RI Business Solution

New Service Introduced

2007-02-09T12:39:00.000-08:00

We will be releasing this press release on Monday morning:

Search Engine Optimization for Beginners

Hope Valley, RI – You have most likely heard about search engine optimization (commonly referred to as SEO), but when you went to look up information on how to properly do this, you were overloaded with information. You know it is something that needs to be done, but may think you won’t be able to complete this task on your own. Well, now there is a solution to your problem. RI Business Solution introduces a new way to lend a helping hand with Start Up SEO.

With Start Up SEO, everyone can learn how to properly optimize their business site for the search engines. A major factor that small business owners do not complete their own SEO work is for fear that they will do it wrong, which is understandable. With all the talk of keywords, link building, proper content, it is a lot of information to absorb and learn.

At this point small business owners had 3 choices:
1. Hire someone to complete the SEO for them.
2. Attempt to optimize their site themselves and hope they do it correctly.
3. Not optimize their web site at all.

Now there is a forth option, Start Up SEO. This offers small business owners a chance to learn “hands on” how to properly optimize their web site for the search engines, while having the live support to turn to while doing it. They can “take control” of their SEO needs and know first hand why they are seeing the results they are getting and how to adjust them in the future as their needs expand and grow.

Search engine optimization is a delicate and complicated process, but is one aspect of the World Wide Web every business owner should learn and know. For more information on this new service tailored for start up and small business owners, please visit RI Business Solution at www.RIBusinessSolution.com.

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We are very excited about this new service, as it stands true to our motto "Lend A Helping Hand". We look forward to watching people become successful through their SEO and having the sense of accomplishment that they did it on their own.

If you could save 2 hours a day....

2007-02-05T12:44:00.000-08:00

Have you ever sat back and thought "I wish I had another hour to get this done"? If you are like most people, then you have. Time is something that seems we never have enough of. We wish we could spend more time with our children or loved ones. Maybe you have stared out the window at a beautiful day wishing you were out on the golf course.

Another aspect of this is people who run work from home. A great concept that provides freedom, a sense of accomplishment, and more. One drawback is when the workload starts to get heavy. You are spending so much time working on what brings in the money, your own administrative tasks are piling up. Bills that need to be entered in, invoices that need to go out, marketing, and let's not forget about keeping that web page up to date.

Do you spend more then 2 hours a day completing all these tasks? Do you realize that all adds up to a week's worth of time at the end of the month? What would you do if you good have that week to yourself? Maybe take the kids to the park or play that round of golf. You could always take your spouse out for some quality time together.

That is where a Virtual Assistant comes in. By delegating those tasks to someone else, you can free that extra week of time. Plus, as an added bonus, there is no additional office equipment to buy or benefit package to put together. You only have 3 hours of work per week? Great, a VA can provide just those 3 hours. Maybe you have a big project coming up and need to use your VA for 10 hours that week. Schedule ahead of time and your helping hand will be available.

Whether you have some word processing, data entry, contact managment, general bookkeeping, or other administrative tasks that need to be completed. A virtual assistant can help you with that. So before you get overloaded and buried in your work, take control and talk to a VA today. We are here to lend you that helping hand.

Time Management

2007-02-02T11:56:00.000-08:00

Getting your small business tasks done in an efficient manner is what time management is all about. We all know that this is no easy task. So to help you on your way, here are some tips to help manage your time more effectively.

1. Create A System – We all work in different ways, so the key is to find a system that works for you. You can use your Outlook calendar, Palm Pilot or whatever you feel comfortable with. Just make sure you have a system in place for organizing your to-do lists. This will also help to ensure that no task goes undone.

2. Take some “Do Not Disturb” time – For any any system to succeed, you will have to work at it, whether it's organizing your incoming e-mails and voice mails or organizing your inbox into to-do files. All of this takes undivided attention, so by using a bulk of time in the beginning of your day ,say from 8:15 a.m. to 9:15 a.m., to organize and plan your schedule, will help the rest of your day run smoother.

3. Implement Your System - Divide your “To Do” list into items by order of importance and the amount of time it will take to complete each of those tasks. Also, if there is something on your list and you can complete it in two minutes, then do it. Because it will take you longer than the two minutes to file it.

4. Utilize A Project Calender - If one of your tasks will take several steps to complete, then file it as a project. You can then divide the project into various smaller tasks and list those on your calendar. Say for example that you want to add a service to your customers. You will need to decide how to price for the new service, develop a marketing strategy, and then introduce this new service. All those smaller tasks can be plotted on your calendar. A useful online project manager can be found at http://www.1stmanager.com.

5. Streamline Your Meetings - Try to run them smoothly by starting with defining what will be discussed. Set up a set start and an end time, then stick to them. Be prepared for the meeting by organizing what you want to discuss ahead of time. Be sure to keep the meeting moving and on task and let everyone know what need you tend to be accomplished by the end of the meeting. Last, but not least, make sure there is a defined set of actions at the close of each meeting for everyone to follow.

Visit us at http://www.RIBusinessSolution.com to see how we can help you manage your time.

How To Find Focus And Turn Your Talent Into A Thriving Professional Business

2007-01-31T11:46:00.000-08:00

There are tons of books and articles available to help professionals start up their business, but few that give practical insights on how to nurture your business once it's out of its infancy. At some point, every self-employed professional reaches the same dilemma: how to build a strong brand and grow their business without taking on too many clients, undervaluing their expertise, or sacrificing their lifestyle.

Once your business is established, you have the opportunity to brand yourself as an expert. Start now, and it doesn't take long to begin savoring the lifestyle and freedom you always dreamed your business would deliver.

The biggest asset you have in your business is...YOU! Your time and unique brilliance are the foundation of achieving a highly profitable, deeply rewarding professional business. Implementing the following brand and business strategies is exciting, motivating, and compelling. Once you start on the path of profiting from a great brand and your unique brilliance, you'll never go back to the old way of running your business again.
Here are five strategies to turn your talent into a highly profitable business that lets your passion run free.

Strategy #1 Know Your Unique Brilliance
Your unique brilliance isn't a particular skill, like driving a car or delivering your service. It describes you when you are at your very best no matter what you are doing. It's as if the best moments of your life are encapsulated into one simple statement.
The goal is to one-by-one, ditch, delegate, or redesign every task that falls outside of your unique brilliance. You are now free to use your unique brilliance nearly 100% of the time. What's exciting is that as you hand off each task, you become more and more energized, productive, and profitable. It truly is a magic wand that once waived, delivers the freedom you always dreamed of.

Strategy #2 Know Your Brand
You don't have to hire an expensive brand consultant to profit from a compelling brand strategy. What you do need is a clear, concise brand that makes you instantly known and recognizable. Brand wisdom goes beyond a logo and a tagline. A brand is the promise of an experience. Your brand must immediately evoke strong emotions and tug on the heartstrings of your choice client.

Strategy #3 Create A Championship Support Team
Sure, when you first started your business, you probably did every task solo. But to reach the next level of business success and freedom means building an excellent team. For example, one client increased his revenue by a whopping 300%. How? He credits spending just $100 a month on a virtual assistant, who freed up so much of his time and energy, he was able to focus on bringing in new business. Now that is great ROI!

Strategy #4 Take Time Of
fYes, you read correctly. I guarantee that as soon as you cut back to a four-day work week, your business will change for the better. You'll work smarter, make better decisions, and create new, lucrative opportunities. Working less time shines a new light on how you run your business. Plus you'll enjoy the rejuvenating benefits of increased creativity, relaxation, and fulfillment by getting plenty of R&R during the remaining three days of the week.

Strategy #5 Leverage Your Expertise Into A Compelling Package or Program
Delivering 1-on-1 services is a waste of your time, talent, and profit potential! No matter what business you're in-consultant, coach, speaker, trainer, designer-there are dozens of ways you can package your service. For example, one client, a professional organizer, stopped charging by the hour, and created a package from the individual services she was already delivering. Within one week she had tripled her revenue!

c) 2005, Kendall SummerHawk. Reprint rights granted to all online venues so long as it remains complete and unaltered (including the "about the author" info at the end). Send a courtesy copy of the reprint to kendall@kendallsummerhawk.com

About the Author:Kendall SummerHawk delivers client capturing website content strategies plus the nationally renown Brilliance Unbridled marketing program. For more FREE tips like these, visit her site at http://www.KendallSummerHawk.com.

What is a Virtual Assistant

2007-01-30T06:32:00.000-08:00

What is a Virtual Assistant?

A Virtual Assistant (VA) is a temporary worker who works for businesses over the Internet. With modern technology, the employer can be miles from the assistant. All the work is performed at the assistant’s location. Because the virtual assistant is self-employed, bills only the hours worked or by tasks completed, and is dependent on referrals and steady work flow from existing clients, he or she can be the perfect solution for any business owner.

Partnering with a VA reduces stress, protects cash flow, eliminates administrative hassles, and enables business people to find the success they originally set out to achieve. A virtual assistant offers several advantages over a paid employee. When you hire a virtual assistant you get all the benefits of outsourcing - no employee tax and benefits issues, coupled with the loyalty and steadiness of a company employee.

If traditional staffing solutions have not worked for you in the past, there may be many reasons. If you need someone only a few hours a day or week, hiring a temp can prove more costly in terms of training than is necessary. As most are also looking for full time employment as soon as you find someone you like, he or she has left the temp service for a full time position.

Paid employees have a host of issues of their own. You not only must provide equipment and furniture for them, but you also have state and federal obligations. Then there are the benefits packages - sick leave, vacation time, and health insurance. It is estimated that the true cost of an employee can double or triple the cost of their annual salary in terms of benefits and liabilities.

Can a virtual assistant be practical?

As more entrepreneurs move their marketing and communications to the Internet, virtual assistants become more and more the obvious solution to staffing problems. For an hourly fee of $15 to $35, much less than the cost of hiring temps or employees, people can take advantage of professional assistance and a variety of skills without the added stress of hiring someone.

Virtual assistants are already computer trained, and can assist with your specific needs from traditional office support services to highly specialized areas including Web page design, internet research, and much more. You can call upon your virtual assistant for basic word processing, phone answering, bill paying, and appointment scheduling.

In addition to this, there is no need to share space with the virtual assistant, as they have their own office setup remotely from yours. Work assignments are communicated through e-mail, phone, fax, or traditional mail. You can take advantage of Web-based tools such as instant messengers and online calendars and planners are often used as a means of keeping in touch. The virtual assistant will help to lend "size" to your company, which will impress potential clients.
How do you choose the right VA?

In some respects choosing the right VA to work with can be harder than hiring an employee. Due to the nature of virtual working, chances are you may never meet this person face to face. Most communication may be carried out via email. So, given these circumstances, how do you know that working with a VA, and even finding the right VA, will be for you?

The numerous benefits of working with a VA are well documented, and there are many, many clients worldwide who will testify to the advantages of this way of working. The purpose of this article is to help you to get informed about Virtual Assistants to aid you in your decision of choosing the right VA.

1. The first thing to consider is what it is you want your VA to do for you. Ask yourself these sorts of questions:
What needs do I need met?
Do I need to hire a local VA?
Will I need to have regular meetings with my VA?

The very nature of virtual working means that when working with a VA location isn't an issue, after all a VA can carry out all the duties a regular in-office secretary can do. They can effectively manage your diary, handle your emails, deal with your correspondence, type up reports, make your travel arrangements, and much more. However, if you feel that working with a local VA is what you need, then you should focus your search on just local VA’s. However, be aware that by doing this you may be limiting your options when choosing the right VA.

Once you have decided on the above issues, and you know exactly what it is you want your VA to do, then make an initial contact with several VA’s and send the same Request for Proposal (RFP) to each of them so that you can make some initial comparisons. Your RFP should include such things as an outline of the project details, asking about their fees/fee structure, how they would go about doing the work for you, how would you receive/send work etc. Basically include anything that you have thought about and would like answers to.

If you need some additional resources to help you find the VA that can meet your requirements, then there are several free searchable databases that are available where you can source and then contact VA’s directly. These databases also list skills and location. Some of these include:

www.VA4U.com
www.assistu.com
www.vanetworking.com

Once you've narrowed your search to two or three VA’s, be sure to have a phone conversation with them. This will give you a good idea as to whether the VA is right for you, how well the represent themselves on the telephone (in case they will be answering/returning calls for you), and how well you and this person 'click'. This is very important step as you will be trusting your business to your VA. As you will be in a 'virtual' working relationship, it is the same as having someone sitting next to you in the office - so you really do have to feel that this person has the right experience.

Another very important consideration in choosing the right VA is does the VA have the right skills to match your needs? Check out their websites, view client's testimonials, and examine their profile. If you feel necessary, ask them if you can contact either a current or previous client for a reference.

Always ensure that you sign an agreement before any work starts so that you both know exactly what is expected of each other. The agreement should set out project requirements, fees (or an estimation of fees), VA's terms & conditions, client confidentiality policy etc. Your VA will provide the agreement, and you should both keep a signed copy.

A Virtual Assistant's role is to support you and your business, by taking the pressure off you so you can spend more time working ON your business instead of IN it.