Wishing you a prosperous New Year 2011

As I reflect on the year 2010, I am grateful for the many blessings in my business and in my life.

May 2011 be a prosperous and happy year for all -- clients, peers, friends, family, and those I've yet to encounter. 

Call-Em-All.com

I've recently found and used  a great user-friendly, inexpensive web based tool. It is "Call-em-all.com." What happened the last time you had to quickly contact 50 people with an important message and e-mail was not practical? Your first reaction may be "I've never had to do that."

How about these situations:

• It's 7:30 am Saturday morning and a water main has just broken, flooded the soccer field and it is up to you to notify players and parents that the game has been cancelled.
• You are an apartment complex manager and need to notify renters that electric power will be out tomorrow morning - and half of your tenants do not have Internet access.
• Your kids' elementary school has to notify parents of a campus emergency.
• Your tax preparation business needs to notify clients that now is the time to make appointments.
• Your support group meets twice a month and has much better attendance when members are notified the evening before the next get-together.

Call-em-all's service provides both audio and text phone messages. The user inputs names and numbers one time into their own database on the site, then chooses the names and/or groups to be called. The stored numbers can be accessed as long as you have the service.

Last spring I was tasked with calling members for our support group. Working in my own business I did not have the two hours usually required to make these calls. At about $0.09 per call minute per person, I was able to "call" the whole list in about ten minutes. If a live person does not answer, the system is programmed to leave messages on voice mail.

So, I'd suggest you keep this option in mind for communications challenges.

Endings and Beginnings

Concurrent with the holiday season, December is a time of endings and beginnings for a small business owner. As the holiday activities consume the time of clients, thus decreasing the hours of VA services requested, more time is available to devote to my own business.

On frigid December days, I sip hot tea or chocolate while weeding out hard documents and electronic ones that are at or past keeping as determined by my records retention policies. When I initially began my VA practice I set up a schedule for document retention. This has enabled me to keep file cabinet space and hard drive space freer for what I need now and in the future. It also keeps me out of trouble with the taxing authorities that might want to look further into history than legally necessary.

With fewer interruptions, December is an ideal time to prepare end-of-the-year reports for clients as well as catching up my own bookkeeping in preparation for the appointment with my tax guy in late January. I've also found December to be a good month to review and revise marketing materials such as my blog, brochures, business cards, and stationery. Now, I even have time to strategize on the direction I will take my business next year.

So many thanks for December and the seasonal business slowdown.

On The Road - a Truly Virtual Trip

Working virtually continues to receive lots of press. As a virtual assistant working from home, I enjoy the benefits of choosing my place and schedule. Until this past month, however, I hadn't yet worked any further away that the local coffee shop that is only ten minutes from home.

Let me back up a bit in time. About four months ago, my husband shared that he would like to travel more while we are both still in relatively good health and strength. As I love the work I do and plan on continuing for several years, I pointed out that I still have a business to work in. Dennis asked could I do it really virtually if I had a good laptop computer. Well, yes I could do that.

So, great organizer that I am I began to research laptops, their capabilities, brands, and costs. Fortunately, a fellow BNI'er who is an IT consultant had begun promoting a new product/service. His company, Advanced Health Technologies (AHT), will provide quality computers to a company including 24/7 technical support - hardware, software, and network - for a very reasonable monthly fee on a 3-year contract. This was just what I needed.

I now have a quality 17-inch Lenovo Think Pad, but if it ever becomes a lemon, AHT will replace it at no additional charge. As for the 24/7 support, I have called the technicians twice and had my problem solved almost immediately - once I just needed to hard reboot the computer and once the technician went into my computer via LogMeIn.

Early this past October 18 we set out on an auto trip to Wichita KS, Neodesha KS, San Angelo TX, and Tucson AZ, being gone a total of about 17 days. We checked only into hotels/motels that offered free in-room WiFi internet connections. As the routine worked out, we would start out at about 7 am and travel six to eight hours, check into our hotel about 3:30 pm, and I would immediately connect to the internet. A couple of hours later, I'd have finished most of the work I needed to do for clients, then we would go for a light supper. When necessary, I'd handle something upon our return.

Two days, I made phone calls before breakfast our time to handle an items that needed in-person contact. Not having a printer with me, I was blessed that Staples stores could print files from my computer, and fax and copy items easily and at very reasonable prices. I did purchase  a 2-GB flash drive to expedite future processes.

My clients barely realized that I wasn't in my usual "office." Their needs were handled just as efficiently and quickly as usual while we got to enjoy our vacation tremendously.

Now, I'm pondering "where to next?"

Success at the Village

Covenant Village of Turlock that is - venue for the 5th annual West Side Women in Action's annual Networking Conference and Vendor showcase. This is to followup on my posting of August 18.

This year we were able to award 5 scholarships and had the pleasure of all recipients being able to attend the conference with us. Not only did each woman receive her scholarship, the scholarship package includes free books and admission for the Alliance Small Business Development Center NxLeveL business training program. This is a 12-week program that provides a practical, hands-on approach to developing a business action plan designed to lead to business success. to the  Go to the website http://wwww.wswia.org for a full wrap up of the convention and bios of the winners.

The event was also a networking success as we renewed friendships with other business women from previous years and initiated relationships with others we had not previously met. There I've found several resources for information and services that I have readily available for my VA business. The growing social network venues, e.g., FaceBook, LinkedIn, Twitter, etc. are increasingly playing significant roles in business networking; however, may we never lose the appreciation for in-person networking. As the classic Girl Scout song goes, "Make new friends {social networking}* but keep the old {in-person networking}. One is silver and the other gold."

*my clarifications

This helps my business?

Often people ask me, "what kind of things do you do for your clients?" I'm inclined to rattle off the software that I'm proficient at, the number of years I've been a VA, and various professional achievements. In my practice, it happens to be that much of what I handle are tasks that they don't teach in business school or college. Much of what I do is handle "personal" business that keeps my clients from being able to devote their undistracted attention to the business.

Here's a brief list of "personal" tasks that I've taken off my clients' shoulders just this month:

• Interpreting a second grader's reading levels from three data bases
• Putting holds on library books appropriate to the second grader's level
• Enrolling my client in continuing education courses
• Ordering prescriptions from the client's pharmacy
• E-mailing the client's doctor
• Updating medical records for the client's children
• Rescheduling client appointment with her financial advisor
• Inserting children's school year events into the client's calendar
• Enrolling client's children in swim and gymnastics classes
• Canceling client's eFax account
• Finding refrigerator parts for client
• Check business voice mail
• Confirming trip itineraries
• Updating pet information with the client's vet
• Finding a reliable photo-to-digital service

No, these are not usually listed with business support. However, by taking these from my client's plate, you must agree I've enable lots of time to be devoted to the business and after hours to the family. And I love being able to assist in these ways.

WSWIA

West Side Women in Action

Have you wondered "what can I do to make a difference" in something I really care about? I've had a desire for many years to do things that are beneficial particularly for women. Being in business, it's an added enticement to find something for business women that can use my skills.

Last August I attended a mixer put on by a local group called West Side Women in Action. It involved networking and relaxing hanging out with other business women. I found the women there to be very comfortable, interesting individuals. That was so enjoyable I attended their Annual Conference in October - great speaker, fun and informative breakout sessions - ones that you can really use - also delicious breakfast and lunch.

What is West Side Women in Action? Their mission statement sums it up: West Side Women in Action is a nonprofit organization that aims to inspire, promote and educate local professional women in business, and any woman who wants to develop a business or career. The goal is to help local women of all ages develop business and leadership skills and expand networking opportunities. This is accomplished through: 1) The annual Conference and Vendor Showcase, 2) Scholarships, and 3) Networking mixers.

This is a project I can support and provide administrative help to. When the organization announced that they needed people willing to help put the next year's events together, I decided this was a band wagon I could get on. I am now their secretary.

Our annual conference will be October 1. Check out the web site for details about a great event in which to invest your time and money: www.wswia.org.