October’s Guest Expert at the VACOC – You’re gonna love this one!

VACOC Monthly Guest Expert Teleseminar Series:

The Top 10 Mistakes That are Killing Your Brand

Presented by Rob Frankel

DATE: Thursday, October 18, 2007
TIME: 5pm PST / 6pm MST / 7pm CST / 8pm EST
LENGTH: 60 minutes (please call in 10 min. early)
COST: FREE!

This class is open to all Virtual Assistants and business owners. Feel free to invite your colleagues and clients.

“Branding is not about getting your prospects to choose you over your competition; it’s about getting your prospects to see you as the only solution to their problem.” ™ –Rob Frankel

Branding is a lot more than just a name and a logo. It’s how users and prospects are turned into evangelists for your business. But even more important than what you know about branding is what you don’t know. It’s costing you real business and real dollars. Branding expert Rob Frankel will be telling you–yes, you– the 10 ways you are currently killing your brand. He’ll also tell you how to fix every one of them.

Join us on Thursday, October 18, for a special hour with Rob Frankel, author of the groundbreaking bestseller, Revenge of Brand X: How to Build a Big Time Brand on the Web or Anywhere Else.  Rob Frankel has been called “the best branding expert on the planet,” advising, consulting and speaking to Fortune 500 companies, funded start-ups and major media such as CBS, CNBC, ABC, NBC, FOX, WSJ, NYT, LAT and many more.

Branding is relevant to every business, and to every part of your business. Rob is the only branding consultant who can show you how creating and implementing brand strategy directly increases your bottom line revenues–and profitability. Be sure to catch a spot at what is sure to be one of our most fascinating, eye-opening events.

Register Now!

About Rob Frankel

Rob Frankel has been called “the best branding expert on the planet,” advising, consulting and speaking to Fortune 500 companies, funded start-ups and major media such as CBS, CNBC, ABC, NBC, FOX, the Wall Street Journal, New York Time, LA TImes, and many more. (For clips, visit http://www.robfrankel.com/videos.html).

Rob is the only branding consultant who can show you how creating and implementing brand strategy directly increases your bottom line revenues–and profitability.

He is also the author of the ground-breaking best-seller, The Revenge of Brand X: How to Build a Big Time Brand on the Web or Anywhere Else, (ISBN 0967991218) and founder/authority on the revenue-generating Branded Community® via http://www.i-legions.com. Details at http://www.robfrankel.com.

 

September’s Guest Expert at the VACOC

VACOC Monthly Guest Expert Teleseminar Series:

The 5 Strategies to Earning Your Worth

 

Presented by Mikelann Valterra

DATE: Thursday, September 20, 2007
TIME: 5pm PST / 6pm MST / 7pm CST / 8pm EST
LENGTH: 60 minutes (please call in 10 min. early)
COST: FREE!

This class is open to all Virtual Assistants, independent professionals, small business owners, micropreneurs and solopreneurs. Feel free to invite your colleagues and clients.

Are you earning your potential? Or are you struggling against an “internal income ceiling?”

In this powerful teleseminar, Mikelann Valterra, founder of The Women’s Earning Institute, explores the psychology of why even successful women undersell themselves and what to do about it.

From having lower pay expectations than other people, to difficulty in asking for what you really want, women who “underearn” deal with complex emotional issues around making money. Learn the five crucial skills to earning what you are really worth, and start making more money today!

Participants will learn:

• How to make asking for what you want easier;
• How and why women underprice themselves, and what to do about it
• How to conquer “The Good Girl Syndrome”
• How getting in touch with “resentment” can make you more money

And much more… Reserve your seat today!

Register Now!

About Mikelann Valterra

Mikelann (pronounced “Michael-Ann”) Valterra is the founder and director of The Women’s Earning Institute and author of the book, “Why Women Earn Less: How to Make What You’re Really Worth,” and the workbook, “How to Set and Raise Your Rates.” As a specialist in earning issues, she speaks and consults widely on how to overcome self-sabotaging beliefs about money. From KOMO News 4 to the Washington Post, she talks about transforming one’s relationship to money, and how women can earn at their potential.

To subscribe to the free monthly “Earn Your Worth” e-newsletter, go to http://www.womenearning.com.

 

More on remote workers vs. Virtual Assistants

A Virtual Assistance colleague of mine was on an online networking forum and she posed a question to the group: What do you know about Virtual Assistants?

A response came from someone who had a remote worker from Team Double-Click (TDC). This person was extremely dissatisfied and because TDC promotes their remote workers as Virtual Assistants, he had a bad impression of Virtual Assistants.

Some of the problems this person had with the remote worker:

• the remote worker was unable to effectively communicate with his clients
• the remote worker didn’t do the work and then lied, saying that she had done the work
• the remote worker was hired to take some of the burden from him and instead he was spending more time on the tasks and getting inferior results to him doing them himself
• the remote worker needed a lot of oversight and was incompetent

Some of the problems this person has with Team Double-Click:

• all of the remote workers are promoted as being able to do anything and everything under the sun from web design to answering the phone
• people in his line of business have had to go through as many as four remote workers
• makes promises that aren’t kept
• analysis of needs is not thorough

Let’s look at these items from the professional Virtual Assistant’s point of view.

• Many Vas offer free consultations so that the business owner and the VA can discuss needs and solutions. The business owner can discern the communication skills of the VA during the consultation.
• A professional VA will likely communicate on a daily basis with their clients, or at least each time the VA completes work for the client.
• This is unconscionable! Professional Virtual Assistants alleviate burdens so that their clients can focus on generating revenue and doing what it is they love. VAs are business owners themselves and understand the mindset of their clients.
• Professional Virtual Assistants need no oversight, are highly competent and have at least five years of high-level administrative background in the corporate world. Most of the VAs I know have ten to thirty years of experience.
• Virtual Assistants are highly skilled in many areas and many VAs are experts in certain areas. No one VA can do everything nor wants to do everything. It’s not profitable – don’t forget that VAs are business owners. A true Virtual Assistant will be honest about what services they offer.
• A Virtual Assistant will conduct a consultation with a prospective client and both the VA and the prospective client will know whether they are a good fit for each other thus eliminating the need to seek a replacement.
• If a professional VA doesn’t keep promises that are made, then that VA is out of business. It’s as simple as that.
• Again, the consultation process can help determine the needs of a prospective client and any good VA will be thorough so as to be able to properly serve the client.

I feel badly for this person who had such a poor experience. I hope I have helped to better define the differences between a remote worker and a Virtual Assistant.

Have you had a bad experience with a remote worker?

 

Continuing Series of Guest Experts at the VACOC

Change Your Focus, Multiply Sales!

Presented by Silver Rose

DATE: Thursday, August 16, 2007
TIME: 5pm PST / 6pm MST / 7pm CST / 8pm EST
LENGTH: 60 minutes (please call in 10 min. early)
COST: FREE!

This class is open to all Virtual Assistants, independent professionals, small business owners, micropreneurs and solopreneurs. Feel free to invite your colleagues and clients.

Focus has always been a critical component of business success. When facing a multitude of choices and distractions, those who consistently move toward achieving their goals have mastered the ability to focus.

In this teleseminar, Silver Rose will take you on a laugh-filled journey of how she has used the power of focus to double her income every year since 2003, and how you can, too.

You will learn how to gain success quicker and with less effort by leveraging the Law of Attraction (you get what you focus on), and you will be challenged to investigate your own approach to business to find out what you are focused on (you may be surprised).

Participants will walk away with the tools for:

• Landing clients versus gathering prospects;
• Qualifying potential clients instead of merely scheduling appointments; and
• Attracting profit instead of income (she who keeps the most wins!).

By focusing on the results you want instead of the process for getting them, you will achieve results as quickly as you’ve always dreamed you could.

Register Now!

About Silver Rose

Motivational speaker Silver Rose specializes in working with individuals who want work that they love and organizations that want employees who love their work. She has devoted the last 18 years to the study of the impact of optimism in the workplace. During that time, she has worked with numerous organizations committed to fully utilizing the resources of their employees and creating a competitive advantage in their marketplaces.

Silver’s customized programs combine timely information with humor and fun to produce results. Her track record of success in Human Resources has made her the “go-to” expert in the field of business/employee relationships. Happily at work on her fourth book, Silver is committed to all individuals having work that causes them to say, “Thank God it’s Monday!”

Visit Silver Rose’s website! 

 

Are Virtual Staffing Agencies operating outside of the law?

There has been a sometimes heated discussion this past week across several blogs concerning the definition of a Virtual Assistant.  The argument was between Virtual Assistance business owners and contractors to virtual assistance staffing agencies.  I threw in my dollar’s worth of opinion because I’m convinced that these discussions are making history by defining exactly what is a virtual assistance practice. This industry will be as prominent as any other profession you can think of in five years. It’s the job of Virtual Assistants to make sure that we distinguish ourselves from contractors to staffing agencies just like an accountant distinguishes himself from the folks who train for six weeks to work at Jackson Hewitt or H&R Block at tax time.

One side of the argument is from virtual staffing agency workers.  They see themselves as virtual assistants.   They argue that because they do their work remotely, that makes them virtual assistants.  Many participating in the discussion work for Team Double-Click (TDC).  TDC does the marketing to get the clients and then farms their clients out to remote temps.  TDC’s clients pay TDC; TDC pays the temps.  TDC is a temporary staffing agency employer similar to the famous Kelly Services; however, Kelly Services deducts Federal Income Tax, SSI, etc. from the paychecks of their employees.  TDC does not and there is no doubt that the IRS will have a field day with them at some point.  TDC’s wages are not up to par with Kelly Services either, even without taking the lawfully required deductions as an employer.

One commenter on the side of remote temps stated that everything is relative and a definition depends upon your point of view.  I’m afraid that’s one of the problems with our society today. Many things are seen as being relative. There are few absolutes. I believe that a Virtual Assistance business can and must be defined in absolute terms.

And so the other side of the argument is from Virtual Assistants.  Virtual Assistants are business owners, not simply remote workers.  They take on the responsibilities, risks and rewards of an entrepreneur.  Virtual Assistants set their own rates, do their own billing, find their own clients through their own marketing methods.  They make the decisions about how their business operates.  A Virtual Assistant is the professional who does the work and therefore, is the one who gets paid and not through an intermediary.  Virtual Assistants have no supervisors because they are the business owners.   They pay their own taxes and make their own capital outlays.  They consult with prospective clients to instill trust and to present the value of working with a Virtual Assistant.

Virtual Assistants commonly have resources other than themselves.  The business world is not a vacuum and most companies cannot run effectively or efficiently without outside resources.  As business owners, Virtual Assistants have a contingency plan for emergencies and their clients are not so utterly dependent upon them that they couldn’t run their business for a while without them.  After all, the clients are business owners, too.

Most importantly, the true Virtual Assistant collaborates with the client based on the idea that both the VA and the client will benefit and move both their companies to a higher level.   If the collaboration is substandard, and it’s the VA’s fault, the VA can expect to lose that client.  The other side of the coin is that the VA has the option of firing the client.

Personally, I don’t take on a client if I’m not sure I can give them super-standard service.  I’ve also had to get rid of a client because the client was unwilling to even try any of my suggestions, let alone implement them.  That’s the beauty of owning my company.  I hold the power.

I welcome further discussion of this topic but be warned.  Some of the remarks made on the other blogs were sarcastic and some people resorted to personal attacks.  I will tolerate neither in this discussion.  My position is that once those types of comments are made in an argument, the one hurling invective has lost the argument. Please keep your comments on a professional level and I will be glad to post them.

 

Another Free Teleseminar

Leveraging Collaborative Virtual Office Technology for Virtual Assistants and Solopreneurs

Presented by Shahab Kaviani, HyperOffice

DATE: Thursday, July 19, 2007
TIME: 5pm PST / 6pm MST / 7pm CST / 8pm EST
LENGTH: 60 minutes (please call in 10 min. early)
COST: FREE!

This class is open to all Virtual Assistants, virtual service providers and solopreneurs. Feel free to invite your colleagues and clients.

Faced with increasing competition from offshore and commodity service providers, Virtual Assistants and other independent service providers must find ways to deliver more value while differentiating themselves from the emerging competition. Leveraging virtual office technology is an increasingly popular method by which Virtual Assistants and independent professionals are growing their businesses.

Virtual office technology allows Virtual Assistants to free up more time while deepening the client relationships they have worked so hard to establish. It allows them to work more collaboratively with clients while reducing time and resource costs. By providing a shared collaborative environment, Virtual Assistants can improve their clients’ experience and give them instant access to critical information any time, any place.

In this webinar, HyperOffice Vice President Shahab Kaviani will walk us through the HyperOffice virtual office technology. Participants get a tour of the HyperOffice collaborative workspace, and learn how to grow their businesses by streamlining operations without increasing overhead, improve client retention, and deliver more value. They’ll also get to hear from Virtual Assistants who have successfully leveraged HyperOffice virtual office technology in their practices to distinguish their services and streamline their operations.

Information to be covered includes:

• What is virtual office technology?
• Key considerations to take into account when choosing a virtual office technology provider;
• How to streamline operations to support clients without increasing overhead;
• How to store all customer information in a single place with permission-based customer access;

And much more!

 

Hallmarks of Virtual Assistance

A fellow Virtual Assistant posted a question on the VACOC forum today. It went something like this:

My business is growing but I’m overwhelmed with daily requests from clients. I also have a hard time concentrating on larger projects, although they always get done on time.

What do you consider “expedited work” and do you charge more for it?

This is what I said:

When I first started my practice, my policy was a 24- to 48-hour turnaround for work and anything that needed same-day turnaround would be charged at one-and-a-half times the normal rate. Fortunately, I never had to implement those policies because if I had, I would have been pulling out my hair. I’ve learned, in the last year, that there has to be order. I can’t provide order to anything with constant 24- to 48-hour turnaround or same-day delivery policies. Order is a hallmark of virtual assistance.

I’ve also learned that multi-tasking, of which I was so proud to be proficient, doesn’t work for a client-based business owner. The best service I can give my clients is focused time and that doesn’t happen in spurts and starts. Focused intervals of time are scheduled to be at least one hour in length. That’s how I can legitimately charge in 15-minute increments. I don’t bounce from one client’s work to another or try to do both at the same time. That’s not an efficient use of my brain or talent nor is it fair to my clients because it will cost them more money. Efficiency is also a hallmark of virtual assistance.

Concentrated time on a task is more effective because interruptions cause the thought process to break and then it takes 15-20 minutes to recapture the same thought process. I know that wasn’t part of your original question but it goes to the same issue. If you’re allowing clients to interrupt you with same-day requests, you’ll find it increasingly difficult to get those big projects done.

It’s time to set a new policy in motion.

 

VACOC Monthly Guest Expert Teleseminar Series

I want to let you know about another upcoming FREE teleseminar sponsored by the Virtual Assistance Chamber of Commerce.

VACOC Monthly Guest Expert Teleseminar Series:

You’d Protect a Human Child, Why Not a “Brain Child?” Intellectual Property for Solopreneurs

Presented by Nina Kaufman, Esq., Wise Counsel Press

Date: Thursday, June 21, 2007
Time: 5:00 p.m. PST/6:00 p.m. MST/7:00 p.m. CST/8:00 p.m. EDT
Length: Sixty minutes
Cost: FREE!

This class is open to all Virtual Assistants, Small Business Owners and Independent Service Providers. Feel free to invite your colleagues and clients.

Do you know the difference between a trademark, a copyright, and a domain name — and the rights each one entitles you to?

Do you want to avoid messy (and expensive) disputes with other business owners?

Want to know how to protect your valuable intellectual capital so that you’re the one to profit from it?

Just as human children need our protection, our “brain children”– or intellectual property — also need our protection. Unfortunately, solo professionals often don’t realize (before it’s too late) that they had protectable intellectual property and what they could have done to protect it.

Given the fast pace at which information flies in the Digital Age, forethought and intellectual property planning is absolutely necessary.

Join me to learn how you can identify your “brain children” and protect yourself economically. A few of the scenarios that we’ll cover include:

• What’s the difference between a copyright, a trademark, and a domain name?
• Can I get a trademark once I have a domain name? And what if someone tries to get a trademark using my business name?
• What if my articles appear on someone else’s website (or blog) without permission?
• Who owns the program that I collaborated on with someone else?
• Can I use ideas in my business that I generated for a client?

And much more!

Free giveaways will be provided to four lucky call participants, so be sure to register today to reserve your spot!

Sign up here: Teleclass registration.

About Nina Kaufman: Nina L. Kaufman, Esq., is a rare combination: a small business attorney, entrepreneur, and stand-up comedienne. Through her humor, wisdom, and legal acumen, she helps entrepreneurs and small businesses protect their companies and develop a solid legal foundation for growth and success. She specializes in working with service-based businesses. Her mission is to help demystify legal concepts and mumbo-jumbo so that business owners can make smart legal decisions, protect their companies, and save money . . . wisely.

For over a decade, she has worked with solopreneurs and small business owners through her NYC law firm, Paltrowitz & Kaufman, LLP. A prolific writer and legal blogger, Nina is the founder and President of Wise Counsel Press, LLC, which produces legal information products for entrepreneurs. She blogs regularly on business partnership and partnering relationships in her Business Partnership Central blog and is a regular contributor to Entrepreneur magazine’s new online portal for women business owners, WomenEntrepreneur.com. Her new book, The Key Questions: 100 Questions to Ask Before Going into Business with Someone Else, is soon to be released through iUniverse and will be available online through Amazon.com and Barnes & Noble.com. She is married and lives in New York City.

Sign up for the teleseminar! I think you’ll enjoy it and don’t forget . . . it’s FREE!

 

Making Room for What You Want

When I decided to start a Virtual Assistance business, I wondered if I could do it. I mean, I knew I could do the work. But could I run a business? See, I’m what is known as a free spirit; in other words, I’m undisciplined and easily distracted. That flies in the face of being very organized, which I am (no wonder the person I fight with the most is me!).

I wrote in my business plan that I would take a project and turn it around in 24-48 hours. Pretty unrealistic plan because what if I got six projects at once? And who knew what the complexity of those projects would be? I had guaranteed failure. So, for months, I was in the frame of mind that if I got a lot of projects to do, I would fail because I couldn’t do them all at once. My subconscious mind was not letting me find clients. Thus my business was failing. I was miserable. During that time I joined the VACOC and subsequently left because I didn’t have time for it. I was too busy failing.

When I came back to the VACOC in October, I decided to purchase their forms. I had to do something besides get a full-time job. Those forms, along with actually participating in the forum this time, has made all the difference. I now realize my limitations are not that I’m undisciplined and can’t run a business. I am running a company and being undisciplined spurs my creativity. My limitation is time and time can be managed. The best way to manage time as a VA is to have retainer clients and the equivalent of one day dedicated to taking care of the business. Take care of the business . . . take care of yourself. They go hand-in-hand.

Two weeks ago I changed my hours from Monday-Friday to Monday-Thursday. Friday belongs to my company. The past two Fridays I haven’t spent a lot of time on the business, per se. What I have done is cleaned out and cleaned up my home. I removed nine large trash bags of clothing and linen, threw out enough stuff to fill three wheeled bins, moved two pieces of furniture to the basement (The cellar will receive the same cleansing at the end of June.). Yesterday I cleaned the house from top to bottom – that was a really good thing because the cat hair was getting kind of thick – lol!

Suzanne Evans of Blueprint Life Coaching started me on this quest. Now I feel so much cleaner, organized, lighter, refreshed. And because I got rid of so much, I have room for those two or three other retainer clients I want.

Have you made room for what you want in your business and your life?

 

Productivity Group Writing Project

TAG! I’m it! So is Suzanne Evans!

TAG! You’re it, Tracey Lawton! And you’re it, Silvia Shields!

This ultimate guide to productivity meme was started by Ben Yoskovitz at Instigator Blog and Vickie Turley of A Balanced Alternative (transforming from Elite VAs) tagged me and Suzanne.

The question: what’s your secret to being productive?

Well, it’s not really a secret; it’s more of a practice. Some might even see it as being a bit on the obsessive-compulsive side. It’s the way I work best.

I believe in the old adage: a place for everything and everything in its place. My home, which contains me, a five-year-old boy, four cats and two fish, tends toward messiness. It also seems to generate things that prove the placard hanging in my kitchen: if the dustball moves, it’s probably a cat. The dustballs bug me, but I can coexist with them. I cannot coexist with disorder.

Like the rest of my home, my office is organized and ordered. My home is small and the office is a small alcove within the home. The operative word is small. If things are not where they belong – and it only takes a few things – small becomes smaller. I haven’t reached smallest yet . . .

Everything in my office is within reach. I can swivel my chair and put my hands on anything I need. This proves to be very efficient. I don’t get a lot of exercise, but that’s not the point. Efficiency breeds productivity and that’s the point. As something comes into the office, it’s dealt with immediately, even if that’s just putting it in its place. A piece of paper is put into a file/folder and the folder may be put into the bin. Or that piece of paper is put into the follow-up file with a corresponding entry on the calendar. The objective is two-fold. Keep the files complete and try to put my hands on a piece of paper as few times as possible.

So that’s my “secret.” Some might call it a disorder. I call it order; it’s organized, efficient and . . . productive.

Okay now – here are the rules of this project from Ben’s Instigator Blog forwarded to me by Vickie Turley:

1. Write a post on your best productivity tips. Challenge yourself by picking your single best productivity tip (although this isn’t a requirement; you can give us more if you want).
2. Include links to other people that have written posts, or include their tips in your post with proper attribution.
   

   Note: I’m not asking that you link to everyone in the group writing project meme; pick the ones you want to connect with. You certainly can link to everyone, but it’s not a requirement. I like leaving more decision making power in your hands so this isn’t just a link grab, but you’re thinking about what your audience & community wants to read about.

   A link back to this post is appreciated though, to help spread the word!

3. If you use Technorati Tags then tag your post “ultimate guide to productivity”.
4. Tag others in your post to spread the meme. Tag as many people as you like!
5. If you link back to Instigator Blog and email me at byosko@gmail.com, I’ll make sure to include at least 2 links back to you. But this isn’t a requirement, it just helps me keep track of what’s going on.