Maximising Your Online Business Potential
May 30, 2009
Online marketing the fundamental principal for driving targeted traffic towards your website. Whether you are trying to gain clients, page rank, subscribers, customers, or general traffic – Marketing is an absolute necessity.
You will find that there are many places where you can purchase essential marketing tools, such as email marketing software, back office website consoles and perhaps even forum software. But have you considered the possibility, that even though you feel you’re getting a good deal – you may not be.
Let’s take a look at your email marketing; you need a subscription box and a means to issue your important newsletters, email campaigns and/or eCourses. You find a recommended and popular email system and sign up for the low fee of $15 a month for up to 500 emails. This is great – you’re on your way!
Then you need a website where you can add your subscribe box. You would also want some really good features such as a blog, a forum, web apps, and of course hosting – you’ll also find a good deal for this online, for a nominal fee of $14 a month. You add your subscribe box and you have your 2 systems up and running.
You’d probably also like to sell your products online, so we add in a shopping cart as well. As this function requires payment gateways, and checkouts, this could be a bit more costly. So you find the best deal you can, at a modest $34 per month for the basic version, and of course when the capacity runs out and your business grows, this could leap up to $99 per month, but we’ll worry about that later, right?
So, now we would like a member’s area. We want to offer excellent customer service, which means keeping our customers details secure and accessible, and as we don’t want the hassle of arranging it through a hosting company, we opt-in for another low cost option – essential SSL, the lowest cost around at $10 per month. Along with our customer service we should have an excellent CRM (customer relationship management) system. So, we throw in another $10 a month.
Such small amounts of money to part with, but essential for your marketing to run effectively. So, let’s see what freebie services we can add on… Analytics, and a Blog in addition to standard email. Let’s take a look and see our result.
* Email marketing $15
* Online business console $14
* eCommerce $34
* Additional extra’s $20
* Total $83 per month minimum…
Then consider, how much is your time worth? How practical is it to manage your online business in 7 different systems?
So, at $83 a month for bare minimum basic fees – and several hours of your time, exactly how cost effective are your marketing tools?
Michelle Dale is The Managing Director of Virtual Miss Friday, a highly qualified Executive Virtual Assistant Service which helps businesses and individuals accomplish every detail of their professional aspirations. Want to discover more about these insightful online business building success strategies? Support the Campaign for FREE Virtual Assistance now!
The Workflow for Blog Management
May 27, 2009
Managing and coordinating a project is not an easy task, especially if things need to be broken down into parts for a number of people deal with individually.
Blogs are fast becoming one of the most essential web fashion accessories you can have – along with a Twitter account of course!
So if you’re like me, and have several blogs to manage in various different applications, how do you go about making sure that all your bases are covered all of the time? The most effective way to manage this process is through an online collaboration or project management space, and there are loads out there for you to choose from. When you have found the one you want, it’s best to set up each blog you manage as a new project – or a new milestone within a project if you’re operating it on an individual client basis.
Then create a workflow for the post and designate people to the tasks within the workflow, so for example:
1. Brainstorm Idea – John
2. Write post or processing – Karen
3. Edit & proofread post – Karen
4. Add graphic – Paul
5. Upload / Schedule – Teresa
6. Complete – Teresa
So, here you have your workflow, and you have also appointed your designated team members who are going to be part of the workflow.
Plan your posts out on a calendar so you can see the forecast for the month ahead (or week, but month is better). This can be part of your brainstorming session, so get the titles for the posts and the rest will follow.
Once you have done this, assign the task to the writer – this is step 2. The writer can then place the post in the project space as a collaborative document. Once the writer has written the content he can assign the workflow to step 3, and the editor can approve the final copy by making changes to the same document.
Step 4, the document is then given a suitable graphic, and if the post requires one it can be uploaded into the blog – step 5, and scheduled to go out on a certain date. At this point the task is complete, and step 6 is to close it.
Everyone knows what role they play because it’s easy to follow, and the same workflow can be used for every blog post on multiple projects. It’s probably a good idea, unless of course you’re a project manager or online business manager, to hire one of these individuals to coordinate your people and workflows for you. Whilst having various parties do the work is one thing, overseeing it is often more difficult than the task itself.
Internet Marketing for Beginners
May 24, 2009
If you’re starting a website, and pursuing a business where a great deal of your income could come from lead generation and overall traffic, then there are a several crucial points you should think about implementing when developing your online enterprise – creating a truly profitable business.
What are the tools you’ll need to be able to change that all important traffic into actual income?
Whether you’re just starting out on the internet, or even if you currently have a website up and running, it’s a good time to put a comprehensive strategy in place to begin turning your website into a booming business. The various key areas you’ll need to focus on are simple, and with a little time – a bit of entrepreneurship skill, and the right tools, you’ll start to generate the desired outcome.
Here are the 5 most essential steps for developing an ideal foundation for your online enterprise.
1. A Website.
This is the foundation of your online enterprise. It is absolutely vital that you get this right. Your website will suggest to your traffic the quality and excellence of your product or service. You never get a second chance to make a first impression. Think of your website in terms of surroundings. You wouldn’t necessarily want to sit for a while in car park, however if you were walking through a park with trees and pleasant surroundings, you’re more likely to stay a while. Your website is the same, and with the competitive nature of the internet, certainly seeking advice on style, colour and branding is vital for creating the perfect environment for your potential customers or clients. Regardless of what you’re building, from a website advertising your products or services, to an run of the mill affiliate portal, an eCommerce shopping cart site or a place to administer memberships or subscriptions, exactly the same rules are followed.
2. Clear, Concise well thought out Content.
Once your attentive audience is relaxing comfortably, they will want content, something of particular interest. Your website content is not just about words, as the text can contain several SEO factors which you may not have considered, for example, Flesch readability scores. You may understand your website, but have you thought about whether or not other people do? Does your content contain key words and search phrases? Have you considered your ‘behind the scenes’ Meta Data carefully? Have you compared your website and your business with your primary competitors? Seeking assistance in acquiring this data can be extremely valuable in terms of knowing what you need to do – content wise, to succeed.
3. SEO and a Fresh Flow of Information.
What happens to a place of business on an empty road? It just stands there empty, although on occasion, by some chance, a few drivers find themselves lost and wander in as temporary visitors. You need to make sure that your website is not that location. You need to have a consistent flow of traffic and several good reasons for the search engines to put your website further up in the rankings. A vital part of your website is a fresh flow of content. Whether this is in the form of a Blog, a Forum, News Announcements and Updates, Regular Special Offers or Articles – there should be new information coming in as often as possible.
4. Lead Capture, Email Marketing and CRM.
It’s not what your customers can do for you, but what you can do for your customers. Adding a subscription box to your website will help establish relationships between you and your visitors. Once they have given you their email address – and their name, they are inviting you to tell them more about your business and your services. They really want to hear from you. Use this to your advantage. By managing your contacts with an exceptional CRM and Email Marketing System, you will have the privilege of additional time to concentrate on building the relationship between yourself and your valued visitors.
5. Marketing.
Once you have built your website into a solid foundation for your online business, get creative with your online marketing. Article marketing, networking, blogging, digital media, press releases, and reciprocal links, along with contributing to targeted websites, groups and communities are all ways of promoting your website.
So, what exactly is this special method?
Pulling all of these elements together with just a little bit of knowledge – or none at all, can be daunting, and even if you’re sure you are taking the correct course of action, using various DIY options usually results in a great deal of time and money wasted, as the final product is rarely anything close to what you were hoping to achieve.
To make sure you are using the right tools for the job, consider hiring an expert Virtual Assistant to help you with bringing these elements together. Work out an in depth plan with your VA so that you can have a step by step – tailor made plan. Take time to talk with your VA and explain your situation in detail, so that you and your new team can stay focused, moving as efficiently as possible towards the acquisition of your goals.
The most crucial step in this process is to always remember – never give up, as building a quality business takes time, so just keep your eye on the prize, and all of your hard work will eventually pay off.
Michelle Dale is The Managing Director of Virtual Miss Friday, a highly qualified Executive Virtual Assistant Service which helps businesses and individuals accomplish every detail of their professional aspirations. Want to discover more about these insightful online business building success strategies? Support the Campaign for FREE Virtual Assistance now!
How to Prioritise Tasks to Save You Time
May 19, 2009
Good task management is vital for any business to run efficiently – especially one which is online, as you’re not necessarily there is person with your colleagues to discuss project progress or go over daily briefs.
When managing large volumes of tasks and projects, a high degree of structure and organisation is crucial to completing them efficiently. A process or procedure should be in place for dealing with large projects, small tasks and regular tasks. This is a much larger subject in itself, so let’s go through a really simple method of prioritising which is an essential part of the task management process. First you need to take all of your tasks and put them on a list. You are then going to sort these tasks into 3 smaller lists.
List A is made up of 2 types of tasks – those which are essential or time-sensitive, and those which, if completed, are going to have an immediate impact upon your business. This means anything that you can do right now which will have a positive impact, whether this be generating income or improving your business in a specific way, and of course, anything which has a deadline.
List B is made up of the things which must be done, but are not time sensitive. An example of this may be tasks like filing.
List C is made up of projects and tasks which you would like to get done, but which have no impact on your current business and can be scheduled in at any time.
Once you have your lists laid out, you will be able to clearly prioritise these tasks in a comprehensive schedule. First, consider to yourself these 2 things:
1. What tasks on your list could you automate?
2. What tasks on your list could you delegate to a professional virtual assistant?
Put these on a separate list, and deal with them first. The sooner you are able to do this for your A & B tasks, the sooner you can start to reduce the contents of these lists on a weekly or monthly basis, with the end result of creating more time for yourself.
For those tasks which you haven’t automated or outsourced to an experienced virtual assistant, you will need to organise these into jobs for yourself. Each job you’re going to do should be broken up into tasks, and each task should be considered as a ‘Milestone’, and each milestone would have a checklist of smaller tasks, which once all checked off, will enable the milestone to be completed.
To begin with, take each of the milestones in your A list, and then break the milestones down into checklists of jobs which need to be done in order to complete the milestone. For this process, I highly recommend that you use online project management software to organise this endeavour – especially if you work with a VA, as most of these things could potentially be outsourced in the future. Most online collaboration software will allow you to create multiple projects in order for you to manage detailed milestones and tasks.
Once you have done that for List A – do the same for list B, and if you have time, you may want to do this for list C too, but usually the C list is set to one side for when A and B are both entirely complete.
This will of course need to be scheduled into a daily plan, and this plan must be tailored according to the amount of tasks you have and the volume of time which is available to you – but as a general rule, your work should progress steadily and everything should get done.
Take some time for yourself before you start each day and make sure to plan your daily schedule, as this will give you a clear direction to follow, and a much greater sense of achievement upon the completion of your working day.
How to Get Your Life Back – Hire a VA
May 12, 2009
How many times have been working long hours, wishing you were just about any place else – relaxing at the club, over at your friends house or checking out a new movie? On how many occurrences have you noticed that tiny pang of guilt when you miss your children’s chess tournaments, or when you have to arrange for a private car to pick them up from after school football practice?
This is really a very common scenario. The work-life balance is something which is very difficult to find if you’re stuck in a rut. You want to get out of it, yet you feel like you can’t because there is just too much on your plate at the moment, or you simply can’t afford to be taking the time off.
So what can you do to get this balance back in your life? Depending on your personal circumstances, there are lots of solutions which may possibly present themselves – it could be that you simply haven’t considered them yet.
A possible solution, or perhaps – a perfect solution, is to hire a virtual assistant. This solution is just like working with a personl online assistant who acts as your virtual – genie in a lamp. For most VA’s, when it comes to business, your wish is there command. Maybe you’ve thought of hiring a virtual assistant before, but weren’t sure of what you would do with them – in other words, where do you start when considering outsourcing services?
Well, first of all it would be a really good idea to initially take a good look at your schedule – daily, weekly and monthly. Write down 2 lists:
1. The first list will be a list of the things that you do, that you really don’t enjoy doing or don’t want to do at all.
2. The second is a list of things that you don’t do, but which you’d really like to be doing.
Then, my advice would be to do a search on the internet for virtual assistants, either on Google, virtual assistant directories or through networking sites such as Ecademy.
Then select 5 of your top virtual assistant. Go for ones where you like the way that they present themselves and their business – scan over their range of services, check their rates, look over their FAQ’s and get a feel for whether they might be the right one for you.
Then, send both of your previously written out lists to the VA’s of your choice, and with these also send an email to the tune of; this is where I need help, and how can you help me make this happen?
Asking will cost you nothing at all, and it will give you good insight into how various virtual assistants can take the pressure off you, helping you to regain your work-life balance. At the end of the exercise you will have gained some valuable tips for dealing with a VA, and you’ll discover what these special individuals can do to help you to achieve work days which involve doing more of what you’d really like, and less of what you don’t, and finally, right here, you may well have just found the person who can make all of this happen for you.
Either way, you have nothing to lose – and everything to gain! Best of all, this insight is completely FREE!
Michelle Dale is The Managing Director of Virtual Miss Friday, an Executive Virtual Assistant who assists businesses and individuals with achieving their professional goals. Want to find out more about online business building success strategies? Support the Campaign for FREE Virtual Assistance right now!
How to Profit From Your Social Media Account
May 11, 2009
As a virtual assistant, on a daily basis I spend quite a bit of time on the internet looking for time saving ways to automate social media tasks. This made me understand that what once began as a way to link up with new people while staying in touch with friends and family – has now changed into one of the most massive marketing engines that exists in our day.
With so much hard work going into developing your social media accounts, hundreds of software programs and other online tools have been created which help you to automate the whole process. After a recent Twitter follow, I received a message that said “I really like you so much and decided to follow you” – interesting, I know for certain that that person has in all likelihood never even seen my profile – and as for liking me so much, I really doubt that person actually even knew that they were now following me… but it’s all just part of playing along at the social media game.
So, of course, I’m not knocking it. I really enjoy working as a social media assistant and discovering new ways of improving business through this new trend, and from my perspective, there really isn’t any other occupation I’d prefer to do, but I also clearly see that it has lost its intended purpose. We are all like little robots trying to promote ourselves and our businesses via a channel which was initially designed to be very personal.
By using microblogging, we can also make sure everyone is updated on where we are. The average internet marketer will advise that you update your twitter account or other microblogging account around 10 times a day. So during your working day you can keep cranking out “Tweets”, saying that you’re in the office, at home, or even cooking dinner if you want to take it that far (Twitter works on your mobile as well). But in the grand scheme of things, have you ever actually read all of the tweets from the people you are following? It’s basically just a numbers game – if you have 20,000 people you’re following, and they all post 10 tweets a day – wouldn’t reading your Twitter account alone turn into more than a full time job?
We basically post a link to all those followers in the hope that a small percentage will click our link – this can lead to new traffic, hits, potential affiliate sales, and maybe even a comment on your blog post – but the obvious fact is, we do it because it’s effective, and because we can make money from our followers. So, is social media really all that social?
Michelle Dale is The Managing Director of Virtual Miss Friday, a highly qualified Executive Virtual Assistant Service which helps businesses and individuals accomplish every detail of their professional aspirations. Want to discover more about these insightful online business building success strategies? Support the Campaign for FREE Virtual Assistance now!
What can an Experienced Virtual Assistant do for You?
May 8, 2009
As a business owner, you most likely keep up to the minute with the latest trends, whether this be technology, finance or business services. The current trend is Virtual Business – and it’s here to stay.
As an executive assistant turned virtual assistant, I have seen this industry evolve over the years. I started out as most young aspiring assistants do – in an office with my director close at hand in the next room. Although, when I think back and ask myself, how much time did I really spend face-to-face with my employer? In actual fact, not much at all. With business trips, lunch meetings and appointments, I very rarely saw him at all.
So from my own personal experience, I can tell you, I could have literally been on the other side of the planet, and still have managed his office as efficiently as I did when I was sitting in it. This is the new way of conducting business – this is where virtual solutions are now taking the lead. Just like fashion changes every season, so does the web, and the creative people that work there are developing new and inventive ways of working with either a single person or a team of freelancers online, as if they were placed directly in your own office.
Office premises, employees, equipment and vending machines are becoming a hassle in the fast pace of today’s society. Do you really want to fix broken printers? Get your tech support to come in to increase the ram on your computers because they are running slowly? Or replace the desks for your team because they are looking shabby? I wouldn’t, that’s for sure. It’s costly – it’s certainly not productive, and I would rather be spending time getting work done that dealing with these small but cumbersome problems.
With a virtual business, you only have to give your attention to one thing only – and that’s telling everyone what to do. Who do you want to do the work, and when do you want it back? It is as simple as that, and if you want to unlock the doors to your virtual business, outsourcing is the key. Freelancers, Virtual Assistants and other self employed individuals are all responsible for their own time management, their own equipment, and their own software. In most cases, by taking on a virtual worker you also have the additional available resources they have at their disposal, which they have personally invested in for their specific niche enterprise, all in an effort to offer you good customer service. For example, you want a new company brochure, now unless you are a graphic designer, you most likely will not have access to the full Adobe Master Collection valued at a few thousand dollars – let alone know how to use it, to produce your company brochure, but it’s likely your virtual worker will have everything you need – so the tables turn, and it is no longer about what perks you can offer your assistant, but what perks your assistant can offer you!
So, what do you need to make all of this happen, and what are the essential tools you must have to turn your business completely virtual?
1. A Personal Computer
2. An Internet Connection
3. A savvy, up to the minute, Virtual Assistant
My guess is, if you’re reading this, you can cross off the first 2 items on the list, now all you need is to find number 3, and you know what they say, there’s no time like the present!
Michelle Dale is The Managing Director of Virtual Miss Friday, an Experienced Executive Virtual Assistant who collaborates with businesses and individuals with the sole aim of accomplishing their professional goals. Want to learn more about these comprehensive online business building success strategies? Join the Campaign for FREE Virtual Assistance right now!
How to Maximise Your Page Rank with SEO
May 6, 2009
When a web developer finishes a website, and the person does the show and tell with their friends an family, they usually just sit on the edge of their seat waiting for the customers bang the door down… and they wait… and then they wait even longer…
What most people don’t understand is that once your web site goes live, immediate success is rarely what’s in the cards. Your brand new, highly polished web site is merely a little fish in a huge ocean.
There are many companies out there who will charge you the earth for what they call search engine optimisation. But do you know what you are really getting, are their results foolproof and are they really “experts”? Well, of course it is possible they’ve got the skills they say they have, but for the most part, it’s rare that anyone actually delivers anything of any real value.
You do not need to spend a fortune on Search Engine Optimisation; here are a few tips to gets you started with your website marketing.
1.Keywords: There are many sites on the internet that offer analysis of your web site, equipping you with a list of valuable keywords.
2.Links: Add and exchange your link with as many sites as you possibly can in order to increase your chances of being found.
3.Forums & Blogs: When posting on forums or writing comments on blogs, ensure that your link is always in your signature line.
4.Articles: Write articles and use an article distribution service to reach as many publishers as possible.
5.Sitemap: Make sure you have a clean sitemap for your website and submit it to the search engines.
6.URL Submission: Make sure your URL is submitted to the top 3 search engines available on the web – there is no need to be listed on hundreds.
7.Directories: Add your site to business and specialist directories on the internet.
SEO takes a lot of time, and the results may take several months to begin to appear, but they when they do come in, all of the difficult work will pay off.
A virtual assistant is the perfect solution for maximising your strategic potential, from the designing and building of your website to carefully planned out search engine optimisation. In addition, they could also drive email campaigns, offer marketing materials and advise on various other ways to enhance and optimise your new web site.
Michelle Dale is The Managing Director of Virtual Miss Friday, an Experienced Executive Virtual Assistant who collaborates with businesses and individuals with with the sole aim of accomplishing their professional goals. Want to learn more about these comprehensive online business building success strategies? Join the Campaign for FREE Virtual Assistance right now!
How to Improve Your Business with Entrepreneur Assist Support
May 6, 2009
As a young entrepreneur just finding your way, you may not have the extra cash just yet to pay for the salary of a virtual assistant to help with writing all of the documents, scheduling and planning. As another option, you could get all sorts of free services and tools that can help you to more effectively manage your business by registering with Entrepreneur Assist.
Once you open your account, Entrepreneur Assist creates a homepage, complete with your business planner at a glance, that’s easy to navigate. You can access your documents, daily planner, business forms, or daily meeting schedule.
The Bookmarks tool is a particular time saver. You can save each and every one of your favourite young entrepreneur articles, web pages and blog posts with only a click of a button, and set up a filing system for quickly searching through and accessing these files.
The Documents tool enables you to create, save and share documents, spreadsheets, presentations and other essential business documents. You can also upload files so they can be edited off-site or published online. You even have the ability to export your files in a wide variety of formats.
The most useful tool in organizing your day is the Planner, which you can access from anywhere. It delivers excellent functionality in the areas of managing your tasks, tracking a project’s progress and scheduling appointments. You can even take notes with it. You can also send yourself email reminders about a project deadline or the next young entrepreneur meeting.
For business requirements, Entrepreneur Assist has a special Forms and Templates option available, so you don’t have to unproductively spend your time designing typical forms, like invoices or fax cover sheets. This section also provides a template for writing a business plan for young entrepreneurs in the beginning stages of launching a business.
As with many businesses created by young entrepreneur, your clients may be local, spread out across the region or the whole world. The Online Meetings tool provided on Entrepreneur Assist makes it possible for you to hold a live meeting, give a live web presentation of your products or service to potential customers, or hold a networking meeting with other young entrepreneurs.
Entrepreneur Assist also has a Library where you have completely free access to a wide array of books in the primary areas of interest of young entrepreneurs.
Whether you’re a young entrepreneur just getting started or someone that’s been in the game for a decade, Entrepreneur Assist is the perfect resource to help you to manage your business more efficiently and cost-effectively.
Michelle Dale is The Managing Director of Virtual Miss Friday, an Executive Virtual Assistant who assists businesses and individuals with achieving their professional goals. Want to find out more about online business building success strategies? Support the Campaign for FREE Virtual Assistance today!
Maximise Your Profit with a Virtual Assistant
May 4, 2009
In our present economic climate there are lots of debates and discussions across the internet on ways to reduce costs in business. If you have a place of work or an office which is costing you more than it should, then consider taking your office online.
In terms of sharpening the competitive edge your business has to have in this difficult market, the value of a virtual receptionist is priceless. This service also keeps your costs down, because by outsourcing services you aren’t required to commit to employing a member of staff.
Here are a few essential things to consider:
An employee requires by law – time off, sick pay, holiday pay and other employee benefits or perks. These are not required with a virtual service. Your virtual receptionist will work only the times and hours you need. Say for example you are paying your PA or receptionist to be in your office to take your calls. She will most likely be there between 9am and 5pm, and how much of that time will she actually be on the phone answering those calls? Unless you operate a call centre, I would guess no more than a few hours. With coffee, lunch breaks and gossip – does it really make sense to maintain this overhead when there is a much better solution?
What are you supposed to do when your receptionist plans on taking time off? Would you need to get an agency worker in to cover those hours? Or would you need to do this yourself? Wouldn’t it be much simpler to utilise a dedicated professional receptionist service which answers your calls for you, one that learns about your business and your customers, and best of all, one that meets your every request?
So, are you convinced yet? How about if I also said to you that your virtual receptionist was able to do a whole array of other things for you as well? Answering calls is one thing, but what if your receptionist could make your travel arrangements, book your doctor’s appointment, buy your mums birthday present and have it delivered, or even do your personal shopping online. Virtual Assistants have the ability to revolutionise your business. Let’s summarise the benefits of this change:
1. You can save money by only paying for the time which is worked, and also by not having to pay a set salary – regardless of whether you’re busy or not.
2. You can save a lot of hassle. The reliability of a virtual service means that your office is always open, and you don’t have to miss important calls if your receptionist has called in sick.
And finally…
3. Time! You can save so much time by outsourcing essential tasks to your virtual assistant. The best thing about this opportunity is that you can make this change right now – hiring a virtual receptionist is as easy as sending an email. So, what are you waiting for?
Michelle Dale is The Managing Director of Virtual Miss Friday, an Executive Virtual Assistant who assists businesses and individuals with achieving their professional goals. Want to find out more about online business building success strategies? Support the Campaign for FREE Virtual Assistance today!












