“Are you sure you can deal with not having a steady paycheck?” 

I’d be retired in Napa by now, sitting on my deck, sipping some obscure cab sauv - if only I had a buck for every time someone asked me that when I announced my decision to venture into the grand word of self-employment.

Surrrrrrrre, I told myself.  After all, I had been in consulting for years - which is as close as you get to not knowing where your next meal is coming from.  And I had been helping my husband run his own business for close to half a decade.  You’d think I would have known better, eh?!

It’s HARD. With a big, huge capital H.A.R.D.  But not in the way you would expect.  Financially it is stressful, of course.  But I knew that it would be.  The real challenge is the self doubt which creeps up on you during those rough weeks when the phone isn’t ringing, or in our case, the Blackberry lies dead as a door mouse with not a tremble to be had.  Those are the moments which I have trouble dealing with.  They are almost always made worse by the fact that they follow brisk periods when new clients abound, good clients are full of new projects, and you barely have time to invoice the work being done.  Periods when you can finally sit back, put up your feet and sigh “Wow.  We made it.” Then, nothing. 

So you plunge back into self-questioning mode, you go over the business model again, you re-validate the target market, brand effectiveness, advertising campaigns and overall marketing strategies…and inevitably, if you did your homework right the first time, you come to the same conclusions.  Yes, the model is viable, the brand is well developed, and it’s just a matter of time…

So, if you are in a funk right now, my best advice to you is this:  rethink your business model, your target markets, your branding.  Try to find room for improvement, because I do truly believe that this constant re- validation makes us stronger, better small business owners.  Every time you revisit what you are trying to accomplish, and how you intend to do it, you become more in tune with your strategy and your objectives.  And by all means, if you need a second opinion, we’re here to help.  And once all that is done, sit back, with your martini / chardonnay / 25 year old port…because once this thing takes off, you won’t have a moment to spare.

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A client of ours called this summer with a plea to help her recruit an Operations Manager who could share the load of managing her growing business.  Sales were exploding (yay!) and the related admin tasks were taking up way too much time, leaving little energy to devote to finding new clients, and developing new products and services.

This is a common scenario for most small business owners - if you have played your cards right - eventually managing the business becomes too onerous, and there is simply not enough time left to devote to growing the business.  This is the point at which a) the business either stagnates or b) you outsource appropriate tasks and take it to the next level.  It is exactly this crossroads which inspired us to launch AskMax - to provide the support entrepreneurs need at that crucial juncture.

Now, recruiting is never easy, and while some placement firms are fantastic, a lot of them charge a bundle and don’t really ever understand what it is that you are looking for.  In the end a lot of people waste a lot of time meeting candidates who are underqualified, overqualified, uninterested, or just downright uninteresting.

Our virtual recruitment service helps entrepreneurs keep control over the search process, while outsourcing the time consuming administrative and technical tasks.  We help them identify what they really need, develop the job descriptions, define a search strategy which takes into account timing and budget constraints, post the ads, screen the CVs, and do preliminary interviews to validate candidates’ knowledge and skills.  Once this legwork is done, we set up face to face or virtual interviews between the client and the best candidates, and provide additional support services as required (e.g. reference checking, recommendations on compensation, etc.).

We did find a great Operations Manager for our client, and she’s been on the job now for a couple of months.  Our client, the previously harried and frenzied entrepreneur, just returned from her first real vacation in over 2 years…and is ready to hire again!!

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In a previous post, Transitioning to the Virtual World, I wrote about how face-time (e.g: lunch or a scheduled meeting) furthers our business relationships. When we’re connecting with people on a virtual level we have to figure out other ways to bring our relationships to the next level, but how?

There are tons of “social media” sites, each one being touted as the best way to connect and network virtually. So where do you start?

I started my social media experience with Facebook, but for personal reasons rather than business reasons. From time to time I waffle as to whether or not I should start befriending people I “kinda knew” back in the day, in an effort to spread the news about my business. To date, I haven’t been able to commit to this strategy.

Next up was LinkedIn, which touts itself as “what networking should be”. I’ve gotten off to a slow start with LinkedIn faced with a catch-22 situation. LinkedIn scanned my address book so I could start making connections. Unfortunately, out of my 400+ contacts there was only one who thought creating a profile on LinkedIn was a good idea.  Since a basic premise of LinkedIn is to expand your network by way of friends of friends, colleagues of colleagues, friends of colleagues, and colleagues of friends (phew!) you should not be asking random people to join your network - you need to have some familiarity or common bond with the person in question. As I’ve been making efforts to integrate myself into the virtual business world I have added people to my LinkedIn network but this has been despite, not because, of LinkedIn. In my opinion, the real value that LinkedIn can provide is their Q&A section. You can post questions or answer other people’s questions on a variety of topics. It’s a good resource when you need information and provides exposure which increases your visibility and helps to expand your network.

The last tool I’m going to talk about is Twitter. Twitter is a micro-blogging site where you can post short updates (140 characters or less) about what you’re doing, known as tweets. You can follow other people’s tweets and people can choose to follow you. I like Twitter because if you find interesting people to follow you will be entertained and enlightened all at the same time. But, I am not using Twitter to the fullest because a) once again, there is only a single person in my immediate circle that has a Twitter account; and b) I can’t wrap my head around the idea that people might be interested in the mundane and trivial details of my minute-to-minute life. I feel the need to come up with scintillating, thought-provoking tweets and I haven’t figured out how to do that on a regular basis (or even sporadically for that matter).

So what am I saying?

From my perspective Facebook is best used to foster personal relationships.

LinkedIn is better suited to creating virtual business relationships as opposed to fostering them. I’m always open to creating new connections. Check out my LinkedIn profile and Cynthia’s too.

Twitter works best for both creating and fostering personal and business relationships. Twitter allows you to seek out people that can benefit your business and the opportunity to directly engage those people.  Twitter’s simple and interactive interface most closely replicates “face-time” in the sense that you are sharing and gathering information that is similar to the small talk that occurs in the real world during a lunch, drinks, or hanging out around the water cooler. Hmm, I’ve almost convinced myself to make an effort to start tweeting more. Feel free to follow me on Twitter.

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Take 5 minutes to hone your “smile and nod” technique*. When listening to someone, smiling and nodding gives the impression that you are carefully considering what it is they are saying, regardless of what you actually feel inside.

Make sure your nod is nonchalant and non-committal. You want your nod to convey understanding not agreement.

The smile should be slight - absolutely no toothy grins allowed.

Most importantly, don’t say anything. Let the other person talk without interruption so they will run out of steam faster. If you are posed a direct question (this is rare since if you feel the need to use the S&N technique chances are the person you are dealing with is either hopelessly self-absorbed, an emotional mess, or absolutely furious with you, and therefore more interested in talking then listening) either answer the question with a question or give a non-committal reply like, “I’ll have to give that some thought.”.

Try it. Time spent engaged in unproductive conversations will decrease dramatically.

* Recommended for use with anyone you find to be generally rude, annoying, irate, obnoxious, boring, and especially useful when dealing with unsolicited advice.

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In honor of its 10th anniversary Google has put its oldest available index, January 2001, online. I know that the internet has grown exponentially since 2001, but typing in a couple of search terms really drives the point home.

I was really curious about the term “virtual assistant” since this is the industry that our business model is based upon and we are always hearing about how quickly this industry is growing.

“virtual assistant”   9,370 vs. 1,390,000  + 14,835%

Next I tried a celebrity that was popular back then and has continued to be in the news. The result? A lot more pages in 2008 than in 2001 but percentage wise it didn’t come close to matching my first search.

“Britney Spears”  1,100,000 vs. 82,900,900   + 7,536%

Finally I punched in a phrase that seems to be on everyone lips (and keyboards) in 2008 - social media. I was curious if anyone was talking about it in 2001. The answer? Not so much. A quick scan of “social media” pages that were listed in 2001, shows that most of them were not discussing social media in the same context that we use it today.

“social media”  1,430 vs. 19,900,000 + 1,391,608%

Wish I could find a way to grow our revenue by 1.4 million percent in the next 7 years…

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There are definite upsides to transitioning from the “real” business world to the “virtual” business world, but there are quite a few hurdles as well. Here’s the one we hear most often:

“Great concept! Let’s meet to discuss it further!”

It’s true that our target market is entrepreneurs, small businesses, professionals, solopreneurs, and busy individuals worldwide, hence our virtual model.

In reality, like any start-up in the early stages, we’re tapping into our personal networks and pitching ourselves to the people we come face-to-face with everyday. Since we are accessible to these people, inevitably any encounter is followed up by “Let’s do lunch!” or any other of the hundreds of interchangeable phrases that connote some face-time. It’s always a challenge to find the best way to communicate to the person in question that our business model is virtual and “yeah, you’re within driving distance of me but I’m not going to meet with you”.

I always try to counter the “Let’s get together!” with “Great idea. Let’s schedule a phone meeting”. My instinct is that people utter the “Let’s schedule a meeting” phrase because in the “real” business world it’s the next logical step in developing a relationship. In the “virtual” business world there are many other ways to foster a business relationship (I’ll be expanding upon this in a future post).

Is it worth the effort to transition potential clients from the “real” business world to the “virtual” business world? Or would it be better to focus exclusively on developing “virtual” relationships? This is a question AskMax is currently grappling with and we don’t yet have the answer. Stay tuned…

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I read this book several years ago for the first time, refer back to it regularly, and it almost always makes the cut when I am coaching entrepreneurs.  I won’t lie to you, the book can be tough to get through at times (and downright boring in parts) but overall this is a key read for anyone who wants to improve their effectiveness - professional or otherwise.

There are tons of resources out there designed to help you manage your time, get organized, increase your productivity and efficiency, but most miss the boat, because the truth is no matter how productive you are, your energy is wasted if you don’t have the ability to identify which tasks require your attention, and which ones don’t.  A lot of people out there are harried, frenzied and exhausted, but accomplishing very little - and mastering the art of effectiveness will set you apart.

NB: “The Effective Executive” does target the corporate exec, not the entrepreneur, but for the most part the skills are transferable and the proposed habits will benefit you regardless of whether you work from a corner office or your kitchen table.

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A great deal of debate surrounds the definition of entrepreneurship vs. small business ownership, and since we define our target market as including both entrepreneurs and small business owners (as well as freelancers, solopreneurs and independent professionals), I figured I should jump on the bandwagon. 

My research revealed that purists take issue with about 90% of small business owners who refer to themselves as entrepreneurs.  This echoes my own personal sentiment since I don’t refer to myself, my partner or my husband as entrepreneurs, though we run small businesses. For some reason though, I feel possessive of the title when I am confronted by individuals who throw the term around, e.g. the 9 to 5er who claims that in their spare time they are somewhat of a serial entrepreneur. 

So, how do you know if you are part of the exclusive, elusive club - the 10% who actually make the cut?

Several variables seem to be relevant in this debate, the first of which centers around wealth creation vs. income generation.  It is frequently argued that small business owners manage businesses with the objective of generating a consistent income stream or salary.  An entrepreneur focuses on significant and rapid wealth creation; often at the expense of short term cash flow since profits are reinvested as part of strategy to further the development of brand equity, or whatever other significant assets the business holds.

A second variable is the role which innovation plays within a business.  A truly entrepreneurial venture should forge new paths and create new markets by offering a product or service which is new and different from what’s already out there, generating new demand as opposed to attracting customers away from similar, existing businesses.

A third variable is ownership. It has been argued that only privately held companies may be entrepreneurial in nature, since the use of public funds or investment inevitably translates into management by and for the masses, which is counterintuitive to the concept of true entrepreneurship.

A fourth variable is the availability and sourcing of resources; while a small business owner such as a franchisee might take a bank loan to start his or her company, an entrepreneur is said to be skilled in securing required resources from scratch, favoring alternative financing options and doing whatever it takes to survive, including working out of their unheated garages, wearing parkas, in January.

And finally, the level of risk tolerance is generally taken into account, since a small business owner is generally relatively conservative, whereas the entrepreneur has to be willing to do whatever it takes to get the business off the ground, often at great cost and with an all-too-frequent rate of failure.

While “small business owner” and “entrepreneur” are often used as synonyms, in my opinion each title holds a different meaning.  Although one is not more worthy than the other the distinction should be recognized.

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Sometimes we are so involved with the tasks at hand that we lose perspective. It becomes easy to dismiss those around us since we feel that we are the only ones that really understand what needs to be done. Take a couple of minutes to encourage those around you to speak up.

Whether it’s an employee, a supplier, a client, your spouse, or your child - take some time to listen.

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Thanks to one of our favorite products, Freshbooks, several of our clients have rediscovered their love of accounting.  Ok, not quite.  But at least now they hate it a lot less!

We recently helped Gourmet a votre service, a Personal Chef and Catering service based in Montreal, redesign their entire invoicing, bookeeping and inventory management process using Freshbooks.

Prior to our intervention, ordering, invoicing, and inventory tracking were all separate activities. As a result the process was very time consuming, and due to the inherent redundancy, left the door open for considerable human error.

The new streamlined system allows the owner to invoice an order quickly by choosing items from a predefined product list which automatically updates his inventory.  Expenses are directly associated to a client and automatically tacked on to the next outgoing bill - which significantly simplifies billing for complex catered events.

The set up was relatively easy.  The most time consuming activity was setting up each different product for inventory since there were 250+ individual items (SKUs), each with their own description and price - but the investment was recouped within one month of no longer having to invoice everything manually.

We also set up Paypal so that Gourmet could easily accept payment by major credit card.

So now clients get their food faster, and more easily than before, which makes them happy.

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