I’m fickle!
There, I’ve said it!
It wasn’t but six months ago that I was all excited about “Mozy,” an online backup system. Well, move over Mozy, I’m now going steady with “Carbonite.”
I think it’s the colors! No, seriously, the colors!
Dots on files and folders show you the status of your backup at a glance:
- A green dot on a file means the file is backed up.
- A yellow dot means the file is pending backup.
- No dot means the file is not selected for backup.
If you’ve not used Carbonite, you can take a test drive for 15 days.
“By default, Carbonite backs up everything in your Documents and Settings folder, including documents, photos, email and data files from applications, such as Quicken, Money, etc. Once a subscription is purchased, music is also added to the list. The default backup does not include programs, system files, temporary files, videos, or individual files greater than 4GB.
And, you can manually add files to your Carbonite backup.
When your computer is idle for some minutes or so, Carbonite will automatically backup files that have been changed since the last backup. If you’ve changed a file and want to back it up before the auto backup begins, you can mark the file as “back up as soon as possible.”
Carbonite is only $49.95/year per computer no matter how much you need to back up. No hidden fees. No limits on backup storage capacity.”
Here is the URL so you can find out more about Carbonite: www.carbonite.com.
I’m just awfully thrilled with this backup system.
This month!
The double edged sword…
As I tucked my 11-year-old into bed last night, he said to me, “Mom, now that summer is almost here, I’d like to start my own business.”
I was taken aback by this comment, not because he wanted to start a business (because he’s come up with several ideas on his own in the past few years) but because I couldn’t figure out where in the world he would find time to operate this business.
Matthew has the busiest schedule of all of us. He is currently very active at church, the equipment manager for his sister’s softball team, in the Reading Society and on the C-Team at school, and attends 4 hours of tutoring each week. He fits all of this in around his homework, PS2 time, and school.
I was also concerned that this business idea would be silly like some of the others he’s had in the past… like the lemonade stand that he wanted to start a few years ago.
Don’t get me wrong, a lemonade stand for an eight-year-old is a great idea, and the cuteness factor definitely helps fuel sales, but we live at the end of a dead end street. It took me weeks to convince him that when opening a business it’s all about location, location, location.
I asked him what sort of business he wanted to start and he responded with, “I want to mow lawns.”
Matthew is not scared of hard work; he’s a hard worker by nature in whatever he does. While his younger sister can breeze through anything that she’s confronted with, whether it be sports or school, he can’t. Surprisingly, he’s okay with this. When I told him that he’d be starting tutoring and devoting an additional four hours of his week to it, he embraced it. He knew that he needed the help.
That’s just the kind of kid he is.
But when he mentioned that he wanted to mow lawns, I just started at him. I wanted to scream at him and say “Mow? Lawns? That’s hard work! Eeeewwww.”
But I didn’t. In my best motherly, loving voice, I said, “I’ll allow you to mow lawns if you mow our yard. I’ll even pay you for it, but it’s late, so we’ll need to talk about your new business in the morning.”
I really never expected to hear anything more about it but when I woke up this morning, he caught me in between my bed and the coffee pot and said, “I’ve been thinking, Mom. I’m going to charge $4 an hour and if it takes me 30 minutes or less, then I’m going to charge $2.”
I stopped dead in my tracks.
My child was on the brink of making the most fatal business mistake that you could possibly make. He was devaluing his time. He was devaluing his efforts.
I tried very hard not to be condescending, I really did. However, I did attempt to explain to him, without caffeine coursing through my veins, that he needed to charge more, because he was worth more.
“But Mom…think about it. If I’m cheaper than the other guys, then I’ll get more business.”
I’m willing to bet this child dreamed of his new business and will continue to think about it until it comes to fruition. I know all too well of this feeling.
With only five minutes between now and the time that he was to board the school bus, I talked to him about valuing his time and his efforts and that if he didn’t, no one else would. It was pretty deep, and pretty good, considering I wasn’t yet awake and he was rushing out the door.
When I told him that I paid the kid down the street $20 to mow my lawn, his eyes got at big as saucers. “Mom, that’s a lot of money.”
“To you, Matthew, yes, it is. But to me, it’s not because the hour that it takes me to mow my lawn takes away from more important things that I can do. It’s worth me paying someone else to save me time.”
I don’t think he quite understood, but with 5 caffeine free minutes, I couldn’t go into my full spiel.
Are you guilty of either scenario in your business? Are you devaluing your worth or doing things yourself to “save a buck”?
If you’re charging a cheaper rate with the impression that you’ll gain more clients, you’re going to work yourself to death to make the same amount of money as someone charges more. You’re worth your rate and there are people out there who will pay it.
On the flip side, are you doing things in your business because you can and don’t want to spend money for someone else? How much is your time worth? Have you ever stopped to think about that?
This week, take some time to determine how much your time is worth. And if you need your lawn mowed, let me know. I have a referral. He’s a hard worker, cute and works for cheap.
Lynn Cox - April Revolutionary Business of the Month
The Revolution would like to publicly congratulate Lynn Cox of Cox Virtual PA Solutions for winning Revolutionary Business of the Month for April!
Lynn has been a member of the Rev since June 2006. Lynn is always there with a virtual smile for each and every member of the Revolution.
Congratulations Lynn!!
Here is what our membership had to say about Lynn:
Lynn’s business has shown tremendous growth in the past year. She has pushed past many obstacles in order to establish a thriving, successful business. She’s a shining example of the amazing things that can happen when a person refuses to give up.
I’ve always been impressed with Lynn’s love for technology. She’s always first to try out the latest and greatest programs and computer systems that most of us are too nervous to try.
Lynn is continually finding ways to broaden her knowledge base and skill set, with her newest endeavors being desktop support and bookkeeping. She is a well-rounded virtual assistant with much to offer her clients and colleagues.
Lynn has shown that you can overcome anything and make lemonade out of lemons with her business. She’s faced some tough times both personally and within her business, but she’s never given up. She identified the problem areas, sought advice, and implemented plans. And now, she’s laying the ground work to be a household name in the UK with her new venture. Her persistence truly makes her revolutionary!
Lynn is always ready to come up to the plate to give advice and share openly and honestly what has worked for her and what has not.
Lynn’s love for technology is infectious. Not many would be willing to give new systems and new ways a try but Lynn takes on the challenge with a fervor and her efforts do not go unnoticed.
Lynn is one of those who always see’s the glass as half full vs. half empty. Her strength and persistence and her ability to rise above any challenge is inspiring to the Rev membership. Continue on in greatness Lynn!!
Set the UK on fire Lynn!
Becki and Heather
Moving a WordPress Blog
Sometime or another, it will happen to you. A client wants to change web hosts or perhaps you are changing web hosts yourself. There are a lot of things to keep straight and a certain order to do those things for it to be a smooth move.
Blog Pieces
To understand all you need to do in the move, it’s important to realize a blog is in a couple of different pieces. When you ftp to your web host, you may see the blog directory. This is where a bunch of files live — most likely with the .php extension. If you were to copy all of these files to your new host, you would not be copying your blog. These files are WordPress application files.
The main part of your blog — your content, pages, titles, categories, tags, seo information, etc — is actually stored inside a database. This database is brain of your blog. It gives WordPress the words to display on the screen.
Where to start
The first place to start is with the new web host. Do they have a one-click install for WordPress? If so, I highly recommend that you use it. Install a brand new blog on your new web host. The main reason for this is to get it in the new web host’s system that you have installed WordPress. This will allow for an easier time upgrading in the future through the new web host. If you copied the WordPress files from your old host, the new host would not know you had WordPress installed.
Things to copy from your old web host
Now, files to get from your old web host. You will need to get a copy of the database the blog has been using. The easiest way to do this is to load the WP-DBManager Plugin. Once you have loaded and activated this Plugin (on your old web host/WordPress install), you can go to Database -> Backup Database. Do not select the GZIP compression and select Backup. It will show you the file name of the backup and will put it in the directory /wp-content/backup-db. You will then want to ftp to your old host, copy the .sql file to your computer, and then upload it to your new web host.
While you are in ftp for your old web host, grab a copy of the theme that you are using and any Plugins you have installed. You’ll copy these over into the new installation for WordPress. The theme will copy over the look of your site. The Plugins may need to be updated, but with the newest version of WordPress, Plugin upgrades are automatic.
Things to do at your new web host
To import your database to the new web host, access the new database created in the installation process through phpMyAdmin. You can select the database that the new installation is using and click on the Import tab. Under File to Import, click the Browse button to locate the .sql file that you ftp’d earlier. In most cases this will run smoothly, but in some cases where the old blog has been running awhile, the database may be too big.
After this import, WordPress may tell you it needs to upgrade your database. Let WordPress do this. Copy over your theme and activated it. Check your Plugins for any that need to be upgraded for the newest version of WordPress.
Hopefully this gives you an idea of how to move a WordPress blog from one web host to another. If you have any problems with these steps or have questions, please feel free to email me.
Lisa B.
Open Source Maven
Top Mom Blog Site Seeks Virtual Assistant
5 Minutes For Mom is looking for a VA and put a public call out today.
If you’re interested, you can see more about what they are looking for and how to contact them here.
5 Minutes for Mom is a site run by twin sisters, mothers, and work at home business owners. I’m not sure how they manage at all with all the giveaways and the like, however, the time has come that they need to shell out a little more work to someone else.
Please head over there and check them out, regardless of whether or not you’re interested in the position. It’s an awesome site!
Until next time…
Heather
Virtual Assistants: Are You On Facebook?
Businesses and individuals, from all walks of life, enjoy meeting and communicating with other business and personal internet users. Despite the fact that people of all ages use the internet to socialize, there are certain groups of individuals that do more than others. Those groups of individuals include students, both high school students and college, as well as business people who know how to harness the power of web 2.0. One of the most popular and powerful social networking sites available today is Facebook.
Facebook may not be as well known to some as MySpace, but it is gaining in popularity each and every day. That popularity is mostly among high school students, college students and businesses who understand the concepts of social networking. With Facebook, you are required to register for a specific network. That network can include the high school or college which you attended or are currently attending or locale. Once you have joined Facebook, you should easily be able to make contact with others who are in the same network. Keep in mind that you can only join one “main” network at a time, however there are a ton of sub-groups that cater to varied interests.
The network in which you join can be considered an advantage of Facebook, as well as a disadvantage. Facebook does not work like most other social networking websites. Instead of being able to communicate with all site members, you are limited to contact with those that are in your particular network, the high school, college or locale that you selected. There are search features available with Facebook which will allow you to search for friends, both personal and business.
Although a large amount of focus is placed on high school and college students, Facebook has added another popular feature to their website. That feature is workplace networks. By joining a specific workplace network, you will be granted access to other community members who work for the same company as you. This feature is nice, especially since many companies have become large corporations or expanded across the country. You may be able to make contact and become friends with a long-distance coworker that you never knew you had. This feature is also great for small businesses to gather and network and share new ideas.
Side note: If you are interested in joining the Facebook community,you should do with all other social networking websites, research. By taking the time to research and examine everything that Facebook has to offer, you should be able to decide whether or not this popular networking community is what you were looking for.
Facebook has so many benefits and features that are unable to be described in one short blog post. If you are intestested in honing in on the power of Facebook, I suggest getting a copy of: I’m on Facebook…Now What?: How to GET Business and Professional Value from Facebook by: Jason Alba and Jesse Stay
Personality - where’s yours?!
I just got off the phone with someone who has expressed an interest in the logo and website design services offered by my company. She mentioned that she is drawn to my website and the personality it exudes.
This website is the third design I’ve had (the previous two were great as well) since I started my business, less than two years ago. I’ve gotten more leads from my site and more positive comments since this latest site went live than I did since I first opened my doors (so to speak).
After I started getting more and more clients, I decided that I could let loose a little and free my personality to live in and on my marketing materials. I have a fun little caricature as a logo and my site layout is quite unique. I figured that if someone didn’t want to do business with someone that decorates her logo for the holidays, then that’s not someone I want to work with. It’s pretty simple.
As a result, interestingly enough, I’ve been attracting more of my ideal clients than ever before. I am working with people that are attracted to my personality. I’m a fun, quirky girl, and I feel that I can still have a professional web presence while sharing that part of myself with the world.
It’s working out great for me. How are you doing? Do you have a site like everyone else? Have you been in business awhile and perhaps could use an extreme makeover? I suggest you do yourself a favor and invest in your self. Every VA website doesn’t have to be the same. There’s no rule that says you have to have a Home, Services, About, What’s a VA and a Contact Us page. There’s no rule that says you have to have a definition of what a VA is. So why do so many virtual assistant websites look the same? Break free! Let your creativity shine through. That’s revolutionary.
Image is Everything!
Janice Byer, Docu-Type, is full of valuable information. I thought this was a good article to post here. Hope you enjoy!
Marketing is an integral part to any business, especially for a Virtual Assistance who has to rely on a professional and creative image. How you get the word out about your VA service can have a tremendous impact on the success of your business. Just throwing together a business card or brochure to hand out, or a quick website is not enough. You need to create a marketing strategy, one that will portray you as capable of creating an image for your clients.
Your marketing strategy is all about creativeness and communication. How you communicate your message will have an effect on how you are perceived in the minds of your customers. If your own marketing material is not enough to get the attention of your potential clients, or if they have a negative perception, then how can you expect them to have confidence in you being able to help them with their needs?
Having a clear idea of what drives your customer to buy can help you to communicate to them why they need your services and how you can create and maintain their image.
So how do you go about making sure that you are saying the right thing and portraying the right image, and that your potential client will keep you in mind?
1. Determine the objective of your marketing material. What do you want to accomplish with this piece of advertising? Do you want your client to call you for further information, do you want them to cash in a coupon or to bookmark your website for future reference? Give them a directive.
2. Decide who will be your target market. Are you trying to sell to a large corporation or to the mother of small children? ‘Who’ is going to buy from you is ‘who’ you need to focus your message on.
3. Compose a positioning statement. In a single sentence convey exactly how you want your customer to perceive you, something that will stick in their mind. (ie. “We specialize in word processing…..”)
4. Now, add a primary benefit to that sentence. (ie. “…so you can get experienced help when you are short staffed or overloaded…”)
5. And then, throw in a supporting benefit. (ie. “…saving you time and money on your staffing needs.”)
6. Now, work with this sentence to get your main message across. If you only had space for one message, what would it be?
7. Add any other supporting messages that will convey the benefits of having your product or service. (ie. “No need to provide equipment. We do everything in our office.”)
8. Give your customer an opportunity to provide a desired response. How do you want them to react to your communication? (ie. “Wow, this is a great service that will save me money” or “I could really use this service to get a handle on things.”)
9. Make sure to project the right tone in your communication. Use a number of adjectives to describe your product or service, expressing how you want to be regarded. (ie. professional, innovative, exciting, friendly, newsworthy, creative, etc.)
10. Last, but not least, consider how you are going to execute your message. Does it fit best on a 3-fold brochure and what kind of paper do you want to use? Do you need a tear-off coupon on it? Does your message fit best on one page of a website or several pages? How are you going to turn your marketing strategy into hard copy or virtual copy?
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All in all, you are designing and executing your marketing strategy to attract potential clients and to show them your creativeness and capabilities. Always have them in mind when putting ideas down on paper or on the web. What you think is appealing may not be appealing to your customer. Ensure that your message will catch their eye and impress upon them that your service can make their lives so much easier in more ways than one…. and better than your competitor!
Janice Byer, owner of Docu-Type Administrative & Web Design Services, provides professional, creative and affordable virtual office assistance and small business website design. She is a Certified Canadian Virtual Assistant (CCVA) and Master Virtual Assistant (MVA). She is also the author of Surfin’ The Net - Docu-Type’s Virtual Collection of Links, which is filled with the secrets of her success. Visit her website for more information and to get your copy.
Turn your radio on…
Guglielmo Marconi!
What do you suppose Guglielmo Marconi and all those other guys attributed to having had a hand in inventing the radio would say now if they came back and saw how their little old “radio” has advanced since their time?
I say “other guys” because while Marconi is commonly attributed to having “invented the radio,” there were one or two others who “got his wires” crossed before Marconi, and managed to provide some semblance of air wave communication as a result. (And the rest of that history lesson is for another time!)
Actually, when you think about it, turning this the other way, wouldn’t it be an eye opener for us to be able to sit around the table or wherever it was they did their inventing, to see how any of them decided to research and go forward with their ideas.
Can you imagine the snickers behind their backs?
The real, ongoing revelation, though, is for many of us right here, right now!
It’s a given that for you, as a “virtual” business owner, to gain new clients, you need a way for them to be able to find you. One of those techniques, which has become somewhat “ho hum” and out-of-date of late has been to put up a Web site.
Okay, so you’ve got your Web site. Now what?
Since it seems “everybody’s doing it,” you want to be somewhat unique. You want some way to draw clients to you.
It was at the “turn of the century” (hee), early 2000-2001, actually, that the concept of using audio files in web pages was first introduced. And we’ve all seen how that has evolved over the subsequent years. So much so that it now includes not just music, but the “spoken word,” too—audio messaging–and even video!
And to build upon that, Internet trends now include an explosion of podcasting and Internet radio shows along with the imbedded audio files. They’re even being “transported” via email.
All are methods designed to get your name, your products and services out there to increase your business, your sales and profits, and give you name recognition.
The “why” and the “how” you use audio on your Web site or in your email depends upon factors that best benefit you; they’re usually as varied as flavors of ice cream, tv channels, or fish in the sea, and might include communication in the format of regular radio, audio file, or podcasting.
This is a terrific way to establish a relationship with your visitors. Once you do that, all the rest can follow.
So, turn yourself on to “radio” and, turn “your radio” on.
Do it, Delegate it, Delete it!!
For us, as Virtual Assistants, it is so easy to become overwhelmed by the mounds of work that comes into our office, especially via E-mail. I know that I myself have easily fallen victim to the trap of letting my in-box become overwhelming. A great deal of our time is wasted having to empty out an overwhelming inbox. Many times we might read the same email several times thinking “I don’t have time, I’ll deal with that later” and before we know it our inbox becomes so overwhelming that it takes an entire day to sort through it. As we work our way through it we soon begin to find things that should have been dealt with or that have been overlooked and undoubtably the stress begins to build.
This quarter I am taking on a new strategy with respect to my email and I am inviting each of you to join with me. I am developing the 3 D’s strategy for keeping email messages under control: Do it, Delete it or Delegate it.
Each and every email I read from here on out will be handled in one of 3 ways:
- DO IT - These are the emails that will require an action by me. If it isn’t something I can answer immediately or act upon immediately, I have also set up two folders and one is “To Read” and one is “To Do”. When it falls under one of these categories I will move it to those folders for later action. I have now also worked into my schedule a half hour at the end of each day and a half hour at the beginning of each day to go through the “To Do” folder and make sure that it is completed each day.
- DELETE IT -Let’s face it we are inundated with emails, several of which are not something we ever plan to act on. We also receive several emails where a conversation is ended by the other party that should be deleted. Also, once you have answered an email and for which you are not waiting for a reply, you should delete it. By removing it from your inbox, it will tell you that it no longer requires anything to be done.
- DELEGATE IT - Finally if I am unable to handle something in an email and it needs to be handled by someone else I “delegate it” to them and forward that email.
My final piece of advice is to create a folder entitled “Waiting for a reply”. This will be for all those emails that you have acted on and you are waiting for a response from someone else. These are those emails that you don’t want to delete just yet for fear of forgetting that you are waiting for something before being able to “Do It”, but that clutter your in-box nonetheless. By moving these from your in-box or your “To Do” files they will not clutter these spaces and cause you to read them several times. Always be sure, however, to make it a point of checking your “waiting for a reply” daily and deleting those that you have received a reply on.
I hope that by implementing these tips you will soon find that checking your emails is not taking up huge chunks of time in your day. With any luck, the next time you hear “you have mail” you will not want to jump under your desk and hide.
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