With the economy in turmoil, many people are considering starting a new business venture. As I spend time in forums and blogs; helping people with start up questions, business concerns or how to start and manage a virtual business, there is an interesting commonality amongst many of them. Surprisingly, most of the doubts they have is not the legality, or the mechanics of starting a business. Instead, their biggest concern is what business to start. Now, this is not in the legal sense, but instead what product or service to sell.

A major challenge potential entrepreneurs seem to have, is figuring out what business to go into. They wonder if they can make a business out of whatever expertise they may have. In many cases, they cannot even figure out what that expertise is! Although for years entrepreneurs have started businesses either on a hunch, personal expertise, family business, or market research. They have seldom started a business based on who they are.

Therefore the number one requirement for a start-up — whether it’s a virtual business or a brick-and-mortar — even before knowledge or expertise; it is to work on yours strengths and passion. Why? Simply because being in business is like a roller coaster, sometimes you are up and sometimes you are down. Using your strengths and passion to start and build a business, will increase your chances of success. This will give you the strength to keep going during those “rough” times, when you wished the world would stop so you could get out.

However, what are your strengths? What is your passion? What business can you excel at? How do you find out? How do you truly know without guessing?

Here are the steps to follow:

1. Find out your personal strengths: To do this, read “Strengths Finder” by Tom Rath. After you are done reading, take the online test that comes with the book (you will get a pin number inside the book). It is a one time shot, so make sure you use it wisely. Set everything aside and have peace and quiet when you are ready to take the test. When you are done, you will be enlightened to find out who you truly are!
2. Find out the best business-relevant interests, values and abilities that fit your personality: Now that you know who you are, you want to find out what businesses fit you best. Go to CareerLeader.com and take the test for individual clients. As the time of this writing, the cost of the test is $95. Most likely, the best money spent before you spend a penny starting any kind of business…Why? Simply because it will provide you with an expert assessments of your unique pattern of business-relevant interests, values and abilities.
3. Find your niche market: Now that you are empowered with your personal and business strengths, go to MarketSamurai.com and download the 30-day free trail. Follow the instructions and find a PROFITABLE niche that fits your personal and business strengths AND can make you money along the way!
4. Build a virtual business: Now it’s time to start building that business you have been thinking about. Therefore the next step is to build your virtual business. Why a virtual business? This is because in this new economy, building a virtual business will also increase your chances of success. The cost of entry is low. The market reach is greater. It allows you to build systems and processes at little to no cost. You don’t have to invest or borrow thousands of dollars. You can hire virtual employees on a per need basis. These are just a few benefits, and I am barely scratching the surface here!
     

   Now go the www.virtualbusinessdashboard.com, download the free report on “How to maximize your business profits!” and start building your virtual business! Once you download the report, you will be routed to the main site where you can get the instructions on how to build a virtual business. Make sure you download the report as soon as you are done with this reading. I constantly change reports and you may not get the same one if you procrastinate.

5. Test your findings: You are not quite ready yet. There is one more important step. Now that you know your personal, business and market strength; you want to test what product or service will have the highest chance of success. These findings will help you optimize your virtual business endeavor for maximum business results. Therefore next do a split-test of your potential products or services (follow the instructions inside the virtualbusinessdashboard.com on how to do this).

NOW you are ready to build a real, sustainable virtual business with a much greater chance of success! Best of luck and please make sure you drop me a note to let me know how your virtual business is progressing.

Would you agree with this…just because you don’t have money doesn’t mean you can’t start a home based business, literally with little to no money.

After such massive economic collapse, people are looking to rebuild their lives. They are looking for new ways out. In this new world economy, ideas are king. Therefore, the most successful people will be the ones that share their life story, passion, knowledge and expertise to help others better their lives or turn their businesses around.

The new business revolution is all about content creation and training. This puts people, who use “helping others”, as a strategy for success, in a position to earn more income and have greater influence. Agreed?

These changes put you in the driver’s seat. You can now position yourself in this new economy as an expert in your field, and all from the comfort of your own home. You can accomplish this by writing online courses, books, speeches, seminars and offer coaching.

So here is how you can start your own virtual business and join the ranks of the new rich:

1. Go to Market Samurai (30 day free trial) and find a profitable niche that meets your passion, knowledge and expertise.
2. If you do not have any products, then sell affiliate products first. It is probably the best way to start a home based business while reducing risk and building business acumen.
3. Go to Clickbank or Commission Junction and find a few affiliate products that match your profitable niche. Split-test your findings using Google Website Optimizer.
4. Build a blog, a squeeze page with a free offer (webinar, report, etc) and start building your list. Remember to use your niche keywords for everything you do.
5. Start on a shoe-string. Use all the virtual business strategies first. Forget about the fancy offices, or the latest phone system. Watch you expenses like a hawk. Costs have a funky way to get out of control when you are starting out.
6. Use all the available free tools. Again, the virtual business strategy is the best when starting out. There a numerous, powerful open source applications you can use to build and grow your business. All you need is a computer and internet access.
7. Use free online marketing to drive traffic to your blog and/or squeeze page.
8. Promote, campaign and sell to your list on the back-end.
9. Start small, build up. Once you start bringing money in, and as soon as you can afford it, hire help and start delegating.
10. Bringing customers AND retaining them should be your number one priority at all times.

Follow this virtual business strategy and drive hundreds of customers to your home based business. Actually, implementing a sophisticated virtual business strategy is pretty simple, once you get the hang of it. First, start with your market research: Niche, split test, affiliate products. Second implement your sales and marketing channels: blog, free offer, squeeze page, back-end sales. Third build your communication channels: Virtual PBX, VoiP phones, and online fax. Then implement your virtual customer service department: Chat, knowledge base, FAQs and support desk. Your are on your way to success!

So to help you out here, I wrote a FREE REPORT: “New Business Success Is All About Merging Your Offline & Online Systems…Learn How to Leave Your Competition in the Dust!” … visit the Virtual Business Dashboard and get your FREE report.

Due to the economy, people of all ages are flocking to start a home based business. The challenge most of these entrepreneurs confront is the unwillingness of customers wanting to work with solopreneurs who lack credibility. The things that make these home based businesses not credible are:

• Not having a professional customer service system
• Not having contact information on their website
• Being able to be reached only by email or phone
• Only having a voice mail as customer support system
• Taking a long time to get back to customers

Here is the simple step you can take right now, today, to make your home based business look and act like an S&P500…implement a virtual business strategy by setting up virtual communication channels.

These channels are: A virtual PBX, professionally recorded welcome prompts, 800# online fax, online support desk, chat, self-service knowledge base and FAQs.

You may be wondering…how much money would it cost your home based business to set up a sophisticated virtual business communication system like this one? Here is the breakdown:

1. Virtual PBX: About $35 per month
2. VoiP: About $15 per month
3. #800 Online Fax: About $10 per month
4. Online Support Desk: About $40 per month
5. Chat: Included in online support desk bundle
6. Knowledge Base/FAQ: Included in online support desk bundle
7. Recorded Prompt: One time fee
8. Phones: Zero, use soft phones (on your computer)

 

…TOTAL COST: approximately $100 per month!

Follow this virtual business strategy and drive hundreds of customers to your home based business. Actually, implementing a sophisticated virtual business strategy is pretty simple, once you get the hang of it. First, start with your communication channels: Virtual PBX, VoiP phones, and online fax. Then implement your virtual customer service department: Chat, knowledge base, FAQs and support desk. You’re now operating like an S&P500!

So to help you out here, I wrote a FREE REPORT: “New Business Success Is All About Merging Your Offline & Online Systems…Learn How to Leave Your Competition in the Dust!” … click here to visit the Virtual Business Dashboard and get your FREE report.

I’m often asked, “Jackie how do I make my business profitable? I currently work hard, constantly expand my business, I have a decent market share, but I’m still not keeping much at the end of the day?” Well, that’s simple, use the virtual business strategy to lift off your profits.

Here are three simple steps you can take right now, today, to maximizing your business profits.

1. Pick your money drainers: Which department, processes, section of your operations is draining the most cash out of your business? Which is giving the least return on your investment? Do you have clients that cost you more to keep than what you make from them? Do you have too many employees doing the same thing over and over again? Try to think of two or three things that are just sucking your business profits, in case one or two are not so easy to take action right away.

2. Figure out your inefficiencies and eliminate them: Sketch on paper the process bottlenecks. Write down the parts that are being duplicated. See if your customer service is effective or if you are losing too many clients. See if you are still using paper filing system for your documents. How about promotional printing that can be converted to online marketing? Can your non-customers facing employees work out their homes? How about your communications system, are you wasting thousands of dollars on LAN lines and paper faxing?

3. Implements systems and digitize them: This is where the virtual business strategy comes into play. Choose a virtual communication system to eliminate expensive LAN phones and fax costs. You may want to streamline your customer service and implement an online support desk. Think about implementing online Customer Relationship Management and Document Management Systems to eliminate all paper inefficiencies. Move your non-facing customers to work from their homes, since you have everything online now, they will be able to access all information from the comfort of their homes.

Follow these 3 steps and drive thousands of wasted dollars to your bottom line. Actually, eliminating inefficiencies and operating costs is pretty simple, once you get the hang of how a virtual business works, but there are things to consider before you start. Pinpoint your money drainers first. Start with the one that is sucking the most money out of your business. Re-design your current processes to make it effective and digitize as much as possible. Then eliminate or move your non-customer facing employees to work from home. Eliminate all that wasted office space; reduce your utilities bills, unnecessary supplies, desks, etc. You’re now maximizing your business profits!

To help you out, I wrote a FREE REPORT: “You’re About To Learn ‘Secrets’ that Most Business Owners Will Never Know About How to Really MAXIMIZE PROFITS!” … visit the Virtual Business Dashboard and get your FREE report.

Never in history have customers been more fickle and demanding than in today’s economy. Businesses that do not provide outstanding customer service will be long gone. In this new virtual business environment, customer service is your main competitive advantage. Therefore, business success lies more than ever, on retaining your customers. Take advantage of the virtual business strategy to catapult your business profits!

Technology, especially customer service technology, has evolved by leaps and bounds. Customers are no longer chained to their local store to get outstanding customer service; they are empowered to take their business wherever they can get the best service. Now that they are freed of distance constrains, thanks to technology, they are free to buy anywhere in the planet…your competition is no longer the shop across the street; but the one in Asia, South America or anywhere on earth where there is outstanding customer service.

Keeping customers is not only smart business practice but a very valuable one as well. This is clearly measured by the Customer Lifetime Value (CLV). Most business owners only see the value of a customer based on the first sale, but do not take into consideration the future purchases of this customer. So let’s see an example:

Mary gets her slacks cleaned at the cleaners for $8. Most business owners will see this as the only revenue. Fortunately, Mary comes back the following week and gets her dresses and some blouses cleaned for a total of $20. Now, you did not have to spend any money on marketing, advertising or sales to bring Mary back, she simply liked your service and the way you cleaned her clothes. So in reality, you made $28 from Mary. Therefore the true value of Mary is all the cleaning she has done PLUS all the future cleaning she will get done if you work hard enough to retain her loyalty…follow me so far?

In order to get the lifetime value of your average customers, simply multiply the average sales you made by the average number the customer came back to your business. Here is the simple formula:

So now that you know the CLV of your customers, the next question is…are your customers profitable? After all, you are in business to make a profit. In order to find out if your customers are profitable, simply multiply your average profit per sale by the estimated number of times your customers buy again. Here is the simple CLP formula.

Knowing these numbers will help you decide how a virtual business can increase your customer’s lifetime value and therefore you business profits.

In a virtual business model, you can implement the different customer service technologies readily available to reduce cost (and therefore increase short-term profit). A virtual business model also allows you to implement a multi-channel customer communications system to increase customer loyalty (and therefore increase long-term profit).

 

A virtual business customer service set up:

• Is mostly free or of very little cost
• It is web ready
• You do not need to know programming to implement it
• You can have it up and running in minutes
• You can have employees or virtual agents anywhere in the world

Now, let’s see how these points affect the CLP formula we discussed above. Customer Lifetime Profit or CLP is all about knowing the profit your customers bring. This means, if you lower your costs, your virtual business profits will be higher. Therefore by having a web based customer service infrastructure in your virtual business, your employees can work out of their homes. This lowers your costs because you no longer have to provide office space, utilities, desks, supplies, etc. If your business and industry allows it, you can even hire virtual reps for your virtual business…this means no payroll taxes or employee benefits. Since most of the applications are free or low cost, this means your out of pocket set-up investment costs are truly minute.

 

A virtual business multi-channel communication system is composed of:

• Chat
• Voip Phone
• Virtual PBX
• Online Fax
• Online Support Desk
• Customer Relationship Management System
• Web Forms

….and sometimes the old snail mail

How do these multi-channel strategies and applications help you with your customer loyalty? Again, going back to the Customer Lifetime Value or CLV discussed before, the more your customers buy from you, the higher your CLV. With an online multi-channel, 24/7 support system, they can reach you in whichever way suits them best, creating massive customer loyalty. Loyalty means your customers will keep coming back for more, which in return means higher CLV.

Keeping customers has never been this difficult. As you can see, setting up your customer service system as a virtual business will decrease your costs, therefore increasing your profits (CLP). It will also keep your customers buying from you over and over again therefore increasing your customer value (CLV). Remember, customer loyalty will make you a lot more money in the long run!

To help you out and get you started, I wrote a FREE REPORT: “New Business Success Is All About Merging Your Offline & Online Systems…Learn How to Leave Your Competition in the Dust!” … visit the Virtual Business Dashboard and get your FREE report.

Unemployment is relentless. Jobs are nowhere to be found. Banks are not lending money. Credits are getting shuttered. There is no equity in our houses…so what is one to do?

Start your own virtual business! Ironically the greatest entrepreneurial opportunities are created during downturns of the economy. According to a report from Challenger, Gray & Christmas, in the second quarter of 2009, 8.7% of job seekers gained employment by starting their own businesses!

Some great examples of companies that started during a recession are:

• Hyatt Corp: Started its operations during the Eisenhower recession (1957-58)
• FedEx: began its operations during the recession of 1973
• CNN: Started during the brutal recession of the ‘80s
• MTV: Born during the economic chaos of 1981
• Burger King: Born during the recession of 1957
• GE: Born during the cruel 6-year recession of 1873

Sure, it sounds easier said than done. You may be thinking you need gazillion of dollars, a business plan, investment funding, credit lines, an office, employees, furniture, and on and on and on…what if I told you that is not true. What if I showed you, you can actually start a virtual business with little to no money?

Here are the seven steps you need to take, to start your own business on a shoe-string:

1. Start a Virtual Business: This means working from your home and all you need is a computer and internet connection. By creating a virtual business you can provide self-service for your clients and a centralized knowledge base for your employees (when you are ready to hire them).
2. Get FREE Open Source Applications: The cost to entry is very low; you don’t have to pay anything for them. A virtual business allows you to digitize your operations, and eliminate inefficiencies and duplicity.
3. Market Online: the marketing channels available today are endless! Social media, blogs, forums, articles, and on and on…and all for FREE!
4. Sell Globally: Overnight, your virtual business will give you access to clients all over the world, and you don’t have to spend an extra penny trying to get them.
5. Install Virtual Communication Channels: Setting up your virtual business with virtual phones, faxes, chats, etc (by the way, most of them for free or at very little cost) , will help you communicate with your clients and vendors from the comfort of your own home.
6. Be Up and Running in Days, or Even Hours: A virtual business allows you to have your business up and running in no time. You no longer have to worry about borrowing funds to cover rent, utility bills, furniture or any of those old world necessities
7. Manage Your New Virtual Business Remotely: You no longer have to worry about daycare, or nannies, or missing that important school field trip. A virtual business will allow you the freedom to run your business and have a life too!

Now, there is nothing holding you back. Figure out a profitable niche market; get your virtual systems in place, and hopefully you will be the next FedEx, GE, or even MTV! To help you out, I wrote a FREE REPORT: “New Business Success Is All About Merging Your Offline & Online Systems…Learn How to Leave Your Competition in the Dust!” … visit the Virtual Business Dashboard and get your FREE report.

So you decided to start a virtual business…now what? Before you get caught up in the daily routine of growing your company, take a step back and think what you will do with your virtual business AFTER you spent all those thousands of hours building it. Or, if a tragedy strikes, ask yourself, what will happen to your virtual business then?

Don’t have a clue?

Don’t worry, you are not alone. Most virtual business or small business owners do not plan that far out, they are just trying to make it through the day. So I thought I’d give you a few ideas on the best way to transfer or sell a virtual business when the times comes, this way you will have a clearer idea of where you are heading even before you start.

Remember though, the key to building a business ready to be sold at any time, is to remove yourself from the daily operations. This is the reason why, it is imperative to build a process driven, instead of an owner driven company. If you eventually do not make this transition, your business will be worth less and you will most likely receive less for your company!

Here is an overview of the best 7 virtual business (or small business) exit strategies:
1. Employees: A few methods to selling a virtual business to your employees are the ESOP (Employee Stock Ownership Plan), an MBO (Management Buyouts) and MBI (Management Buyins)
2. Charitable Trusts: This is a great strategy for those virtual business owners who want to benefit from charitable giving. A few methods are CRTs (Charitable Reminder Trust) and CLT (Charitable Load Trust)
3. Family: This is when you want to transfer your virtual business to your children or a family member. A few methods are gifting stock, GRATs (grantor retained annuity trust), FLPs (Family Limited Partnerships), SCINs (self-canceling installment notes), IDGTs (intentionally defective grantor trusts) and private annuities.
4. Co-owners: When buying out a partner the co-owner transfer channel is a good method. It includes buy/sell agreements, rights of first refusal provisions and other transfer techniques.
5. Retire and Sell to an Outsider: When retiring, numerous of the previous mentioned methods can be used. Such as charitable trusts, private annuities or grantor retained annuity trusts.
6. Continue in the Business but Sell to an Outsider: This strategy is usually implemented when an owner needs growth funds but does not want to invest personal assets. It can be sold to a private entity or to a public one.
7. Going Public: This is the process of offering securities (common or preferred stock) of a private company for sale to the general public.

As you can see, planning for the future takes time. So to help you out here, I wrote a FREE REPORT that shows you how to build a valuable business: “You’re About to Learn Secrets That Most Business Owners Will Never Know About How to Really MAXIMIZE PROFITS!” …visit the Virtual Business Dashboard and get your FREE report.

It is no secret baby boomers are flocking to start-up new businesses. Unfortunately in the new economy, business success is about merging your offline and online systems…but baby boomers come from an offline world! So what is a baby boomer to do? Here comes the virtual business strategy.

Before we go over what a virtual business strategy is, let’s discuss the three main reasons this trend is taking place. First some baby boomers got hit the hardest with the downturn of the economy and now they have to start over again. Second, many of them are empty-nesters and now they have time to do what they love. Lastly, a lot of them can financially afford it, since they no longer have the expenses of mortgages, kids, college and other financial responsibilities.

Regardless of the reason, the fact of the matter is, baby boomers are starting businesses faster than any other age bracket. According to a 2009 Kauffman Foundation Study: “Contrary to popularly held assumptions, it turns out that over the past decade or so, the highest rate of entrepreneurial activity belongs to the 55-64 age group. The 20-34 age bracket, meanwhile, which we usually identify with swashbuckling and risk-taking youth (think Facebook and Google), has the lowest rate.”

This is a very interesting statistic. However, because the main difference between baby boomers and the younger generation is the use of technology, baby boomers will have to catch up very fast if they are to succeed. Therefore if baby boomers learn to adapt to the new way of doing business, combined with their years of knowledge, this may actually be the greatest entrepreneurial trend this country has ever seen.

Why is it so important to morph your small business into a virtual business; or to start a new business with a virtual business strategy? Well, in the current economy, businesses are getting massacred with overhead expenses, lack of funding, relentless competition, changes happening faster and faster, and a global economy. Therefore, the benefits of a virtual business are endless.

Here are the 7 top virtual business strategies:
1. The cost to entry is very low. A virtual business can be set up using mainly free open source applications.
2. It makes you more efficient. Once the virtual business systems are in place, you eliminate a lot of inefficiencies and duplicity.
3. It makes your more effective. You can accomplish in minutes what used to take you hours, maybe even weeks.
4. You can expand your market globally.
5. You can have employees, vendors and clients located just about in any place in the globe and manage them from the comfort of your home.
6. You can be up and running in a few days, if not hours. Once you understand how to set up the virtual business applications (and you don’t even need to know programming), you can have your business totally live in minutes. No offices to rent, no long term leases, no furniture to buy, no expensive utility bills!
7. You can run your virtual business remotely (even in between golf games). You can accomplish this by either having virtual assistants that run your daily operations or by simply managing your clients from your Blackberry or laptop

…it really does not get any easier than that!

I’d love to hear from some entrepreneurs who started a business at age 50+. What challenges did you confront? What is it a good move? Are you happy or do you regret it? What would you have done differently? Please post your comments below.

Planning for the future takes time. So to help you out here, I wrote a FREE REPORT: “New Business Success Is All About Merging Your Offline & Online Systems…Learn How to Leave Your Competition in the Dust!” … click here to visit the Virtual Business Dashboard and get your FREE report.

Many of you must be wondering what a Virtual Business is. Before I explain how a Virtual Business works, it is important to understand why small business owners fail to build valuable companies. It is no secret most small business owners spend years building their operations. Unfortunately, very few realize they built a company that cannot be sold until it is too late. As business owners, we are usually confronted with this situation during a time of crisis, such as a personal tragedy, owner burnout or a health problem.

The reason most small business owners fail to build a valuable company is because they fail to see their business as an asset. They grow it by getting caught up in the mechanics of running the daily operations until they become the business themselves. In other words, they fail to build a process driven rather than an owner driven business. This is where implementing a virtual business comes into play. You see…

Most of us start a small business:
• To have independence
• To make money
• To be successful
• To have pride
• To create a better life
• To stop struggling paying bills
• To have nice things

But few of us start with the “end” in mind, in other words, with the “exit” strategy. The day when we will have to transfer, sell or close our small business. Therefore, to build a valuable business, it is best to build a virtual business with a “wealth creation” mentality, rather than a “job replacement” one. How then, can a virtual business help us build a valuable business?

The value of a small business goes up in accordance to how efficiently it operates and how financially transparent it is. Its value grows as well, when an owner-manager becomes less central to the daily operations of the business. The reason is because the business survival is no longer dependent on the presence of the owner-manager to continue its existence. This makes it easier to find investors and potential buyers when the time to “exit” the business comes.

The least expensive way to build a transparent and highly effective business is by implementing processes and digitizing operations. This is where the virtual business strategy comes into play. Building a virtual business simply means merging your offline and online systems. The virtual business allows employees, vendors, and customers to communicate and coordinate more efficiently, without the required presence of the owner-manager at all times. By implementing processes, digitizing operations and implementing a virtual business strategy, a small business is not only ready to be sold or transferred at any time, but its value also increases.

Again, planning for the future takes time. So to help you out here, I wrote a FREE REPORT: “New Business Success Is All About Merging Your Offline & Online Systems…Learn How to Leave Your Competition in the Dust!” … click here to visit the Virtual Business Dashboard and get your FREE report.

You may have noticed the word “Twitter Patted” in Twitter lately? At first, I had no idea what it meant but according to the Urban Dictionary, Twitter Patted or twitterpated’s definition is:

• Complete and immediate infatuation with someone or something that occurs in the onset of Spring; giddy excitement rooted in the physical. After meeting a potential romantic partner, the overwhelming physical desire and excitement to see them again
• The way you feel when you really like someone but you just dont know how to explain how you feel.
• Complete and immediate infatuation with someone or something that occurs in the onset of Spring; giddy excitement rooted in the physical.
• An enjoyable disorder characterized by feelings of excitement, anticipation, high hopes, recent memories of interludes, giddiness, and physical overstimulation which occur simultaneously when experiencing a new love. These feelings take over without warning, usually at odd times (such as at a check-out line), with or without the partner present, and make it difficult to concentrate on anything but romance. They interfere with work and safe driving, but should be experienced at least once in every person’s lifetime.

There you have it. Twitterpatted basically means to be eagerly enthusiastic, aroused or infatuated with a person, place or thing…have you been feeling twitterpatted lately?

Learn How to Unleash the Power of Twitter

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