm did not stumble into the world of business strategy by accident. His path was shaped by years of hands-on experience across marketing, sales, and business operations — the kind of experience that can only be earned by doing the work, not just studying it.
Long Play Strategic Solutions LLC, or LPSS, was born from a simple but powerful idea: most businesses fail not because they have a bad product or a weak market, but because they lack the strategic foundation to grow with intention. They react instead of plan. They hire on impulse instead of building systems. They spend money on tactics without ever defining a clear strategy.
LPSS exists to fix that. As a strategic consulting and business development firm, LPSS works with entrepreneurs and small business owners to build the kind of long-term foundations that do not just survive market changes — they thrive through them. The name itself tells the story. Long Play. Not the quick win. Not the flashy shortcut. The long play.
Lael built LPSS on the belief that sustainable growth requires three things: clarity on where you are going, the right people to help you get there, and systems that keep everything moving even when the founder steps back. This philosophy did not just stay inside LPSS — it eventually gave birth to Ogmentor.
The Problem He Saw That Nobody Was Solving
Lael Sturm is the kind of person who pays close attention to the frustrations of people around him. And for years, he kept hearing the same story from entrepreneurs, coaches, startup founders, and small business owners.
They were buried in work. They were doing things that did not require their direct attention — answering emails, posting on social media, updating spreadsheets, following up with leads, managing their CRM. All necessary tasks. All tasks that were eating the most valuable resource they had: time.
The obvious answer was to hire an assistant. But hiring a full-time employee in the United States is expensive. Between salary, benefits, payroll taxes, and the sheer time it takes to recruit and train someone, most small business owners simply could not afford it. And hiring off a freelance platform like Upwork or Fiverr came with its own problems: inconsistent quality, no accountability, and the founder still had to manage every little thing themselves.
This was the gap Lael Sturm decided to fill.
"You should not have to choose between growing your business and affording great help. With the right system, you can have both."
Ogmentor: More Than Just a Virtual Assistant Company
When Lael Sturm launched Ogmentor, he was very deliberate about one thing: it was not going to be just another virtual assistant marketplace. The world already had enough of those. What Ogmentor would offer was something fundamentally different — a managed virtual assistant experience.
The distinction matters more than people realize. When you hire a VA from a platform, you get a person. When you work with Ogmentor, you get a person plus a whole team behind them. Every virtual assistant that Ogmentor places is tested, trained, and supported by a senior team of experienced marketers and business operators. If there is ever any confusion about instructions, goals, or milestones, the VA has instant access to that support team. They are never left to figure things out alone.
Here is how the Ogmentor process works. First, the client defines what they need. Then, Ogmentor provides three exceptional candidates — all pre-vetted, pre-tested, and ready to contribute from day one. Interviews are conducted over Zoom. Once a VA is placed, Ogmentor continues to shadow them, coach them, and make sure they are meeting expectations. Payroll, bonuses, and vacation pay are handled completely by Ogmentor. The client simply gets great work done.
The three pillars of Ogmentor's service are:
Virtual Executive Assistants — For the busy professional who needs help managing emails, calendars, research, and presentations so they can focus on higher-level decisions.
Virtual Marketing Assistants — For business owners who want to bulk up their marketing without hiring a full-time team. Social media management, email campaigns, graphic design, podcast outreach — all handled.
Virtual Sales Assistants — For sales-driven businesses that want their closers closing, not doing admin. The VA handles CRM updates, follow-ups, appointment setting, lead qualification, and prospecting so the pipeline stays full.
And the price? Up to 80% less than hiring a US-based assistant with equivalent experience.
The 80% Factor: Real Savings, Real Results
One of the most compelling things about what Lael Sturm has built with Ogmentor is the economics of it. For most small businesses and solo entrepreneurs, hiring help is the single biggest financial hurdle they face. The numbers simply do not add up — at least not when you are looking at traditional hiring.
Consider this: a skilled marketing assistant based in the United States might cost a business anywhere from $4,000 to $7,000 per month once you factor in salary, employer taxes, health benefits, and the time spent managing them. For a growing business that is not yet generating large revenues, that cost can be the difference between scaling and standing still.
Ogmentor changes that math completely. By sourcing and placing highly skilled assistants from overseas markets — particularly the Philippines, where English proficiency and professional skill sets are strong — Ogmentor delivers the same level of quality at a cost that even early-stage businesses can absorb.
But Lael has been very careful to make one thing clear: cheap does not mean low quality. The virtual assistants placed through Ogmentor are not random hires pulled from a job board. They are tested on all the tools modern businesses use — project management software, CRMs, email marketing platforms, social media schedulers, design tools, and more. They are trained before placement. And they are actively managed after placement. This is the Ogmentor difference.
"Every entrepreneur deserves a great team. The only question is whether the system you use to build it is working for you or against you."
Who Ogmentor Is Built For
Lael Sturm did not design Ogmentor for Fortune 500 companies. He designed it for the person who is building something real — the entrepreneur who wears ten hats and is starting to feel the weight of all of them. The side hustler who wants to go full-time but needs more bandwidth. The coach or consultant who is great at their craft but drowning in admin. The e-commerce founder who needs product listings updated, customer emails answered, and social media kept alive.
These are people who understand that their time is worth more than the tasks they are still doing themselves. They just need a reliable, affordable, and professionally managed solution to hand those tasks off to. That is exactly what Ogmentor delivers.
Real estate agents have used Ogmentor VAs to manage their CRM, schedule showings, and keep their social media active. Marketing agency owners have used them to handle client deliverables and reporting. Online coaches have used them to manage email funnels, book guest podcast appearances, and keep their inbox from becoming a disaster zone. In every case, the result is the same: the business owner gets time back, and the business grows faster.
The Philosophy That Drives Everything
Spend any time looking at what Lael Sturm has built, and one theme starts to emerge clearly: he is deeply committed to removing the barriers that keep entrepreneurs stuck.
Most people think the biggest barrier to business growth is money. Lael disagrees. He believes the biggest barrier is time — specifically, the time that entrepreneurs spend doing work that does not actually move the needle. And the reason they keep doing that work is because they either cannot afford to hire help, or they have tried hiring help and it did not work.
Ogmentor solves both problems at once. It makes skilled help affordable. And through its managed model, it makes that help actually work. The founder does not have to babysit their VA or figure out how to train them from scratch. They get someone who is ready, supported, and consistently delivering.
This is not just a service — it is a philosophy. It is the belief that every entrepreneur, regardless of how early they are in their journey, deserves access to the same kind of high-quality operational support that big companies take for granted.
The Long Play Mindset in Action
The name Long Play Strategic Solutions is not an accident. Lael Sturm has always been drawn to the long game. He does not promise overnight results or instant transformation. What he promises is something more durable: a system that compounds over time.
When an entrepreneur hires a VA through Ogmentor, the impact is not just felt in the first week when tasks get done faster. The real impact shows up six months later, when the founder has spent hundreds of hours on strategy and relationship-building instead of inbox management. It shows up in the new clients they closed because they had time to follow up. It shows up in the content that kept getting published because someone else was scheduling it.
That is the long play. Small consistent inputs that create massive cumulative results. Lael Sturm understands this better than most, and everything he has built reflects that understanding.
What Sets Lael Apart as an Entrepreneur
There are many people who build businesses. There are fewer who build businesses that genuinely improve the lives of other business owners. Lael Sturm belongs in the second group.
What makes him stand out is not a single big idea or a viral marketing moment. It is the consistency with which he has applied clear thinking, genuine empathy for his clients, and a relentless focus on quality. He did not just build a service that delivers virtual assistants. He built a service that makes those virtual assistants great — and that keeps them great over time.
The free resources Lael offers — including a free book on delegation and regular webinars — speak to this generosity of spirit. He is not just trying to close a sale. He is trying to genuinely help entrepreneurs understand what is possible when they stop doing everything themselves.
That approach builds trust. And trust, over time, builds a business that does not need to shout to be heard.
"The goal is not just to give entrepreneurs a helper. The goal is to give them their life back."
The Future Lael Is Building Toward
The demand for virtual assistant services is not slowing down. If anything, the rise of remote work, the explosion of entrepreneurship, and the growing awareness among business owners that delegation is a superpower — not a luxury — is only accelerating the market.
Lael Sturm is positioned exactly where the market is heading. With LPSS providing the strategic backbone and Ogmentor delivering the operational execution layer, he has built a pair of businesses that address both the big-picture and the day-to-day needs of growing entrepreneurs.
More industries are waking up to what real estate agents and coaches already know: a skilled, managed virtual assistant does not cost you money. It makes you money. By freeing up time, plugging revenue leaks, and keeping your marketing and sales engine running consistently, the right VA pays for itself many times over.
And at the center of that shift — quietly, consistently, doing the work — is Lael Sturm.
— — —
To learn more about Lael Sturm and the team at Ogmentor, visit ogmentor.com. To explore strategic business consulting through Long Play Strategic Solutions, reach out directly.