|
THE ADVANTAGES OF VIRTUAL ASSISTANTS
You may have a
multitude of reasons that prevent you from hiring a personal
assistant, though it's obvious you need one. Wouldn't it be great if
you had an assistant that was always ready to work for you, but only
when you need him or her?
The virtual
assistant takes the role of the temp and elevates it to the status
of entrepreneur. Because the virtual assistant is self-employed,
bills only the hours work or by tasks completed, and is dependent on
referrals and steady work flow from existing clients, s/he can be
the perfect solution.
A virtual
assistant offers several advantages over a paid employee. When you
hire a virtual assistant you get all the benefits of outsourcing -
no employee tax and benefits issues, coupled with the loyalty and
steadiness of a company employee.
Temps are a
transient solution, and they can be expensive. If you need someone
only a few hours a day or week, a temp can prove more costly in
terms of training than s/he is worth. Most are also looking for full
time employment, so as soon as you find someone you like, s/he has
left the temp service for greener pastures. Paid employees also come
with a host of issues. You not only must provide tech equipment and
furniture for them, you also have state and federal obligations, and
employer compliance and unemployment liabilities. Then there are the
benefits packages - sick leave, vacation time. It is estimated that
the true cost of an employee is over double and sometimes triple the
cost of their annual salary in terms of benefits and liabilities.
Significant for some is also the loss of privacy and personal issues
- you are sharing your small space with others. Do they make good
roomies?
VAs are already
computer trained, and can assist with your specific needs from
traditional office support services to highly specialized areas
including Graphic & Web design. Call upon your VA for basic word
processing, phone answering, bill paying, appointment scheduling and
calendar maintenance. You can train your virtual assistant to go
beyond administrative support to client development and marketing
support. There is no need to share space or even for live in the
same city. Work assignments are communicated through IM, e-mail,
phone, fax, "snail mail," or Web-based tools. Schedule changes,
project reports, or customer-service alerts can be performed
immediately. The virtual assistant can lend "size" to your company,
which will impress potential clients.
Tuesday, November 25, 2008
Small Business & Entrepreneurs
By Elaine Appleton Grant
Posted March 25, 2008
Now that you're
Linking In,
TwitteringDo a Google search on "virtual assistant,"
and you'll come up with over 1 million listings. Some of those
million plus, naturally, are better than others. You can use a VA in
the same town—handy if you want to meet in person before you give
the assistant the virtual keys to your business information—or use a
VA in the Philippines, India, and many other countries.
Costs vary. Cal Evans, a Nashville-based editor of a site for Web
developers, paid only $12 an hour for a virtual assistant he found
on
Guru.com and $10 an hour when he hired his daughter to do data
entry from her college dorm room in Savannah, Ga. But $30 to $50 an
hour isn't unusual, especially for complex tasks like building or
maintaining websites.
If you're going to try out a VA, learn from the pitfalls of
people who have gone before you. Always get references and talk with
the VA—don't simply E-mail—before you sign a contract. Michael Port,
author of
Book Yourself Solid, advises hiring a company, not an
individual. "What happens if this individual goes down?" he asks.
But perhaps the best advice is to be aware of your communication
style. If you're used to giving direction only to experts, you'll be
in for a shock directing far-flung generalists via E-mail. When
Evans hired both of his VAs, he expected that they'd be able to
follow his cryptic directions—for instance, to talk with potential
speakers for his upcoming technical conference. But neither knew
anything about programming.
"If I shot off a quick IM, they would have no idea how to do it,"
he says. "They were speaking a foreign language." Once he explained
his directions more clearly, both did excellent work, he says.
Although, he adds a little ruefully, "I did have to learn not to
start messages to my daughter with cute little nicknames."
Hire a Virtual Assistant
by Blanche Evans (REALTY TIMES)
Building a real estate business can turn into a exhausting treadmill if
you aren't careful. The more business you do, the more administrative tasks
you have; the more time you spend on administrative tasks, the less time you
have to generate new revenue.
The only sensible solution to growth is to multiply your manpower. Yet,
you may have a multitude of reasons that prevent you from hiring a personal
assistant, even though it's obvious you need one. Wouldn't it be great if
you had an assistant that was always ready to work for you, but only when
you need him or her? Meet the virtual assistant, a creative new labor force
that provides practical solutions for small businesses and job growth
potential for outsourcers.
Hire an entrepreneur
The virtual assistant takes the role of the temp and elevates it to the
status of entrepreneur. Because the virtual assistant is self-employed,
bills only the hours work or by tasks completed, and is dependent on
referrals and steady work flow from existing clients, s/he can be the
perfect solution for a busy agent.
A virtual assistant offers several advantages over a paid employee. When
you hire a virtual assistant you get all the benefits of outsourcing - no
employee tax and benefits issues, coupled with the loyalty and steadiness of
a company employee.
If you have found that traditional staffing solutions don't work for you
there may be many reasons. Temps are a transient solution, and they can be
expensive. If you need someone only a few hours a day or week, a temp can
prove more costly in terms of training than s/he is worth. Most are also
looking for full time employment, so as soon as you find someone you like,
s/he has left the temp service for greener pastures.
Paid employees come also come with a host of issues. You not only must
provide tech equipment and furniture for them, you also have state and
federal obligations, and employer compliance and unemployment liabilities.
Then there are the benefits packages - sick leave, vacation time. It is
estimated that the true cost of an employee is over double and sometimes
triple the cost of their annual salary in terms of benefits and liabilities.
Significant for some is also the loss of privacy and personal issues - you
are sharing your small space with others. Do they make good roomies?
How practical is a virtual assistant?
As more agents move their marketing and communications to the Internet,
virtual assistants become more and more the obvious solution to staffing
problems. For an hourly fee of $15 to $35, less than the cost of temps or
employees, agents can take advantage of professional assistance and a
variety of skills at the click of a mouse.
Virtual assistants are already computer trained, and can assist with your
specific needs from traditional office support services to highly
specialized areas including Web page design. Call upon your virtual
assistant for basic word processing, phone answering, bill paying,
appointment scheduling and calendar maintenance. You can train your virtual
assistant to go beyond administrative support to client development and
marketing support.
There is no need to share space or even for the agent and the virtual
assistant to live in the same city. Work assignments are communicated
through e-mail, phone, fax, "snail mail," or diskette. The agent can take
advantage of Web-based tools such as instant messengers, like ICQ, and
online calendars and planners are often used as a means of keeping in touch.
Schedule changes, project reports, or customer-service alerts such as new
listings for a client can be performed immediately. The virtual assistant
can lend "size" to your company, which will impress potential clients.
"As cable Internet, wireless Internet, and other broadband solutions grow
in the marketplace, the VA will be well-placed to leverage the additional
communications tools and grow even closer to the small business or startup
client," says Christine C. Durst, president and CEO of
Staffcentrix, LLC.
How to find a virtual assistant
There are several effective ways to find a virtual assistant. Simply
enter "virtual assistant" in your favorite search engine. Another solution
is to search the directory at www.staffcentrix.com. Staffcentrix is a
resource/support company for virtual assistants. You can search the pool of
virtual assistants manually, or use the free referral service to search the
database for those who most closely match your needs. In the directory, you
can learn the virtual assistant's experience level, services provided,
software and hardware capabilities, and his/her email, URL address, and
other contact information. The
International Virtual Assistants Association also has a comprehensive
directory of virtual assistants.
Contact the virtual assistant who most closely match your needs via
email. Most virtual assistants are used to proving themselves with small
projects of an hour or two. Any more than that and they should be paid for
their time. You can set up payment arrangements by time or task.
VA
TROUBLE
years ago, an idea sparked
the Internet business community, and spread like wildfire. The idea was based on
the premise that individuals, small businesses and corporations alike could take
advantage of advances in technology by sourcing out much of their administrative
tasks to "Virtual Assistants" (VA's).
The idea certainly was a good one. After all, the VA would work from their own
office, provide their own equipment, pay their own taxes & insurance and much
more. Basically, the VA would take over administrative tasks for the client, as
well as relieve the client of the strains of hiring an additional employee or
employees. Even better, the VA would be the clients personal success coach, not
only helping them get on track in their personal & business lives, but helping
them stay on track and even succeed beyond their initial personal & business
goals.
Since the dawn of the Virtual Assistant idea, however, many formerly successful
VA's have been relegated to the title of online freelancer. While a few VA's
remain focused on the task of providing solid administrative services to their
clients, most now work on smaller, less personalized services. Many of the VA's
that I know who once handled contracts for clients on an on-going basis are now
struggling just to find one-shot projects that will help pay the bills.
The problem is not that the VA's services are not useful. In fact, far from it.
Hiring a Virtual Assistant has many, many advantages, particularly for the small
business owner or individual. With a VA by their side, these types of clients
can make major advances towards acheiving their goals in their business, as well
as personal lives. The best part is that because a VA works entirely over the
Internet, and by fax & phone, they allow the client to get back to what's
important - business!
Unfortunately, many would-be clients tend to shy away from the services of a VA
simply because, even after 3 years on the scene, the client fails to see exactly
how the Virtual Assistant process works. In addition, they remain hesitant
because those in the VA industry have not been able to get their message across
in a manner that relieves the client of their fears of working with a VA.
So, how do VA's overcome that fear? A proven formula has yet to be found, though
some have found success with a variety of client based 'offers', such as
discounts or freebies until the client reaches a goal. Others have begun
offering a trial period that allows the client to get a 'feel' for the service
before actually paying for it.
Unfortunately, these can have a negative effect on the VA industry by painting
the VA as being less than worthy of the client's time or effort. For those that
would use these 'gimmicks', I would strongly suggest that you place a little
more faith in yourself & your abilities before giving your services away.
There is no doubt that there is a huge market for the services of a VA. I have
had the opportunity to discuss this issue with a number of marketiing and
branding 'gurus', and their response is always the same: until the potential
client is properly educated and their fears addressed, many VA's will continue
to struggle.
WHO NEEDS A VA!
Time is precious to ALL business owners…so anything that frees up time and
helps business is invaluable! A Virtual Assistant (VA) does both – and more!
Business owners – like you – hire VAs to free up time, help business and SAVE
money! Yes…I said SAVE $$$. That may seem like an oxymoron, but just stay with
me here. VAs are self-employed. They pay their own taxes, their own insurance,
they pay for their own equipment and furniture, for their own training, etc.
Plus! YOU CAN MORE THAN LIKELY WRITE OFF VA’S FEES AS AN EXPENSE – and you don’t
have to pay taxes for a VA (as you would for an employee) or provide benefits
and insurance…THAT’S HUGE! Any savvy business person sees the value in this
right away!
So, why should you hire a VA?
1. To save money
2. To fill a position or to help with a temporary project
You (i.e. business owner, entrepreneur, etc.) pay only for the VA services
used – only when needed – no down time. One week you might have 20 hours of work
for the VA, the next, only 5. Why would you pay a full-time, onsite employee
(who probably can’t get done in a day, what a VA gets done in 2 hours!)
benefits, vacation, taxes, lunch breaks, chatting at the copy machine, etc…when
you can partner with a VA to do it for you in half the time – for half the
expense???!!!
Jennifer Cummings, Entrepreneur and Owner of Keytura, Inc., who has been
using virtual assistants and virtual outsourcing for years says, "My virtual
assistants and consultants have helped me execute so many of the ideas I just
had sitting on my desk. Using their services, I take action...which means I make
more money! They are invaluable to my business!"
At this point you might be asking, “Well, how do I know this VA is doing what
I’m asking her to do? How can I trust her?”
Well, that’s not hard. #1 - If your VA is not doing what she says she’s
doing, it’s eventually going to become VERY obvious. Things won’t be getting
done and it will show. #2 – Your VA will keep track of – and provide you with a
detailed record of – tasks completed & time they took. #3 – and this is HUGE…
Your VA is a business owner just like you!
Your business success is KEY to your VA’s business success!
If your VA screws up your business, she is – in essence – screwing up her
own. What person in his or her right mind would do that???!!! You both (you and
your VA) need to think of each other as business PARTNERS because that’s exactly
what you are. You are partnering your businesses for success!
So, where can you find a VA? Try places like: http://www.IVAA.org, http://www.elance.com,
or http://www.guru.com. You won’t be sorry you made this decision. Your
increased profits, productivity and ROI will show you that VAs are something
that “just make sense!”
10 SIGNS YOU MAY NEED A VA
1. You've missed out on
opportunities because you forgot to follow up or didn't have time to submit a
proposal.
2. You've sent out articles, proposals, or other important correspondence with
spelling or grammatical errors.
3. You haven't sent out your "monthly" newsletter in several months.
4. You often work evenings and/or weekends to stay on top of administrative
tasks.
5. You have projects requiring skills and/or software that you don't have.
6. You have lots of great ideas for your business, but no time to carry them
out.
7. You haven't updated your website in over a year.
8. You've been procrastinating about tasks on your to-do list for several weeks
- or longer.
9. You've had to turn down opportunities because you couldn't figure out when
you would do the work.
10. You'd love to take your business to the next level - if you only had the
time.
|
