Working from home has many advantages and also a sort of familiarity
that can become a downright pitfall in some instances. It is easy
and sometimes quickly discovered that away from an office your
productivity is not as high as you thought it would be. Working from
a home office can easily become a productivity killer when a business
owner doesn’t stay on top of things. However, don’t fret!

This can be changed with a few simple steps to get your business
organized, making productivity easier.

First of all, realize what you do is run a business.

Your business needs a permanent place to live.

It could be your dining room, a corner of your den or the entire den.
Some people set up shop in their garage or kitchen. Wherever you decide that your home office will reside, recognize that it is your work space and nothing else can share that spot.

Yes, that includes the laundry you forgot to fold last night, too.

Moving on, now that you have an office space, set some guidelines
for how you will run your business. These guidelines don’t run to
the particulars of your chosen industry but more to organization
for better operation of the enterprise. In plain terms, if everything
is in its place, you won’t waste time looking for it.

A filing system will be your best friend.

This includes a filing cabinet for important papers.
Every correspondence doesn’t have to exist in paper form.
Contractual agreements with clients and copies of past invoices
can be filed, but emails don’t need to be. Save yourself some time,
money and fresh air by not printing every client email that comes
to your inbox.

An electronic filing system keeps emails, project specs and proposals
organized by client without adding to the paperwork you already have
to handle. Electronic files are easy to organize and can be zipped
to clients in an instant if need be.

You won’t even have to use snail mail.

Also, keep an in and out box on your desk (we almost forgot about the desk).

Incoming mail is organized as soon as it hits the desk.
Junk mail is shredded, orders are filed in a box to be
filled and other mail is sorted according to purpose.

Dealing with mail first thing prevents anything from getting overlooked.

Along the same lines, create a priority box.

This is the box that will be checked first thing in the morning
and last thing before you leave your home office. In the morning,
the box contains all of the items that need attention that day.
In the evening, organize the contents to be ready for the next morning.

This makes it much easier to have your daily work tasks set
when you get to the “office” each morning. No more wasted time
planning your day while an hour or two of it is vanishing.

Low productivity in a home office arises mainly from disorganization.
We often aren’t sure what we want to work on or what is most important, so it takes a little while to get that together. If you are organized from the beginning and keep your priorities current, you won’t spend your time deciding what to do next – you’ll already know.

Good bye time wasters, hello productivity!

Jan Tallent
Tallent Agency Virtual Assistance

Jan Tallent is the owner of Tallent Agency Virtual Assistance for 11 years, a marketing and small business online newsletter for going on 10 years, an internet marketer for my own digital products PLUS tangible products and an avid social networker . I also have an eBay store so stay pretty busy 10 to 12 hours per day, mostly on my computer and the net.

I am concentrating my VA biz on proofreading , editing and transcriptions as these are my favorite assignments to take on and where my strengths lie. If you are in need of these or any of my other Virtual Assistance services, send me a message and we can Talk about and schedule your project or projects .

For the potential Virtual Assistant

The life of a freelance worker before the Internet was very different from what it is today. In the past, any freelancer would need great mobility or spend hours on the phone, either asking for work or finding out WHO to contact for this endeavor. In order to get around to pitch yourself to potential customers, you would require boundless energy and an ability to deal with being told “no” face to face or over the phone. So much of freelancing is about speculation, after all. You could try to sell yourself a hundred times and could be told “no” a hundred times. Although the Internet offers no guarantees of acceptance, it does make things a bit more equal for the freelancer.

There are many sites on the Internet that offer the opportunity for freelancers to pitch to potential customers on specific jobs – a searchable database means that you can even check for jobs that match up perfectly with your own specific skills and abilities. You can name your price and tell the customer how quickly you can turn a job around. The days of having to get out there, pound the pavement and then be told “sorry, we’re not interested” are more or less over. Not to mention that the Internet provides a truly monumental research tool for the jobs that require a bit of extra knowledge. The internet is nothing less than a launch pad from which to set your career in motion.

For the potential CLIENT

Outsourcing Using the Internet

Sometimes in business, as skilled as you may be, there are things that you are unable to do. A customer will come through with a very specific task and, although you will be able to do most of it, there may be a part of the job that poses you problems and prevents you from completing the task. In this respect, it may often seem that you will have to turn down the opportunity. But that is not necessarily the case. With the Internet at your fingertips, you have ready access to a skills base that means you can complete on that job even if some of the work is outside your own skill or time reach. Welcome to outsourcing or using a Virtual Assisant.

Thinking of it as a non-Internet situation for the moment, imagine that you are an interior decorator who specialises in hanging wallpaper, painting and plastering. It may just be that a job comes through that involves all of that, plus laying a hardwood floor. You’re good, but you’re not experienced in laying down floors. With the use of some contacts, you could pay for the services of a person who is capable and experienced in that part of the job. By paying them to take those duties on, you can accept the job and move forward.

There are many workers out there who do business via the Internet, and to contact them all you need to do is pick up the phone. If you cannot complete a job all by yourself, but it will pay well, there is no need to give up. Just log on, find a contact and get the job done.

Jan Tallent
Tallent Agency Virtual Assistance

Jan Tallent is the owner of Tallent Agency Virtual Assistance for 11 years, a marketing and small business online newsletter for going on 10 years, an internet marketer for my own digital products PLUS tangible products and an avid social networker . I also have an eBay store so stay pretty busy 10 to 12 hours per day, mostly on my computer and the net.

I am concentrating my VA biz on proofreading , editing and transcriptions as these are my favorite assignments to take on and where my strengths lie. If you are in need of these or any of my other Virtual Assistance services, send me a message and we can Talk about and schedule your project or projects .

Businesses are all about the client and the product . There are files for clients and files for products. With so much paperwork, it is hard to keep everything organized. Businesses, especially smaller ones, need a virtual assistant database manager .

It would be nice for business owners if they could just talk about and sell their products or services all day long. Unfortunately there is more to it than that. Nowadays, businesses live and die on statistical analysis and other reports. In order to generate these reports you need the data to back them up.

Poorly organized data can weaken a company. For instance, how would a business ever know how their products are doing in certain areas of the country? What about customer feedback ?

The Market

Businesses capture data in order to grow. They would never discover their strong areas, weak areas or whether marketing campaigns were a success. Information is king in the business world.

To that end, it is important to manage data in an organized fashion. Customer names and information need to be logged, reports need to be generated about product demographic, customer surveys and profits to name just a few important areas.

Database management is another area that small business owners often don’t have time to look after. It takes time to organize this information and that takes away from the business of promoting and creating new products . It is a catch-22 that a virtual assistant can help with.

Do you have expertise in the area of setting up databases in different formats? You can assist online and offline businesses. Each business keeps records of customer names, demographic data, product inventory , monthly revenue and other vital information.

Virtual assistants, who specialize in database setup and management, provide such services as:

• Database design and maintenance
• Data entry of customer names and information
• Create data spreadsheets from compiled records
• Process new data
• Create reports for clients
• Create graphs and other visuals
• Tech support for clients using new databases

Databases allow your client’s employees to retrieve information that they need to do their jobs. With a little training by you, everyone can learn to access the databases that you create. The business of information gathering is streamlined for greater efficiency.

The basic infrastructure of the company’s records is in your hands. A small business can go from a desk full of loose papers with information to a well-organized database that can be updated in a few keystrokes thanks to you. Any information that the client needs right away, you can access with ease.

Businesses thrive on information and as a virtual assistant database manager; you are a major part of that winning equation. If you like working with data and are good at organization, this might be the niche for you.

Jan Tallent
Tallent Agency Virtual Assistance

p.s.

Due to excessive spam abuse, email providers and ISPs have gotten tough on blocking spam. But in their zeal to weed out spam, your support emails to your customers are being blocked! That’s why you need a customer support system hosted on your own web server.