Wednesday, March 31, 2010

10 different ways to use Skype, other then just for free calls

by Sarah Santacroce

Today I’m starting another twin series, two posts about the same subject: Skype

Skype is the world's number one internet calling service, but you can do much more with it than just make cheap calls. Are you already using all the services that it offers? Find out below:

Add me to Skype

1. Run multiple Skype accounts
If you are like me, and like to keep personal life and business separate, it’s very convenient to have two different Skype accounts, one for your private contacts and one for your business relations. If you have Windows XP Pro, you can create and run more than one copy of Skype on your computer. This lets you switch between accounts. To do this you will need to create another Windows account (go to Start, Control Panel, User Accounts) and create a new account. After that you will have to start a new Skype instance:

  • First, open “Run” window by pressing the “Windows key” (little flag on your keyboard) and R at the same time. Note: If you don’t have a “Windows key” on your keyboard then you can open “Run” window also under the “Start” menu.
  • Once you have the “Run” window open, enter the following command with quotes and press OK. "C:\Program Files\Skype\Phone\Skype.exe" /secondary (copy the command here and past it) Done!

2. Do you use your computer for Skype?  You don’t have to!
For super ease of use, you can purchase a USB phone that connects to your computer.  Take it a step further and look for a wireless phone. Sure!  Skype Wireless phone works wherever you can find wireless access.

3. Use Skype to promote your business
You can use the mood message (the little bubble next to your photo) to promote your business, latest articles on your blog or other links of interest. Go to “Personalize”, “Add video to your Mood” and post your links or other message.

4. Call forwarding
People can still phone you even when you're not using Skype. By setting the Call Forwarding option you can have any incoming calls transferred to a phone of your choosing (your caller will be charged at the standard SkypeOut rate). In fact you can set up to three phones in the software – home, work and mobile perhaps - and they will all ring simultaneously until one is answered. To turn this feature on go to Tools, Call Forwarding.

5. Secret emoticons
Did you know that other then the long list of available emoticons, there’s also a 15 that are hidden and only available if you know the code? Most of the hidden emoticons have a slightly more adult theme (rude, smoking, drinking, etc) but a couple of them are cute, such as (heidy), a little squirrel or (tmi) (too much information). Find the full list here.

 

Did you like those tips? Come back next week for my 2nd post about Skype tools for the small business owner. Have you ever recorded a Skype call? For example that first very important call with a new customer? I’ll show you how in my next post. Stay tuned…

For this post I found some information from the this website. I herewith give them full credit for that info!

 

Related posts:
Google Tools for your Small Business – Part 1
Google Tools for your Small Business – Part 2

Friday, March 26, 2010

6 tasks any Entrepreneur could outsource to a Virtual Assistant

Everybody talks about outsourcing nowadays. They say it saves you time and money. Really, is that true? Let's see:

  • Virtual Assistants only charge for actual time worked
  • Virtual Assistants use their own equipment
  • You don't need to pay employment insurance, vacation pay, sick pay, or contribute to retirement plans and worker’s compensation
  • There is no down time or training expense for specialized skills, since Virtual Assistants are already qualified
  • You pay no agency fees. Temp agencies usually charge an agency fee to work with them
  • You can benefit from time zone advantages, your Virtual Assistant works while you sleep

Outsourcing to a Virtual Assistant

Hmmm, that's quite an impressive list of benefits. But what kind of tasks could I delegate to my Virtual Assistant?
Let me give you some examples:

  1. A VA can post your company videos on Youtube
    Youtube and video branding becomes more and more important. Did you know that Youtube reaches 1 Billion views per day? You will have to agree that it would make sense that your company’s videos get posted and marketed on Youtube. A VA can set up an account for you, post the videos, send out links on Facebook and Twitter or embed them on your website.
  2. Add a press page to the company website
    Every website should have a press page. A Virtual Assistant can create a press page, and add links to articles in which your company appears on a regular basis.
  3. Help you distribute your press release and articles on various directories
    It’s very important to write regular articles and press releases. But it’s even more important to distribute them online so people actually read them. A VA can help you distribute them to various directories online.
  4. Translate your website
    Are you working with many clients who speak another language? Or are you based in a bilingual country? Some VAs are multilingual and can translate your website for you. They are usually not certified translators, but can offer the same quality for a smaller price.
  5. Organize venue arrangements: seating, meals, beverages, flowers etc
    Next time you have to organize a big event, why don’t you hire a VA instead of trying to prepare your speeches and organize everything at the same time? A VA can get in touch with the venue provider and arrange seating, meals, beverages, podcasting etc.
  6. Setup an online backup system for your computer
    Honestly, when was the last time you backed up the data on your computer? A Virtual Assistant can arrange an online backup system so that you’ll never have a nightmare about loosing all your files again!


These are just a few samples. If this post has sparked your interest in a VA, click here to find out what else you could delegate.

Related posts:
How can a Virtual Assistant help you?
7 tips on how to communicate effectively with your VA
How does the remote business relationship with a VA work?
What’s the difference between a VA and an employee?
What exactly is a Virtual Assistant?

Friday, March 19, 2010

Google Tools for Your Small Business - Part 2

by Sarah Santacroce

As promised last week, here is my second post about two other useful Google tools for small business owners: Feedburner and Wonder Wheel. And since you were so loyal and came back to read this one, I'll throw in a little bonus for you: GOOGL, the free 411 Service :-)


Feedburner

First of all, what are RSS feeds? According to Wikipedia, “RSS (most commonly expanded as "Really Simple Syndication") is a family of web feed formats used to publish frequently updated works—such as blog entries, news headlines, audio, and video—in a standardized format.”

So as I explained in my previous post about the Google Reader tool, anybody can subscribe to a feed and read the updates in a feed aggregator such as Google Reader.

How do I burn a Feed?

Ok, so let’s say you have a blog and write weekly or daily updates. In order for your readers to be able to subscribe to your updates (by clicking on that cute little orange icon), you will first have to burn a feed. Ready? Let’s do it together:

  1. Go to Feedburner.com
  2. Sign in with your Google Account or create a new account
  3. In the field “Burn a feed right this instant” insert your blog url
  4. Hit Next
  5. Click on the RSS (second choice), not the Atom
  6. Change Title and Feed Address if you want to
  7. Congratulations, your feed is now ready!
  8. Click on “Skip” and go directly to feed management
  9. Now you can integrate your feed into your blog by creating the little orange icon or offering your readers to subscribe to your updates via e-mail
  10. Bonus tip: Under the “Publicize” tab, you can add a Twitter account and Feedburner will automatically post updates to your social media account.

Did you know that you can subscribe to the RSS Feed of Linkedin Answers? If you’re interested leave me a comment and I’ll tell you how…


The Wonder Wheel

The wonder wheel is a tool which was designed especially for webmasters, but every small business owner who uses keywords either on their website, blog or in news articles can use it. It’s a great little SEO tool!
Here is how it works: you input a keyword and the Wonder Wheel pulls out 8 of the most searched terms originating from your keyword. The cycle can go on and on endlessly…

How to get this tool?

It is completely free and requires no downloading at all. Simply search up a keyword through the Google page and on the left hand side, you should see a link called, “Show Options.” Click that, then scroll down and hit the ‘Wonder Wheel’ button under the category, ‘Standard View’. Here’s what you would see if your keyword was : play money.

image

Still not convinced how this can be useful to you? Try this:

  • Find keywords with high search rates for your niche, imbed them in your website
  • Find keywords in other languages by choosing Google.de for German for example
  • Search for keywords when writing a new blog entry
  • Use it for mind mapping when creating adds for your new product
  • Etc. etc. the possibilities are endless…


And here’s your bonus Tool: GOOGL

Did you know that Google can also be used as a free 411 service in the US?

1. Dial 1-800-GOOG-411 from any phone

2. State the location and business type

3. Connect to the business for free

4. Done!

Watch this video for more info:


In case you missed last week's post about Google Reader and Google Alerts, click here to view it!
Are you working from home? Read my post on how to stay productive.





Friday, March 12, 2010

Google Tools for your Small Business – Part 1

by Sarah Santacroce

This is the first out of two posts about some great Google Tools you can (and should) use for your small business. They are totally free of charge, but not everybody knows about them…


Google Alerts

I personally use Google Alerts to monitor anything that concerns Virtual Assistance in general, my company’s name and my own name. After setting up the alerts (see instructions below) you will get an e-mail from Google with all the new entries for a particular news item, blog, Web page update, or video. This is a great way to stay informed about your area of expertise, interact with people by leaving comments on their blogs and posting interesting articles on Twitter or Facebook.

Defining an alert is simple. Go to Google.com, click on “more” in the left hand corner, then click on “even more”. The Alerts tool is the first one on the list. Then you just define the type of alert you would like to receive, specify how often the alert should be delivered (as it happens, daily or weekly), and provide the e-mail address to which it should be sent. If you prefer not to clutter your e-mail account, you can also subscribe to the feed instead and add it to your Google Reader (see below).

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Google Reader

According to Wikipidia, Goolge reader is a is a Web-based aggregator, capable of reading Atom and RSS feeds online or offline.” In other words it is a web application which gathers web content such as news headlines, blogs, and podcasts in a single location for easy viewing.
It is very useful to collect information about your market, your expertise, your competitors, your clients etc. You can subscribe to RSS feeds of Blogs, websites, Twitter streams, online newspapers etc. The list of possibilities is endless. Let’s take the example of a blog: if you want to subscribe to the RSS feed of a blog, all you have to do is:
1. Find the the orange RSS Feed logo and click on it. feed-icon-28x28
2. It will then ask you with which reader you want to subscribe to the feed. Click on “Google Reader”
3. Then click on “Add to Google Reader” and the updates of this blog will now appear on your Google Reader!

Pretty useful, don’t you think?

If you like these two tools, don’t forget to come back next week (or just subscribe to my feed) when I will give you more details about two more handy tools: Google Feedburner and Google Wonderwheel

See you soon!

P.S. What is your favorite Google tool? List it in the comments!

Wednesday, March 3, 2010

How to stay productive while working from home

Working from home is a great opportunity, especially if you have young children. However, it isn’t as always easy as it sounds and presents some major challenges. Being your own boss has a long list of pluses, but it takes some great organizational skills and motivation to stay productive. If you follow these few tips bellow, you should be heading towards success with your business:



1. Create a Specific Space to Call Your Office
Preferably you have your own office, with a door that you can close. If that’s not possible, make sure your family members know which specific space in the house they have to consider and respect as your office.

2. Limit time wasters
Instant messaging, Twitter, web surfing, Skype are all distracting your work and will result in lost productivity. Reserve a certain time slot during the day for these activities and limit them for the rest of the day.

3. Limit distractions and interruptions
Schedule times to review and respond to mail, email and voice mail. Set up a separate business phone line. Turn off e-mail and let the answering machine pick up the phone during the rest of the day.

4. Let friends and family know that you are a professional
Just because you are working from home, doesn’t mean that you are available for coffee breaks and phone calls all day long.

5. Create a schedule to start and complete a given task and stick to it
Begin and end tasks on time. A daily or weekly "To Do" list can also be a helpful tool to stay on track and stay productive.

6. Learn new tools for better time management
Invest some time in learning new tools that will help you save time in the long run. Share your favorite time saving tool in the comments! I like echosign.com to get my contracts signed and returned to me in no time (no more faxing, reminding, sending back etc.)

7. Take breaks and exercise
Mistakes happen more often when you are tired and overwhelmed. Take a break, go for a walk or a run. Physical activity clears your head, reduces stress and therefore boosts your productivity.



Monday, March 1, 2010

Outsourcing Virtual Assistance Work Overseas

Maybe you have read Tim Ferris’s book "The 4-Hour Work Week" or maybe it's just a common misconception of the term "Virtual Assistant" that made you believe that you can get quality work for as cheap as $3 per hour. Don't get me wrong, you can find Virtual Assistants who work for 3$ per hour, I'm just not sure about the quality... Denise Griffitts, a Virtual Assistance Industry Expert, wrote an excellent article on that subject and she was kind enough to let me post it here. Thank you Denise!


By Denise Griffitts
· March 1, 2010 ·

Question

Hi Denise.

What do you tell people when they say they can hire virtual assistants overseas and pay them $3.00 an hour? What are the pros and cons of that? Have you posted any blogs on the subject? Do you have any good articles I can read so as to know how to respond to people when they say this?

I also have had people tell me that they have tried to use virtual assistants in other countries and that they experienced problems in communication because they didn’t speak good English and they also received documents that were full of language, punctuation and formatting errors. I believe you get what you pay for and I don’t know how anyone can expect to receive quality for $3.00 an hour.

I would really appreciate anything you could tell me on this subject and any blogs or articles you can refer me to.

Thanks!

Debbie Forte

Answer


That is a great question Debbie and I will do my best to answer it for you.

My motto is and will always be, “Do What You Love and Outsource the Rest!” Now that is an easy premise for me to put forth, but what does it actually mean to the entrepreneur who badly needs ongoing assistance to build and grow their business?

As a business owner you realize by now that running a business, be it a traditional brick and mortar business or an online endeavor is one of the most time-consuming things one can think of. Your life as you knew it changed dramatically the moment you became self-employed. Being your own boss and enjoying creative freedom is for many, a dream come true. But honestly, how many hours have you spent on the dull, uninspiring, and extremely time-consuming work of keeping a business running? Across the board, entrepreneurs of all descriptions describe the biggest drawback in their business life as the drain of the daily minutia that chews through hours and drains creativity.

As a business owner, you end up wearing multiple hats. You are your own accounting department, marketing department, sales, tech support and customer care. On especially bad weeks you might find yourself spending more time on these tasks than on actual billable work.

Hiring a Virtual Assistant, someone who can take care of things you don’t have time for, can help you build and grow your business while retaining the creative passion that launched you into entrepreneurship in the first place. You can now find Virtual Assistants offering pretty much any service you might need assistance with, from administrative to social media marketing to web design.

If your business is in its infancy, or if you have a very limited budget you may be considering outsourcing some of this work to other countries. At this point, especially if you’ve read Tim Ferris’s The 4-Hour Work Week, you might be thinking about hiring an offshore Virtual Assistant, probably based in India or Philippines. You can find many of these “Virtual Assistants” on Elance.com, Guru.com and similar sites. You can also find them by performing a simple Google search by using the term “offshore Virtual Assistant”.

Offshore VAs can offer a wide variety of services, including some very technical ones such as web design. And their rates are incredibly low compared to their colleagues in the US and Canada. It is not uncommon to post an RFQ on Elance and receive bids with rates as low as $3 per hour. Virtual Assistants in the US and Canada, on the other hand, set their rates to an average of $30-35 per hour and some go as high as $70 per hour, depending on their core competencies.

Given these wildly different rates, making a choice seems like a no-brainer. Pick an offshore VA and save both time and money, right? You might feel a twinge of guilt over sending work overseas, but then you have to think of what’s best for your business, don’t you?

You’re absolutely correct – your business interests should be your top priority. That’s exactly why the “no-brainer” choice, the one based solely on cost differences, might not be a good one for your business, and may actually hurt it.

Most bestseller business books and top-of-search-engine articles on the subject will wax eloquent about all the potential benefits of cheap overseas labor. But search for “offshore outsourcing problems”, dig deeper into Elance reviews, and talk to fellow business owners who tried this option and you start getting a more balanced picture.

Most of the complaints about offshore vendors in general and Virtual Assistants in particular mention issues such as language and cultural barriers; inadequate communications from vendors; lack of experience or specific skills, especially when it comes to creative services; cost and time overruns; lack of project and process continuity; and need for close and continuous supervision.

While some services might be well-suited for offshore outsourcing, others simply are not. Consider content creation – all those articles, press releases, blog posts, newsletters that businesses now use as part of their marketing. Even if, and it’s a big if, the content is grammatically correct, there’s still the relevancy issue. It is unrealistic to expect an offshore Virtual Assistant to communicate effectively with target audiences that are distant in terms of geography, language and culture.

Cost and time overruns are not unique to offshore vendors. But they become much more difficult to control when combined with inadequate communications and cultural barriers. If choosing an offshore Virtual Assistant, you need to make sure to communicate early, often and state your concerns or requests in a very clear way, all of which can become very time-consuming.

Another very common complaint is the amount of close supervision, if not scrutiny, that is required when working with offshore assistants. Sure, even if you hire a local VA, you might have to do a bit of hand-holding at first, just so that your assistant learns the ins and outs of your business as and your management style. But any close supervision beyond this adjustment period defeats the entire purpose of hiring virtual help. Keep in mind that the VA you decide to work with is ultimately going to help you build and grow both your business and your online presence. A highly technical, highly competent Virtual Assistant actually partners with you to help you meet and exceed your business expectations. You should be able to have complete confidence that your VA is treating your business that same way she/he treats their own business. As if it was the most precious thing in the world!

The extremely low rate of offshore services is the reason behind yet another commonly-cited problem. Virtual Assistants who charge such low rates make money on volume. With hundreds and even thousands of clients and projects, they simply don’t have time to ask all the questions, review the alternatives and advise you of the best ways to handle specific tasks. Another issue is that they primarily work on one-off projects. For example, instead of dealing with just one project manager for all your tasks or projects, you might end up communicating with several people.

This is exactly the opposite of how higher-paid Virtual Assistants approach their clients’ work. Even though many accept occasional projects, they build their businesses around ongoing work with a handful of clients. These Virtual Assistants go beyond simply completing the tasks assigned to them. They approach each task while keeping the bigger picture – their clients’ business goals – in mind. As small business owners, they relate especially well to their clients’ concerns.

On the other hand, offshore VAs are mostly employees of virtual assistance companies. It is simply unrealistic to expect an employee in India to really understand the issues facing a business owner in the United States or Canada.

We all look for bargains. Keeping costs down definitely helps maintain a healthy bottom line. But when looking for a Virtual Assistant, a business owner needs to remember that a VA is much more than simply an implementer and that price and value are not the same. There are potentially many hidden costs and lost opportunities hiding behind a low rate offered by offshore Virtual Assistants.

Denise Griffitts
Virtual Assistance Industry Expert
http://virtualassistantindustry.com
info@ virtualassistantindustry.com


What is your opinion on the subject? Please leave your comment.






How Can A Virtual Assistant Help You

Are you or your small business overloaded with administrative tasks?
Does the term "Social Media" give you nightmares?
Is your to do list never ending?
If your answer to the above questions was "yes", then you should check out this great slide show that demonstrates how a Virtual Assistant can help you. It has been put together by my friend, Sophie Guiziou, who runs her own Virtual Assistance business in Paris, France. Visit her website at: www.optimoffice.fr


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Other posts that might interest you:
How does the remote relationship with a VA work?
7 tips on how to communicate effectively with your VA
What exactly is a VA ?