Easiest way to Screen Share and Trouble Shoot Virtually

admin    free, Online Tools     crossloop, help, online tools, support, touble shooting, virtual

We have all probably been there, trying to walk someone through how to install or use a software. It’s one of the most difficult and annoying things to do especially if the other person is not too savvy with the computer and internet. The easiest way would be to share screen over Skype but since they are not too savvy they probably aren’t already using Skype. There’s a great very easy to use tool, Crossloop.

You and the other person downloads the application and they give you the access code. You enter it and that’s it. Very easy to use. They both a PC and Mac version.

Tasks that a Virtural Assistant can Eliminate for you

admin    Online Tools, Outsourcing, Productivity     Outsourcing, productivity, Screenr, VA, video capture, Virtual Assistant

You can dramatically increase the amount of free time you have by hiring a Virtual Assistant (VA). They can do many redundant things for you business or personal. When you hire a VA you might not have enough tasks for them for the 40 hour week so go through this list to help you get ideas:

Here is a list of standard things they can do.:

1. Scheduling interviews and meetings
2. Web-research
3. Following up on appointments, errands, and tasks
4. Online Purchases
5. Creation of legal documents
6. Basic Website Maintenance (web design, publishing, uploading files) that doesn’t require a professional
7. Monitoring, editing, and publishing comments for online discussions
8. Posting job vacancies online
9. Document creation
10. Proofreading and editing documents for spelling and formatting
11. Online research for updating blogs
12. Updating the database for CRMs (Customer Relationship Management)
13. Voicemail Transcription
14. Market Research
15. Financial Research
16. Business Plan
17. Industry Analysis
18. Market Assessment
19. Reports
20. Legal research
21. Analytics
22. Creating presentations
23. Reports and Newsletters
24. Search Engine Optimization
25. Maintaining and updating databases
26. Managing Procurement processes

It is best if you start with simple tasks then move to more complicated tasks. The best is to make a video outlining step by step how to do it. I recommend using Screenr which is a video capture webapp that is dead simple to use and super convenient.

Those are just some ideas. If you have more please suggest in the comment section below.

Compare free online survey tools

admin    free, Online Tools     free plans, Poll Daddy, survey monkey, surveygizmo, surveys, webapps, zoomerang

If you do surveys here and there but it’s not part of your main business you might consider using the free plan from the top survey providers Surverymonkey, Zoomerang, Surveygizmo, and Poll Daddy. There are details of their free plans.

SurveyGizmo:

SurveyGizmo is the top choice because it has a very easy to use interface to help create questions quickly. It is the only provider to offer unlimited questions and you can have over 100 responses per question. And the great thing is you can also export your data.

1. 250 Responses per month
2. Unlimited questions
3. Basic reporting
4. Export data

SurveyMonkey:

SurveyMonkey is easy to use with simple features it does not offer the slick and highly usable interface of SurveyGizmo. It also have many limitations like the other providers.

1. 100 survey responses per surveys
2. 10 questions per survey
3. Basic reporting
4. No data export

Zoomerang:

1. 100 survey responses per surveys
2. 10 questions per survey
3. Basic reporting
4. No data export

Poll Daddy:

1. 200 survey responses per month
2. 10 questions per survey
3. Branded with links
4. Basic reporting
5. No Data Export

You can try those out. What I highly recommend is NEVER use GetResponse’s survey feature. I used that at first because I have a free account and it was a waste of time and cause of much frustration. There are not much options for questions and when viewing the data it is very limited and you cannot see each response. The worst is the export data feature, I got the data in excel and could not follow, took a lot of time. And the data was actually incorrect from the site to the export file and I discovered that the most important respondent was missing.

Step by Step Guide to Finding a Virtual Assistant

God    Online Tools, Outsourcing, Productivity    

What can virtual assistants do:

Virtual assistants (VAs)  provide personal and office support services, such as

1. general administrative tasks
2. making customer contacts;
3. writing reports;
4. editing documents; sending out marketing materials;
5. handling thank-you notes, gifts and follow-up letters
6. setting up and maintaining databases
7. handling billing and bookkeeping; and updating Web sites.

You can also get a VA to manage your personal life as well. Here are some of their tasks:

1. Some VAs even help clients manage their personal lives
2. Doing such tasks as arranging for pet-sitting
3. Calling the plumber
4. Scheduling doctor’s appointments
5. Planning an upcoming family reunion
6. Or coordinating a move.

For a comprehensive list see: Tasks that a Virtual Assistant can Eliminate for You.

Sites to find VA’s:

Many people have recommended using VAs from the Philippine because their culture and accent is close to North America. They are also hard working and very loyal. Some sites to use is Onlinejobs.ph ($49) and Manila Craigslist (Free). However I posted 2 of the same job description on Onlinejobs.ph and Odesk and I find the candidates on Odesk to have a lot higher quality response.

Searching:

1. Better to hire them full time and split with friends or clients
2. Lower rate is not a good thing. When a VA is charging too low of a rate it means that either 1) they are not good or 2) they will have to juggle too many tasks to make a living and your responsibilities will slip to the side
3. Have everything written and signed. This includes fees, terms and conditions, etc…
4. Consider working with someone on a short term project basis before fully jumping in. This will ensure that you two are compatible but also ensures that a VA is what you are looking for.
5. Find out the hours they are available and make sure it is compatible with their responsibilities.
6. If there are certain specialized tasks you have make sure they have the right tools and equipment to do the tasks you require
7. View sample work.
8. Ask them to fill out a survey. You will get a lot of applicants, the fastest way for you to filter it out is to have them fill a survey, you can use SurveyMonkey.
9. Look for training and certification. If you are using Odesk it provides this information.
10. Return business. Look up the history of the VA to see how much and how long does their client stay with them. If they have many clients but only a few or no repeat clients then it a telltale sign that they are not good. In Odesk I was able to see how much each client spends with them then I know that they are good.
11. Look for polish work. A sure sign of incompetency is spelling errors, typos, and gaammar mistakes.

Working Together:

1. Use a software to communicate – e.g. basecamp or other
2. Stay in contact
3. Set realistic deadlines
4. Set a communication schedule

once they are hired treat them like an employee. The saying goes “Hire slow fire fast.” If you get any clue that they are not the right fit end it as soon as you can. Make sure they are real issues and not just communication issues. One of the biggest issues would be punctuality.

Questions:

Hire one or hire many?

Hire from a firm or individual?

Signs of a good Virtual Assistant

1. If they ask for a consultation
2. They have a system or software they use to keep track

Tools to find the perfect domain name

admin    Online Tools, SEO    

Part of the starting a business is finding a good domain name. Here are some really cool tools that makes it very easy. You can also use this tool to build additional SEO sites with the keywords you want.

Domain Hole – A tool that help you mine expired domains. Then check on hosterstat to see the age of the domain. You can find some good ones.Here’s a list of what you can do:

1. Expired search – Find expired domains based on keywords
2. Name Spinner – Enter a keyword then select options to generate available names with the keyword
3. Instant Check – checks the domain as you type it but what’s really great is that all the names stay on the page
4. Complete Check – Checks all the different TLD extenstions
5. Name generator – This helps you come up with web 2.0 names where the domain is available

Panabee – Enter 2 words and it will generate a list of possible domains. Comes up with a lot of creative names.

Bust A Name – combines keywords in different combinations to get available domains

namestation – use this tool to generate random words or hold a contest for names. Tools that generate random domains, combine and blend words, and find short web2.0 domains.

Valuedrops.com – This shows the dropped domains for today and pending drops for tomorrow. It uses it’s logarithm to filter by value.

wordoid.com – Enter a word and this generates names with that word. e.g. enter “deal” and you get dealized, dealizing,, idealth, etc…

Domai.nr – enter a word and it will help you find short domains

Applying Lean Startup Techniques

God    Online Tools, Sales     99designs, Agile Software Development, AppSumo, Ash Maurya, Chargify, demo, Lean startup, Minimum Viable Product, MVP, Pivotal Tracker, Postmark, Recurly, Running Lean, sales, tools, Twilio

Lean Startup is a philosophy about starting a product/service where market demand is verified as quickly as possible for with the minimum resources required.

I am currently working on a “video yellowpages of dentist” where unlike a yellowpages there is no monthly fee and the dental clinic only pays for the lead generated from our service. This is how I applied some of the Lean Startup principles:

1. Get customers before making the product
   The original idea was quite different from what it was now because customers were not willing to pay for it and it was too much work. After talking with a couple of dental offices extensively we were able to make an offer the customer was willing to pay for. So far I had meetings with 2 dentists and both signed on. And one dentist referred 2 other dental clinic that were interested in the idea. Our goal is to get 10 customers to cover all of our cost of making the site. We do not offer any “freemium” plan as it diverts from creating something customers would pay for as well as we need money to fund the project.
2. Make a demo for selling
   Because we had nothing it was hard to get dental clinics to pay us money. So we made a quick demo mock up with very limited features, scrape the internet for data to populate it then pitch it to dentists. The great design and functionality was important in communicating with the dentist to build the trust.
3. Didn’t waste time with design contests like 99designs… at the beginning.
   I have used 99deisgns many times and love it. But to move quicker for the demo we grabbed a template from the internet and got the designer to modify it. Design contests takes time and lots of communication. And no we don’t have or need a logo at this point. When we do need a logo and once we finalize the site and direction by getting feedback then we will use 99designs to create it.
4. Minimize cost for coding but keeping the quality
   It is absolutely important to have great code. I wanted to use Ruby on Rails (ROR) for this project. Because ROR coders are expensive I got my coder in Philippines to learn ROR which decrease the cost of development. But to make sure the code is right and we move quickly I hired a experienced coder from Toronto to “consult” and review his code and pay him his full rate but for only for a set limited hours a week.
5. Use the right tools for agile communication
   We are using Pivotal Tracker for Agile Software Development
6. Minimum Viable Product
   There is an extensive wish list of features for the product. As such we segmented it to 3 major phases. Phase one is the MVP and we might never even do phase 2 or 3, we just wishlist features there so our minds stay clear. Within Phase one there are 3 different stages and the site can go live when each section is complete. Each stage can be done within a week.
7. Move faster, develop as little as possible
   These are the software we plan to use. The majority of the development would be integrating the APIs instead of making new software. 
   1. Twilio - Track leads. We offer Twilio numbers on the site, visitors call that number, get directed to the dental office and the dental office is charge for that lead.
   2. Postmark – Sending emails to users
   3. Recurly or Chargify – Monthly billing. Based on our current forecast the price structure of Reculry is substantially lower then Chargify but we have to do more research.
   4. YouTube/Wistia - Would like to use Wistia for hosting the videos but to keep cost low we will start by using youtube to hose the videos.
8. Lean Sales Process
   To get sales quickly I bypassed the urge to dedicate my attention building a sales team and sales program. Instead I am focusing on getting referrals to and from dentist. To fill out the rest of the customers needed to meet the target of 10 I will be making cold calls to dental offices that have already bought “video” listings on yellowpages, those are the perfect candidate for this service.
9. Lean Sales Pitch
   Even our sales pitch is lean! Due to the simplicity of our service our sales pitch can be done in 15mins (by intention and necessity). We will be testing this with more clients so I can’t say this is a success but it’s our aim.
10. Using Mentors and LinkedIn to Minimize Mistakes
    To learn about best practices and find any pitfalls I might asked several mentor or people that had been through this for feedback and learn about their experience. That has helped a lot. Also I join and have been participate in the dental groups on LinkedIn to learn about the dentists and sales professionals in the industry as well as to make contacts and have potential future partnership. Lastly I also tell everyone and anyone about the project and i have gotten the most insightful feedback from people I least expected.

You can get special discounts to many of the tools by buying it from AppSumo.com. Please vote for me here for the Lean Startup Challenge. Also I highly recommend getting Running Lean by Ash Maurya which also has great tidbits of real life experience using the Lean Startup methodogy.

Services for Canadian Small Businesses

God    Canadian, Online Tools     bank, banks, Canada, credit card, currency exchange, Financial services, hsbc, mbna, money, Paypal, RBC, saving, Shipping

It is very important to have the right tools for your business. Having the right tools can save you time and also money and this builds up.

I have research lots of different options and these are the services I use:

Financial Services:

Bank Account: HSBC.ca – Business direct

One of the few no fee banking services but unlike others which are usually credit unions there are many locations and a powerful online banking where you can do a lot of different transactions.

Currency Exchange: VBCE (Vancouver Bullion Currency Exchange) and Oanda

These two have a lot lower rate than the banks and other currency brokerage houses. Oanda has the lowest rates for smaller volumes around $10,000. I find that at higher volumes they are about even. For me I use VBCE because people are nicer and Oanda gave me such a hassle when I tried to sign up. Also VBCE uses HSBC so when I wire them money, it’s free and they wire it back to my HSBC USD account.

USD based bank account: RBC USA bank

Paypal requires you to have a USA based account to withdraw fees. What that means is the bank has to be physically based in the US. I recommend calling them to sign up, the branches are clueless about setting this up and will often tell you that they can’t do it or you need are not approve or other crap. It’s very easy and quick when you call in. You will need to put this under your personal name. You will get a credit card as well to use, I discovered that if I use credit card for transactions outside the US they charge a 1% fee. Be aware of this.

Credit Card: MBNA Smart Cash

No annual fee, 1% back, 2% on gas and grocery. Nothing beats this!

Transportation:

Shipping: E-shipper.com

Unless you have high volume shipments you are not going to get a special rate from UPS or Fedex. E-shipper gets a volume discount and passes part of the savings to you. Shipping within Canadian cities are very inexpensive. Going to the US, I’m not sure the savings that great and it doesn’t offer much for international savings.

Shipping: FreightCenter

For larger item shipments FreightCenter seeks rates at the different trucking companies and gets you the lowest price. The prices are actually lower than directly contacting the trucking companies yourself.

Free online tools for the virtual office

God    free, Online Tools     basecamp, dropbox, free, gamil, Google Docs, online, tools, yammer

1. Dropbox – virtual hard drive – gives you 2GB of data
2. Basecamp – Simple Project Management tool, helps keep track of shared tasks.
3. Yammer – Internal company twitter. Great to keep updated on what everyone is working on
4. Gmail and Google Docs – Free collaboration on excel and word documents.