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Ideas for my VA

by Seatbelt99
16 replies
I've got a full time VA from the Philippians who I am extremely happy with.

I have him doing a number of things but for the past few months his primary tasks were writing posts for BuildMyRank (both for some of my sites and for some customers of mine). Well, BMR is dead now so that's freeing up a lot of his time.

I really don't want to screw him over and have to drop him back down to part time, so I'm looking for things to have him do.

Any ideas or suggestions would be great. Ideally I'd like to give him things he can do to help generate money from my sites directly but if you have ideas which I can sell and then have him complete the tasks that's fine too.

His skills:
He's an alright English writer (better than most I've seen but still not perfect by any stretch)

He's a hard worker

He can learn to do just about any task I've given him so far



Thanks!
#ideas
  • Profile picture of the author JOSourcing
    Banned
    The first thing that struck me as odd is your inclination to "give him things to do." That shouldn't be a goal of outsourcing. But if you must, there are tons of tasks available:

     Sales and Marketing (such as telemarketing, public relations, market research, direct marketing, advertising, sales representation, etc.)
     Services (such as customer support, on-site services, professional services, etc.)
     Administration (such as payroll, bookkeeping, human resources, data entry, collections, answering services, word processing, etc.)
     Professional (such as legal work, tax preparation, engineering, etc.)
     Management (such as project management, recruiting, etc.)
     Operations (such as software manufacturing, inventory management, online distribution, remote site repair, etc.)
     Consultancy (such as planning, process management, certification, etc.)

    HTH
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    • Profile picture of the author Seatbelt99
      Originally Posted by JOSourcing View Post

      The first thing that struck me as odd is your inclination to "give him things to do." That shouldn't be a goal of outsourcing. But if you must, there are tons of tasks available:

       Sales and Marketing (such as telemarketing, public relations, market research, direct marketing, advertising, sales representation, etc.)
       Services (such as customer support, on-site services, professional services, etc.)
       Administration (such as payroll, bookkeeping, human resources, data entry, collections, answering services, word processing, etc.)
       Professional (such as legal work, tax preparation, engineering, etc.)
       Management (such as project management, recruiting, etc.)
       Operations (such as software manufacturing, inventory management, online distribution, remote site repair, etc.)
       Consultancy (such as planning, process management, certification, etc.)

      HTH

      Thanks for the ideas. What should be the goal of outsourcing?

      Regarding most of your ideas, however, I'm just one person trying to make money online. I am not making huge amounts yet (roughly $500 income weekly) and don't have anything for sales/marketing, no customer support, no payroll or book keeping or legal work or anything like that.

      Thanks
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      • Profile picture of the author JOSourcing
        Banned
        Originally Posted by Seatbelt99 View Post

        Thanks for the ideas. What should be the goal of outsourcing?
        It could be cost savings, improved product/service quality, access to 3rd party knowledge/talent, reduced production time, etc.

        All of your outsourcing goals (as described above) should correlate with your business goals.
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  • Profile picture of the author Matthew NY
    You could have him/her do backlinking or writing and sell the work on Fiverr. When things slow down I give my VA things like that to do.
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    • Profile picture of the author Seatbelt99
      Originally Posted by Matthew NY View Post

      You could have him/her do backlinking or writing and sell the work on Fiverr. When things slow down I give my VA things like that to do.
      Thanks. I have him do some general writing on fiverr, both articles for people to use and also he answers questions on Yahoo Answers and posts on forums.

      I'm interested in expanding to some sort of link building but I am not an expert in this area myself so I'm not exactly sure how to train him in it. Any suggestions here?
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      • Profile picture of the author Matthew NY
        Originally Posted by Seatbelt99 View Post

        Thanks. I have him do some general writing on fiverr, both articles for people to use and also he answers questions on Yahoo Answers and posts on forums.

        I'm interested in expanding to some sort of link building but I am not an expert in this area myself so I'm not exactly sure how to train him in it. Any suggestions here?
        Many VA's already know how to do this. If yours does not, just google "Manual Backlinking" and scrape some relevant lists. Then explain to your VA that you need them to write mini-blog comments, social bookmarks, etc. for various websites that give you gigs on Fiverr.
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    • Profile picture of the author JeanneLynn
      Originally Posted by Matthew NY View Post

      You could have him/her do backlinking or writing and sell the work on Fiverr. When things slow down I give my VA things like that to do.
      The problem with that is the Fiverr seller may be listed as a US seller and people who buy the articles may think they're being written by a Native English speaker. It's always disappointing for me when I receive an article and you can tell it's written by someone with poor English and grammar (especially since I purposely picked a US seller to avoid this).

      I know that you can't expect much for $5 an article, but there should be a disclaimer in the gig that the articles are outsourced to the Philippines. I doubt it would hurt business because most people don't care about that and outsource themselves. However, some people like me, only want native English speakers to write their articles.
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  • Profile picture of the author andynathan
    I would have to agree that you should not keep someone busy just to keep them busy. Think about how you can expand the $500 per week you are making now. What activities would enhance this?


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  • Profile picture of the author Noel Cunningham
    If you create your own info products you could train him in a few different tasks and drive traffic to your squeeze pages?? If he builds you a list and you make some sales on the backend then you'll be quite happy with him...

    There's millions of tasks to get done in IM so sit back and brainstorm for a bit - no doubt you'll have him working like a trojan before long!!

    - Noel.
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  • Profile picture of the author celente
    first of all work out which traffic sources are converting best for you, and then get your VA to do that work, and teach them how to do it properly and then let them at it.

    That is what we do, and it brings in sales without us doing much work at all.

    Good luck, and use videos to help train your VA's doing that helped increase our profits big time.
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  • Profile picture of the author Resale Rights Ninja
    Have you thought about sharing your V/A? Split his time and cost between yourself and someone else?
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  • Profile picture of the author SixAM
    Nice thread and i am getting some ideas here :-)
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  • Profile picture of the author jessiepadgal
    Very useful tips about outsourcing here. I am in the hiring process for a VA and training process for my full-time writer, and this has given me a lot of insight into what to do.
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  • Profile picture of the author JeanneLynn
    You should give him a list of blogs to comment manually on. If he makes nice thoughtful comments, they'll probably be approved.

    I also like the idea of "sharing" your VA. Maybe someone on the board needs a VA, but doesn't want one full-time. It's a pain to try to find a good worker. I'm sure someone would really appreciate having a skilled VA to help them out.
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  • Profile picture of the author nicolelwriting
    I think that many on this thread have provided loads of helpful information and have even given me ideas for when it is time for me to hire a VA to help with me with my business.

    I think that the top thing you should use your VA for promotional related services such as advertising your business, posting comments on blogs, forums, and other social media sites.
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