In This Issue...
Happy Canada Day!
I feel a distinct priviledge having been born and raised in Canada. We are a strong, proud and gentle nation, one who cares for our neighbours, enjoys an envious standard of living and can wonder about the beauty that surrounds us in every corner of our great country. I hope you all enjoy a wonderful celebration with family and friends as we celebrate the 143rd birthday of our nation. And, for those of you in the U.S., Happy 4th of July!
Relatively speaking, the personal computer is young, as is the Smartphone and social media tools. In many ways, technology like this has changed the way we work and I don’t doubt that you’ve had moments when you thought how you managed without it. What hasn’t changed, however, is the underlying importance of the interaction these tools facilitate, the conversations that they create and the business and personal relationships that are fostered. From the technology-based world and the face-to-face personal arena, our feature articles this quarter look at two different, yet extremely valuable, ways to get the important business conversations started and keep them going. We hope you enjoy reading what our feature writers have put together and find value in the advice. Enjoy! See you (virtually, of course) next time, P.S. Remember to bookmark the CVAN website: www.canadianva.net.
A Note from CVAN Owner, Pam Ivey Have you visited the CVAN site lately? There have been a lot of changes - in our look and in the way the site functions, and I hope you'll agree, it's a nice facelift! We've switched over to a WordPress blogsite, with Wishlist Member, and I'm delighted with the results. I'd love to hear what you think! You know, you only get out of your membership what you put in, so participate! Join in conversations, suggest tools and resources you'd like to see made available, and even step up to the plate and lead one of our CVAN Continuous Learning Teleseminars in an area you have passion and expertise! Contact me if you'd like to do so and I'll make sure you get in the lineup. We're still doing a little housekeeping so please do check the site. You should have received new login details to access the member's area. If you haven't, please send a note to admin@canadianva.net and we'll make sure we get that information to you.
Get Noticed!
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Feature Articles from our Resident Writers Twitter management tool – Hootsuite
1. Web-based application 2. Personalize your view with tabs 3. Connect to multiple sites 4. Keyword tracking 5. Schedule a tweet
Benefits of joining a local virtual assistant networking group Virtual assistance may be an ideal career choice if you have what it takes to be your own boss and the desire to have the freedom and flexibility of working from home. The demand for virtual assistants is growing rapidly, as the profession becomes more widely known and as technological advances make it practical to work with clients located anywhere in the world. Although working from home offers many perks, it is not without its downside. Many VAs who are used to working in a busy office setting find that they miss having co-workers around so they can seek advice, discuss ideas and share a laugh once in a while.
Sometimes, however, communicating online just isn't enough, and many VAs find they can learn much more and get to know each other better by meeting in person. Getting together with your industry colleagues provides an opportunity to talk about issues that arise in your day-to-day work, share information and ideas, and provide each other with support and motivation. Furthermore, when you meet on a regular basis, you learn about each other's skills and backgrounds, what type of work the other members like to do, and so on. When you form a personal relationship with someone, you can decide whether they're someone you'd be comfortable partnering with on projects or referring clients or subcontracting work to when someone needs a service you don't provide. Even though you work from your own home office, many businesses prefer to work with someone local so they can easily deliver paperwork or meet in person from time to time. Many local VA networking groups have a website which includes a member directory and/or an RFP system to help you attract new clients in your area. There are local virtual assistant networking groups all over the world, so if you don't belong to one already, find out if there's one in your area. If not, why not start one yourself? About the author
Harmonized Sales Tax: What Does It Mean for VAs? Today, July 1, 2010, Ontario introduces the Harmonized Sales Tax, or HST. And guess what folks, we're affected too. Instead of charging just 5% GST on our services, we now must charge 13% HST. (And darn it, didn't I forget to fill up the car yesterday!) McGuinty, in his infinite wisdom, has decided that combining the 8% Ontario provincial sales tax (PST), and the 5% goods and services tax into a harmonized 13% HST, will create jobs, reduce the cost of doing business in Ontario, and make us happier shoppers. Well, like it or not, and it would be surprising to hear from anyone that does, it's here and we need to understand our responsibilites as small service business owners This information is taken from the Ontario Government website: (http://www.rev.gov.on.ca/en/taxchange/needtoknow.html) The move to HST means you will now only deal with one set of forms, one payment and one point of contact for audits, appeals and taxpayer services. This checklist is a general guide of what you need to know as the July 1, 2010 implementation date approaches.
Congratulations to our very own CVAN members, Karen Bowman and Bonnie Taylor-Wachowicz who were featured in an excellent article in the Ottawa Citizen on June 30th, titled, "The Virtual Answer: Being an assistant from afar provides a flexible option" Great article ladies! Read the story online.
If you or one of your VA colleagues has cause for celebration – an anniversary, a recent success – please drop us a line so we can share it with everyone. Contact the Editor at editor@canadianva.net and we’ll put it in the next newsletter. We’ll look forward to hearing from you!
Guest Writer Ready, Set, Reinvent
In business, reinvention is what helps you stand out against the competition. My hope is that the creative side of reinvention excites you as it does me. I need to reinvent to keep me interested. If I didn't get to reinvent my companies, I would be completely bored with them and they would not be profitable at all. Here are a few areas (and time frames) you should consider as avenues of ongoing reinvention. Remember that there is less competition at the top and you always want to lead.
Over the last 10 years, I have literally created hundreds of new promotions, reinvented my websites at least a few dozen times, updated my information products at least once a year, and reinvented my personal brand a few dozen times, too. My customers have always responded with enthusiasm and each time we upleveled our companies in some way, we always increased our revenues. Simply put, your customers want to see you invest time and money in reinventing or updating your solutions in order to continually invest in you to solve their problems. Are you a reinventor? When I reflect back on my life, I realize that reinvention has always been exciting to me and I believe is one of the reasons I have been so successful. However, early on, when I was jumping from one entrepreneurial adventure to another, I felt more like a failure than someone who was reinventing. For a few months each, I sold Avon and then Discovery Toys. As a single mom, I even started my own very profitable in-home daycare called, SMILES Learning Center. But my heart wasn't in it and I kept finding myself back in start-up again and again in new businesses. Sound familiar, anyone? Now, I get it, that reinvention is in my DNA. So, once you find a smart business model like I did, stay in that business model and pour all of your reinvention energy into that one business. That is how you achieve success. Other hints of my "branding reinvention DNA" go as far back as first grade when I changed the pronunciation of my name to "Sher-ee" instead of "Sheri" (which is how it is still spelled today). My mom moved us a lot and when we moved to my new school, I just decided that when I enrolled again, I would tell them to pronounce my name a different way. It worked! And my mother, who was always in the middle of her bipolar chaos, just went along with it. Talk about early reinvention. I must have known intuitively that Sheri Lynn Keys just didn't work for me. Earlier this year, my inner circle client, Daria Boissonnas, e-mailed me and told me some interesting trivia about the way I pronounce my name now. She said it is also like the Hindu girl's name "Shri" (pronounced "Sher-ee"), meaning luminous beauty. And it can also mean Lakshmi, the Hindu goddess of wealth, light, wisdom, and fortune, as well as luck, beauty, and fertility. So, because of the uniquely beautiful way I pronounced my name, it means: wisdom, luminous beauty, light, wealth, fortune, luck, and fertility. Yep, that sounds like me! I often wonder what if? What if I had never been so bold at six years old to reinvent myself? Maybe my whole life would have turned out completely differently had I never literally changed the meaning of my name. Sheri McConnell is the CEO of Sheri McConnell Companies, Inc. and the president and founder of two global organizations, the Smart Women's Institute of Entrepreneurial Learning (formerly the National Assn of Women Writers-2001) and the Global Institute of Associations-GIA. You can visit Sheri, access her free article archive, and grab lots of free stuff at http://www.smartwomeninstitute.com or http://www.giaconnect.com. Sheri lives in San Antonio, Texas with her husband, their four children, a weenie dog, and three hermit crabs.
Tools For Your VA Biz In an effort to cut costs, I've come across a few terrific f-r-e-e tools that I'd like to share. I hope they can help you in your business too! (no affiliate links are imbedded here - just sharin'!):
For letters to the Editor and article submissions, please submit either in a Word-compatible document or in the body of an email. Send an email to editor@canadianva.net
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Twitter has been around since 2006, but it’s still a big anomaly to some entrepreneurs – which is why social media virtual assistants are in big demand. Many clients are looking to their VA's for insight and coaching on how to streamline their Twitter activities. When asked which Twitter system I recommend, I always reply "why, Hootsuite" (http://www.hootsuite.com), of course.
Social networks and internet-based virtual assistant groups such as the Canadian Virtual Assistant Network play an important role in filling this void. Whenever you get stuck with a technical problem or need to tell someone about something terrible (or wonderful) that happened in your business, these groups provide access to a large group of online colleagues – and that's great! Many business relationships and even friendships have emerged from this type of interaction.
Reinvention. To remake or redo completely. Are you ready to pour your heart and soul into a business and then go back to the drawing board repeatedly? In my experience, you will need to reinvent your personal and business image, your website brand, your infoproducts and much more, every few years.
