We’ve all heard of the time-value of money, but have you ever thought about the time-value of you? If I could sell you an hour of your own time, would it be worth $5.00? The real question is, what is your time really worth? What’s the time-value of you? To earn $100,000 a year you need to earn about $50 an hour, assuming a 40 hour work week. That means anything you do that is worth less than $50, or that someone else could have done it for less that $50, is costing you money! The most common challenge I hear from entrepreneurs and small business owners today is that their task list seems to grow and grow. They feel stressed and overwhelmed.
There are many ways to promote your business. Among them is a company website, but just having a site doesn’t ensure anyone will ever find it. The most common ways to generate interest are search engine optimization, pay-per-click advertising and marketing.
When it comes to marketing for sellers and buyers these days you have to be in many places. Social media sites like Facebook and Twitter, along with video sites like YouTube, Craig’s List, Postlets and so on. Do you do direct mail? How do you pull your mailing lists and coordinate the operational aspect of the mailing? Who places your ads, either online or in the local paper?
With so many ways to promote your business, it can easily become overwhelming trying to do all the marketing yourself. There’s just way too much to do. And that is where a virtual assistant comes in. What if you could take 75-95% of your marketing tasks and delegate them to a trained assistant for as low as $5-7/hour? (Notice I said a ‘trained’ assistant.)
Which would you prefer? Someone you had to train 100% from scratch, or a virtual assistant (VA) who was already familiar with and trained in email and article marketing, blogging, Twitter, YouTube and more?
When choosing an outsourcing firm, make sure they provide training for your ‘employee’ in the essentials of Internet marketing; otherwise it’s really not going to be the best match for you. As real estate investor-marketers we will always need hep with: • Creating and posting online ads – Creating and sending follow-up emails and thank you notes – Handling inbound and outbound buyer/seller calls – Preliminary tenant screening – Updating websites with new properties – Updating your profiles and posts on social networking sites – Marketing and other research – Data mining and list sorting for lead management – And much more.
As marketers we need help with many repetitive tasks on our plate; there’s just too much to do. Many will feel overwhelmed and frustrated – ending up working many late nights and feeling burned out the next day. If this sounds like you, imagine having a trained, outsourced employee giving you all the support you need — already trained in basic marketing tasks. If they lack a specific skill you want, you can trust them to ‘Google it,’ learn it, and complete the task with little to no intervention on your part.
What if you could actually take a day or two off knowing that ‘all is well’ and that your dutiful assistant was working diligently and effectively to drive traffic and make sales on your behalf?
Imagine the relief, the feeling of satisfaction and the peace of mind of getting things done without doing them yourself. Imagine the joy of working on the parts of your business that really TURN YOU ON — the high value tasks that you enjoy MOST. Perhaps that’s closing deals and talking with private lenders or maybe it’s developing new marketing programs; perhaps it’s learning the latest investing techniques or applying the latest marketing tools to improve your traffic and conversions, which you could then share with your assistant who can then implement them for you even more effectively.
Offline and online Internet marketing can be far easier, more productive and far less stressful than it’s ever been before — when you finally have someone in your corner helping you. If you’re having trouble completing your marketing tasks, then stop struggling right now and get some support. Stop doing everything you’re currently doing and let a trained virtual assistant help you. You’ll find that your marketing is functioning more like a well-oiled machine than an old, broken down jalopy struggling to get out of first gear.
So, if you’re feeling tired, frustrated or maybe even on the verge of burnout… … if you’re struggling to keep up with your endlessly increasing marketing tasks — not getting even half of what you want accomplished… … And if you KNOW that there MUST be a better, simpler way to really get your marketing rolling… then STOP and let a virtual assistant help you. You’ll be very relieved and glad you did — and you’ll probably end up wondering what took you so long to hire an assistant in the first place.
Hiring a virtual assistant is easy. Hiring the RIGHT virtual assistant can be much more challenging. I’ve found a great company to support you in your outsourcing endeavors; the company is called 123Employee. 123Employee provides outsourced agents with cutting-edge training in areas such as lead generation, blogging, Twitter, article marketing, web design and more. They work hard to make it EASY for you to have not just a run-of-the-mill virtual assistant, but one who has the know-how to support your marketing campaigns like a pro.
On February 25, 2010 I will be hosting a teleconference with Daven Michaels, author of the book “Outsource This!” and principal at 123Employee. His company is a leader in the field of outsourcing and is helping the small business owner compete at a whole new level…and for pennies on the dollar!
Their agent training is constantly being improved, which means the agent working for you will always be on the cutting edge as new marketing tools and technologies emerge. You can get all the details by clicking here http://tinyurl.com/pactprosperity Also, be one of the first 25 people to click here http://tinyurl.com/pactprosperity and you will receive a complimentary copy of ‘Outsource This’ – your guide to global outsourcing. Check out 123Employee now. If you’re interested simply shoot me an email and I’ll send out information on the call in a separate email. Mark your calendar so you don’t miss the call. It will be on February 25, 2010 at 9:00 PM EST