Become a Smarter Business in 2012!

by Michelle Hill-Smith
www.OnTaskAssistants.com


As a small business owner in a failing economy, eliminating unnecessary expenses in overhead and operations is one of the sure ways to keep your business afloat. Making this decision is critical to your success. Revamping your business to fit the “Go Virtual” business model should be the first step taken in operating your “Smarter Business.”  Choosing this type of model doesn’t have to mean a major re-writing of your business plan or taking out a small business loan.

This is actually fairly easy and simply requires that you retire the ice-age methods for production and implement 21st Century communication technologies.

Times have definitely changed and all for more productivity, simplicity and a better ozone layer.  Today, many small business owners are able to run a full operation from the comfort of their own homes cutting overhead expenses by nearly 60%.  With major cutbacks in space, leasing fees, property taxes, signage, hardware and furniture, unproductive staff, and utilities, not only are you spending thousands of dollars on the machinery, software, office space and more, the cost of managing other bodies and their needs is quite costly as well.

For this very reason, working with what is known as a Virtual Assistant or Business Support Specialist is one of the smarter ways to do business. However, working with any ole' VA just won't do. Ensure that you check out their expertise, the credentials and most importantly, their compatibility and ability to work with you and provide ALL of your business needs. Find out how they're operating their own business. What systems are they using, if any at all. An additional observation needs to be on the professionalism, organization and reputation of their company. Not only is working with a proficient and passionate individual or team crucial for your own productivity, but it’s also a smart starting point to establishing  better systems for your business.

The benefits of working with a virtual team are endless. From helping you run your office, keeping track of customers, freeing you to gain more productivity to build revenue and much more, a strong team can be the difference between success and failure.  In many cases, your virtual assistant or team will be more proficient than you at certain tasks, and will be able to complete them with greater accuracy and in less time than if you did them yourself.  Because as business owners, we tend to where many hats, even those that are not our type or color, we become severely overwhelmed, confused and unproductive. This costs us tons of time, money and ultimately customers.

Solve this problem by learning to delegate some of your time-consuming projects and activities. If you’re worried about training your new Virtual Assistant or Team to do what you need, keep in mind that they specialize in office management, social media, creative design and many other areas in small business marketing, productivity and operations. Your colleagues are already making strides towards modernized productivity which is to Go-Virtual. Do some research and learn how you to can eliminate issues with time management, high cost of doing business and become a Smarter Business in 2012!

Amazing Grace...How Sweet the Sound!

In these trying times for business, we all need a savior! Everyday, we wake up, go into our offices and stare at the piles of tasks that overwhelm our desk. We start on one task which last for a good 30 minutes. We begin another task for another 20 minutes. We find reason to complete another task and that lasts for about 5 minutes. It becomes a cycle. Why? Why is this happening everyday, for 7 days a week?

For many, this cycle runs for as long as 24 months and sometimes longer. It always seems to happen when we are really pushing the pedal for a stronger and more productive business. For some, there’s just a heavy fear of trust. This type of business owner doesn’t necessarily lack the skill to do the task, however, he feels confident in himself to handle everything on his own. He feels proud to wear all of the hats. After all, he can brag to his colleagues about it. Unfortunately, every good day has its end.

Then, there is the other business owner who feels that the things he loves doing most like networking, negotiating and selling are most important and should be priority. After all, these activities are what earned him more clients in the past 6 months. He leaves small yet, important tasks behind in hopes of getting to them later. This individual is the socialite, loves to go out and network for more business. He’s quite successful at it as it is his comfort zone. His business is steady growing; however, the tasks to successfully maintain that growth are expanding along with it. Even though this business has the productivity, its customer base begins to slowly suffer and crumble as the back-office operations are at a stand still.

Are we noticing a pattern here? No matter which type of business owner you are, you will eventually require assistance in order to not become a statistic. Your competition has already made strides towards saving his business. He’s accepted the fact that he can not and must not do it alone. Not only has he gained more time to network and grow his business, he’s also enhanced his business’ presence both visually and virtually! It’s now the 21st century. Doing the same thing for years and expecting a different outcome doesn’t work. The times have changed and so has the way of doing business.

Your competition has taken back an average of 6 hours in his day and here’s how:
1. NO spending countless minutes on dead-end or irrelevant phone calls;
2. NO sifting through and responding to emails every 10 minutes;
3. NO sitting behind a desk bombarded with paperwork, data-entry & blog updates;
4. NO waiting around to answer calls from customers, clients or potentials;
5. NO hair pulling over managing his bookkeeping and paying bills on time;
6. NO more “Mom and Pop” mentality …he’s now social and virtual!

With running a business, we all know that the above list could have gone on for days. In today’s business model, there’s a new way of running an effective, stable and productive business. It’s quite simple actually. The business model of today includes partnership, relationship, duo, assistance…whatever you choose to call it. We could all use a little assistance to make it work. Finding the right individual or firm to represent you and provide the relief you need is not that easy. With this in mind, OnTask Assistants has developed a series of support services to better assist “today’s” entrepreneur, small business and busy professional.

Introducing, Assist Me™, Answer It™, Cover Me™ and Make Me Social™, a series of business support services that cover the business owner with the immediate necessities for his company.

Assist Me™ serves as an affordable office support plan that covers everything in back-office operation from data-entry to accounts payable. Assist Me™ also comes with a 5-35% discount off of creative design services. Cover Me™ provides the essence of your very own personal assistant to help you with things such as gift buying, reservations, travel arrangements and much more. Answer It™ is your live telephone answering service that answers your calls during your company’s business hours. Make Me Social™ is an all-in-one social media marketing assistance platform that makes it easy for you to build your company’s reputation online.

All of our support services are straightforward, flexible, affordable and dependable. For more information please visit: www.OnTaskAssistants.com/ for more information. Or call: 863-874-0333.