What have you learned in 2009?

As 2009 comes to a close and we prepare for the coming year, it’s important to stop for a moment and really evaluate the impact that the past year has had on us as individuals and as a company.

It’s been a tough year.  The economy has been slow and a lot of businesses have suffered.  As a result, many small business owners aren’t hiring virtual assistants.  They’re doing the work themselves or hiring a family member who is out of work to do the job.  It’s been a struggle and we’ve had to make quite a few adjustments to compensate for these losses.  Luckily being a virtual company has made it a bit easier to tighten our belts and make quick changes in order to stay afloat in these difficult times.

It’s been a good year for us as well.  You may be wondering how that’s possible but let me assure you that it is!  The slow economy and loss of business has really made us step out of the box and come up with new ideas to attract and retain new clients.  It’s caused us to focus more on the retention of our current clients and strategize more with our virtual assistants.

We’ve also had plenty of time to evaluate our systems internally and ensure that all the basics are being covered.  Phones are answered by a live person, emails are responded to immediately, follow up on new leads is occurring consistently 100% of the time.

Our team has decreased in size with only the best people remaining.  Our entire team is focused on bottom line results and they’re all working together as a team to achieve those results instead of working against each other and fighting for sales and commissions.

Overall it’s been a very positive year for us.  We’ve learned so much and we intend to take what we’ve learned with us into 2010.  The economy will improve and we’ll be ready for it.

As we sit down to determine our goals for 2010 we already know that they are within reach because of the foundation of behaviors we’ve laid out in 2009.  It’s that very foundation of behaviors that we’ll take with us into 2010 and beyond!

What will you take with you into 2010?

Missing Opportunities?

Have you been missing out on good opportunities to increase your revenue? Times are tough right now and most small business owners can’t afford to miss out on even one opportunity to make a sale, keep a customer, or form a strategic alliance with someone who might be able to facilitate new opportunities. Unfortunately, however, we see people everyday who are doing just that!

Recently I’ve spoken with several of our clients and prospects who’ve mentioned they’re answering phones, doing paperwork or handling follow up calls. Why? Well, the answer is obvious. It has to be done. Although it’s true the work has to be done; are you really the one to do it?

This is just one example of ways that small business owners can miss opportunities and lose business. Over the next few weeks we’ll be discussing other opportunities you may be missing and I’ll show you how to take advantage of a few very simple tools that we use to ensure our client database continues to grow.

The first thing I’d like you to do today is ask yourself this one question. “What brings in business for me?” Is it networking, sales calls, and marketing tasks? Or do you make more money when you’re answering phones and reading emails?

Make a list. On the left side list all the tasks in your business that directly generate revenue.
Example:
Sales calls
Networking
Client contact

On the right side list all the tasks that are necessary but that won’t directly increase your revenue.
Example:
Answering phones
Calling vendors
Researching information for your newsletter

Once you’ve finished, take a closer look. Are you personally managing the right list? If you find yourself mainly accomplishing tasks on the right then you’re missing opportunities. If you aren’t selling, marketing, networking and increasing your connections then you are effectively working yourself right out of business!

Your challenge today is this. Consider where the potential for income lies in your business.
Then take five minutes and make your list. Don’t have time? Well, then close your doors and hang a “For Sale” sign on your office door because if you can’t find five minutes to think about how to generate more revenue you’re in real trouble!

Normally my blog posts are designed with quick answers to our client’s most pressing problems. Today, however, I’d like to leave you with this one assignment. Simply make a list of the things that will generate income for your business. Think about it. Are you doing tasks that you should be delegating to others?

If you’d like some personalized help with your list simply send me an email at marketing@teamdoubleclick.com and I’ll arrange for one of our experienced Virtual Services Representatives to give you a call. She’ll provide you with a free consultation to discuss your business needs and help identify some areas where you may be missing opportunities. She’ll work with you to organize your list and then help you evaluate the types of things you could be doing to generate more revenue today.

Are you missing opportunities to earn more money and build your business? You’re not alone! Please join me over the next few weeks as I discuss possible missed opportunities and how you can take action to avoid them!

Using Your VA To Increase Your Bottom Line

As a small business, your focus on the bottom line is always crucial. But how do you increase your bottom line? Increasing the bottom line can happen two ways. One way is to reduce expenses. The other is to increase sales. Of course – that’s Business 101, right? But how does a small or home-based business on a shoe string budget do those things?

Reducing expenses

It all adds up! Five dollars here, ten dollars there, maybe a couple hundred somewhere else. Take a good hard look at the services you’re using. Are they all optimized for what you use? A good example is your phone service. Are you signed up for an unlimited long distance calling plan? Make sure you’re using a plan that matches your monthly usage. If the number of minutes you signed up for each month doesn’t match your actual usage then it may be time to re-evaluate and switch to a less expensive plan.

You can also reduce expenses by making good use of a virtual assistant. A professional virtual assistant can not only help keep an eye on your bottom line, but s/he can save you money because you only pay for what you use. A virtual assistant is essentially on stand-by for whenever you need her and she only clocks in when she’s working on your tasks. This saves huge amounts of money over in-office assistance and bricks-and-mortar staffing agencies.

Hiring a virtual assistant also helps reduce, actually eliminate, the cost of hiring an assistant. When you make the decision to hire a staff member, if you’re considering an in-house person, you need to factor in the cost of an additional phone line (or two), an additional computer, desk, office chair, etc. With a virtual assistant you don’t need any of those things. All virtual assistants come with their own equipment to get the job done!

Increasing sales

Not enough of you to go around? Write up the sales procedure you use, along with the phone script, give her the qualifiers (what makes a good customer for you), send your virtual assistant the names and phone numbers you want called, and have her cold call and qualify leads for you. Imagine being out and about during the day following up on all those leads she finds you! Talk about saving you time and helping you make more money. You can even take it one step further and ask your virtual assistant to send out the preliminary information to your potential customers. Now that’s making good use of your time and your virtual assistant’s time!

Sending out letters and postcards? Have your virtual assistant do it! As a business owner you shouldn’t be spending your time licking envelopes and stamping cards – it should be selling or servicing your customers. What dollar amount do you bill for your time? $50 per hour? $75 or $100 an hour? Isn’t it more cost effective to have a $15 per hour assistant handling those menial tasks for you?

Have your virtual assistant answer your inbound calls for you. How many times during the day does someone call that you don’t really need to talk to – that someone else could handle. How about the time wasters who call just wanting to chit chat? Let your virtual assistant screen those out for you. Better still – train her on the types of calls that come into your office and teach her how to handle each call type. Again, this frees up your time to do what you do best!

A virtual assistant can not only help you save money, which of course impacts the bottom line, but he or she can also help you make more money.

Are You Looking For A Better Deal?

Its official, we’re all looking for a better deal. A cheaper hotel room, a lower car payment, a smaller mortgage and better coupons at the grocery store. With the prices of everything soaring right now, it’s hard not to look for cost savings wherever you can find them.

And your business is no different. Small businesses still need assistance in order to be profitable. Someone has to answer the phones, take orders and deal with vendors. Marketing, sales and operations make up the bulk of any small business and since one person simply can’t handle every task (at least not well) then business owners everywhere are looking for cost effective solutions.

On June 1st of this year Team Double-Click® decided to jump in and provide that solution to small business owners who were looking for answers. VirtualAssistingUSA was created to allow business owners to connect directly with an affordable U.S. or Canadian based virtual assistant. VirtualAssistingUSA is a self serve entity that allows businesses to save up to 50% off the cost of hiring a virtual assistant through a staffing agency and even more over hiring an in-house assistant.

At Team Double-Click®, we’ve spent the last nine years marketing our services to small business owners and virtual workers who were looking to connect with one another. Our business model has been specifically designed to save money, increase revenue and give people a better deal than what they previously had gotten with an in-house person.

We are now opening that same business model and marketing strategy to all of our partners and potential partners in order to share with you what’s working, what isn’t and what we’ve done to combat a struggling economy.

We hope you’ll find our tips, strategies, tools and observations to be both eye opening and profitable for you. And don’t forget to send us your blog link (marketing@teamdoubleclick.com) and connect with us on your favorite networking sites.

Enjoy our new blog!

Gayle Buske
http://www.teamdoubleclick.com
http://www.virtualassistingusa.com

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Free PR For Your Small Business

Do you ever feel like the “best kept secret” on the internet?  You have a great service to offer but very few people know about you.  Are you looking for ways to get more attention for your business?  Most small business owners are!

As a small business owner it’s important to use a well rounded approach to gaining attention for your business.  It’s easy to get caught up in all the new social media strategies available to you.  They are extremely important and should definitely be integrated into your marketing plan but they are by no means the only way to market yourself or your business.

Don’t forget about some of the more traditional approaches.  They may not be as glamorous but many still do the job when it comes to introducing your products and services to the public.  Below are just a few ways you can gain attention, partnerships and sales for your small business.

Article marketing:  Articles don’t necessarily have to be long in order to get your point across.  Think about your audience.  Who are they and what are they looking for?  Provide value to your target audience  in the form of a short informative article.  Give them information that benefits them and you’ll have a friend for life! And don’t forget to use some of the top article directories to submit your articles.  It’s great to have them on your website but getting them in front of others through sites like http://www.isnare.com or http://www.ezinearticles.com allows you to get more exposure by allowing others to use your information for content on their websites.

Free Reports:  Offering a free report is a great way to build your list of prospects!  Use a sign up form on your website, blog or even on your Facebook page (yes, you can do this if you use the FBML App) and you’ll have the opportunity to market to all of these prospects at a later date.  Make sure you’re offering something of value.  Help your prospects sell more, earn more or save more and you’ll soon find yourself with an endless supply of potential new business.

Press Releases:  When was the last time your business did something newsworthy?  It doesn’t have to be groundbreaking but it does need to be something that provides value to the people you are trying to get in front of.  Are you offering a new product that will change the way they do business?  Do you have a new service that will help them save money?  Is your company volunteering in a community project that will benefit your hometown?  All of these things are newsworthy!  Once you’ve written your press release you can submit it to sites like http://www.businesswire.com, http://www.internet.com or http://www.prnewswire.com.  Using distribution sites like this not only save you time but also help you get your news published instantly!

Help a Reporter:   http://www.helpareporter.com/.  This is one of our favorite tools for free publicity.  You’ll receive information from reporters who want to write specific stories.  If you have something to say that can add value to their work then you may quickly find yourself with tons of free publicity for no more than a few minutes of your time!

With information so freely available on the internet there are lots of ways to get free or inexpensive publicity for your small business.  So get yourself a plan, ask for help when you need it and enjoy helping your business grow!