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Paying bills, running mail to the Post Office, shopping for office supplies
doing year-end taxes, submitting quarterly self-employed tax deposits,
answering the phone, marketing, seeing new clients, someone has to do it, right?
Is any of this billable? No, but they are things that have to be done. You are
the only person that can do these tasks?
What's your time worth? Do you pay yourself $10 an hour, $20 an hour, $50
an hour, $100 an hour? How much does it cost you to run to the post office?
To answer the phone? How many hours each day do you work? How many days
each week? When did you last have any time to yourself or do something you
enjoyed, other than taking deposits to the bank?
You need help with the ordinary tasks that are not bringing in any money. The
point here is that you need to channel your energy into the work that you are
qualified to do, the things no one else can do like meeting new cleints or setting
up that new ad campaign.
What you need is a top-rate assistant to help you, at least part time, to answer
the phones, send faxes, open and respond to routine mail and email, run errands
etc. One place that I have found invaluable is our college campus here in town.
Depending on the line of work that you do, look for a student who has similar
interests in your line of work. Even a student who is taking general business
classes would be a good fit, and it can benefit both of you. I have already
stated the areas where it will be helpful for you as a business person.
The way it will benefit the student is that she/he will be learning on the job
experience that cannot be taught in the classroom, as well as being able to
make some income for themselves while in college. You never know you may
even be working with a future business partner.
If you are working out of your basement office or maybe you have a small
office that you lease that has accomidations just for yourself, then maybe
hiring an assistant maybe will not work for you, so now what do you do?
There are lots of "virtual" assistants out there to help. They work in their
own offices, providing support services for you on an hourly, daily, weekly, or
per job basis. You pay for the time or job that they do. It may be more
expensive, because they are in bsuiness just as you are.But if all you need is
three or four hours a week, it's more cost-effective to hire a Virtual Assistant
than to hire someone to come into your office.
Being able to just pick up the phone and call someone that you know is already
trained can be less stressful than trying to supervise someone that you
have just hired part time, not to mention the fact of working with payroll taxes
and wage reports.
Time is money in a home-based business or for that matter for any business.
Keep more of it for yourself and make more by "outsourcing" the work you don't
need to do yourself. One of the best resources I have found invaluable is
International Virtual Assistants Association. They have access to virtual
assistants for anyone in the world. Just go to the website that is listed below
and enter the type of assistant you are looking for.
http://www.ivaa.org/IVAAdirectories.htm
By Bob Brolhorst
Wave 5 Marketing
bbrolhorst@wave5marketing.com
http://www.wave5marketing.com
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