The Local Women in Business Market of Brooklyn, NY 11234 is Now Connected to WomenPartner.org.

WomenPartner.org has successfully laid the foundation for its global hyper-local business news platform to facilitate lucrative cross marketing partnerships between women around the globe. As part of phase two of its development, WomenPartner.org plans to answer to the question “How do I market my company to businesswomen in Atlanta, Paris, Sydney, and every other major metropolitan area around the globe using the local resources already in place instead of reinventing the wheel?” by molding its new members into spokeswomen to provide business intelligence about their local women in business market.

Businesswoman Ellen Levinas of Virtual Assistant Business Solutions is now working with WomenPartner.org to develop a snapshot of how to market to businesswomen in the Brooklyn, NY 11234 zip code, part of the part of the New York-Northern New Jersey-Long Island, NY-NJ-PA MSA, while she plants the seeds of collaborative business relationships. As of 2012, the NY metropolitan area had the largest number of women-owned firms. New York’s women in business market in 2012 had an estimated 674,200 businesswomen and generated $93,813,000 in revenue.

As spokeswoman, Levinas will lay the foundation for WomenPartner.org’s “Main Street Marketing to Women Initiative” to spark collaborative business relationships between virtual businesswomen, professional women and the women owned Main Street companies located in the New York metro area by showing them how them to cluster so they can form mutually beneficial cross marketing partnerships to increase their profits while improving their local economies.

Levinas will make it possible for businesswomen around the globe to research Brooklyn, NY 11234 and its women’s business market to find out who just opened a business; discover women owned brick & mortar companies open to cross marketing; access business programs in place to help women; uncover local marketing resources in place to reach the women in business market; identify who the influential business and professional women are; learn about the “must attend” local events to position their company in front of the women’s business market; and more.

“I see WomenPartner.org as a wonderful resource for any woman in business to utilize, however, there is more to it than just that. The amount of effort and work put into just this site alone, with so many wonderful resources was enough to tell me that this will become a super site for all women in business, from all walks of life and businesses. I signed up because I believe that there is power in numbers, and women in business has become very large in number, but I also wanted to become a resource in of itself, and to help and collaborate with local women.

I think that everyone needs some sort of help to some degree. Why not collaborate, Network, and share, After-all this is the social age, what better way to help each other than this. With costs sky rocketing everywhere, this might just be the perfect solution for more than just gaining new leads… We can Share advertising costs, work together on different projects, and so much more, it just makes sense.” — Ellen Levinas

WomenPartner.org is conducting a drive to find women in North America, South America, Asia, Africa, Australia, and Europe to get involved and represent their city’s women in business market. Over 5,000 cities around the globe will be showcased on WomenPartner.org.

For More Info About Ellen Levinas

WomenPartner.org Profile
www.vabizsolutions.com
Ellen@vabizsolutions.com
917-757-0913

Welcome to Virtual Assistant Business Solutions-MVA Certified - Certified Virtual Assistant Solutions for all of Your Business Needs at "OUR" Fingertips!

It’s both an honor and priviledge to have been awarded  for my “Exceptional Contribution” as Webmaster and Consultant for the Superintendents Technical Association of New York City!  If you’re seeking out educational resources in the Resident Manager, Superintendent, Building Maintenance areas, as well as Porters, handy-persons and more, then this is the place to get the absolute very best.   STA has all the tools and resources that you are looking for, if you are interested in this area, or need to re-certify, or get certified for the Certificate of Fitness and much more!   A special thank you goes out to Mr. Peter Grech, Director of Education and its Board Members.

See YOU at the Top!

Ellen Levinas, MVA, CMA

Welcome to Virtual Assistant Business Solutions-MVA Certified - Certified Virtual Assistant Solutions for all of Your Business Needs at "OUR" Fingertips!

Each spokeswoman page on WomenPartner.org  has a section for 3 directory listings.  If you would like to sponsor / partner with a spokeswoman (like me) it is $50 per listing so please let me know ASAP.  It’s a great way to get exposure on WomenPartner.org at a major discount.  I am a Spokeswoman and have 3 directory listings available – Through me you can get a listing at a discounted rate as above, $50.00 with major exposure…Contact me if you are interested! 

See YOU at the Top!

Ellen Levinas, MVA, CMA

Welcome to Virtual Assistant Business Solutions-MVA Certified - Certified Virtual Assistant Solutions for all of Your Business Needs at "OUR" Fingertips!

Keynote speaker Jim Feldman advises: Step 1. Accept shift.  Step 2. Make shift happen.

(NewsUSA) – In business, there is a new mantra — “Shift happens.” For example, what would you do with a railroad boxcar full of Chef

Boyardee pasta sauce?

“You just spent $5,000, which you did not have, to purchase something you did not need, in a boxcar you could not move. And you think you have problems?” recounts Jim Feldman, keynote speaker, ongoing entrepreneur and author of “Shift Happens: No Job, No Money, Now What?”

This is one of many unpredictable “You did what?” kinds of scenarios you can expect from the book by Feldman, a person who turned his first profit at the tender age of seven, realizing that critical thinking and problem solving weren’t just for grade school.

“One of the first things I tell an audience at my speaking engagements is, if you want off-the-shelf training, I’m not your guy. I’m going to shake things up and make you uncomfortable,” says Feldman.

Feldman believes this same concept of pushing the envelope, overcoming challenges and embracing reinvention also applies to personal growth — and this is reflected in his book.

“This book is written as a kick-starter, a mind-stretcher, a sweaty palms and high colonic for your business and personal life. It is not for the faint of heart or those who won’t step out of their comfort zones or get off of their pity porches,” Feldman writes early on, noting that his no-nonsense approach may have you cursing him one page and admiring him the next.

Regardless, you’ll step out of the narrow box telling you what you think you should do, and you’ll grow. Take this kick-in-the-butt advice for example:

* Shift your attitude. Stop whining. Stop complaining. Stop making excuses. Stop “should-ing.”

* Let go of uncertainty. Fear makes for lousy decisions.

* Act like a child. That means stop doing what you don’t like, and make yourself happy.

* Constantly re-evaluate relationships, priorities and goals.

Feldman likens his book to buying a hammer at a hardware store; he’ll give you the tools, but what you do about it is up to you.

Business moguls like James Dyson and Steve Jobs make change look easy. Dyson took the bag out of the vacuum and the blade out of the fan, creating two markets that can’t live without Dyson as a brand or product. Jobs founded a tech dynasty on sheer foresight. Feldman knows that change can be as hard as a box of nails. But he makes it accessible.

Remember the boxcar of pasta sauce? Feldman sold it back to the manufacturer for eight times his investment. Learn more about Feldman at www.shifthappens.com, or find him on Facebook and Twitter.

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Is the thought of writing a Press Release or paying for one making you sick?  Don’t worry, you’re not alone!  If writing is not your strong suit then you’ve found your path to an easier road ahead!

Introducing:

The Ultimate Press Release Guide and Tracker

All the Tools You Will Ever Need
To Get Your Press Releases Out to the Masses -
Completely for FREE!

*How to Write a Press Release
*What a Press Release can do for Your Business
*Where to Send Press Releases

Bonus 1: 45 Press Release venues that you can send
your Press Release to completely for free!
Bonus 2: A Press Release template to assist you in
creating an A+ PR!
Bonus 3: An editable preformatted Excel template to
track your press releases, dates, titles and more! This tool is a must have!

Also Included:

· Editable Press Release Template with
descriptions in each paragraph to help you along
· Tips and Information that you need to know

Brought to you by: Ellen Levinas, MVA, CMA
Certified Master Virtual Assistant & Marketing
Advisor

Grab yours today in our new business tool shop!

Welcome to Virtual Assistant Business Solutions-MVA Certified - Certified Virtual Assistant Solutions for all of Your Business Needs at "OUR" Fingertips!

A pretty fab article on the growth of remote contractors, which of course includes Virtual Assistants.  Back in 2000/2001 when I went back to college to get my BS degree I chose the newest degree out there; which was, business/e-business.  At the time however, remote contractors of any kind was fairly new, but I saw the immense potential in this new found trend.  Personally I was always fascinated with anything computer related, so I took a leap of faith not exactly knowing what would come out of it other than my own determination to get my degree.  I am glad that my choices were the right ones for me.   It took some time, but as you can see this is no longer a trend, but more of a way to work and hire these days.  Even if you are not on oDesk or Elance one can still work remotely no doubt, doing numerous tasks and jobs, but as with anything else nothing will come to you on a silver platter.  You have to want it badly enough, be self-motivated, and persistent!  Catch the wave I say!  Take your leap of faith and stick with it!

See YOU at the Top!

Ellen Levinas, MVA, CMA

As more employers embrace telecommuting, marketplaces that connect them with remote freelance workers are taking off.

These sites allow businesses to post projects that can be completed away from an office in a database that workers can browse. They’re different from crowdsourcing sites such asMechanical Turk that help businesses hire anonymous workers for often-mindless tasks. Rather, jobs listed on them take significant time to complete and typically require professional skills such as programming, graphic design or writing.

One such site, oDesk, announced on Thursday that it has doubled its gross revenue every year since 2007. It says more than 120,000 new freelance jobs are posted on its platform each month. Meanwhile, its competitorElance tells Mashable it has experienced more than 100% year-over-year growth in the number of businesses that have posted a job on its site and that it posted about 650,000 new jobs on its site in 2011. Both companies say about 1.5 million contractors have registered for their sites.

“We have reached a tipping point where the early adopters have convinced everyone else that this is the way to go,” Elance CEO Fabio Rosati says. “Our first quarter this year will be the fastest growth we’ve had in our company’s history.”

 

Perhaps encouraged by studies that suggest workers who telecommute are actually more productive in some situations (if not over-worked), more companies do seem to be getting comfortable with the idea of hiring outside of their geographic area. Elance and oDesk’s customers include well-known companies such as Google, Microsoft, Dell, Cisco, HP and AOL.

But jobs on both platforms still trend toward programming, and in a survey of 7,000 oDesk clients, 62% of them categorized themselves as “early adopters.”

 

“If you think about ecommerce, it took 15 years for the market to mature to the point where people feel comfortable buying a big-screen TV online,” oDesk CEO Gary Swart tells Mashable. “E-work is so similar … in the early days, maybe it’s like [when ecommerce was mainly used to buy] Beanie Babies and Pez dispensers, but as the market matures and gets to the point where people are comfortable hiring online, we think it’s as big as ecommerce, or bigger.”

Swart points to three trends that have helped remote work take off over the past few years: better Internet tools, a bad economy that requires companies to produce more with fewer resources and worker expectations.

“Contractors are not working this way because they have to,” he says, “they’re working this way by choice. They want the freedom.”

Rosati says Elance attempted to launch a marketplace for remote workers in 1999 — before LinkedIn or Skype existed. Without the right environment, that project flopped, and the company didn’t revive the concept again until 2007. It’s done $500 million in transactions (of which it takes a 6.75% to 8.75% fee) since. The company estimates that by 2020, one in three workers will be working online.

Venture capitalists seem to agree with the positive assessment of the space. oDesk announced on Thursday it has raised a $15 million Series D round of funding, bringing its total money raised to $44 million. Elance announced a $16 million round in January.

Source: http://mashable.com/2012/03/22/odesk-elance-remote-contractors/

Welcome to Virtual Assistant Business Solutions-MVA Certified - Certified Virtual Assistant Solutions for all of Your Business Needs at "OUR" Fingertips!

Do you run a membership site or business? Perhaps you run or are a part of an affiliate team. Draw attention to your prospective new members by placing a customized membership card graphic on your site! Or even do one better, have your team put a membership card on their sites, signature tags, or wherever you want it to go! Example: If I ran a membership site of my own, I would email members of my team a membership card with their name on it and then they could hyperlink it to the affiliate site they’d want other’s to go to. Same thing can be done for signature tags. A fabulous way to get noticed and draw attention! Why settle for just a link or just a banner when you can have something extraordinary!  Remember they can also be free passes, free membership, or anything that you would like it to be or read.

You new membership card/cards will be emailed to you in Jpeg format.

Feel free to email me if you have any questions.

Welcome to Virtual Assistant Business Solutions-MVA Certified - Certified Virtual Assistant Solutions for all of Your Business Needs at "OUR" Fingertips!

Here is something that you just don’t want to miss!  100′s of free e-books on social media and more!

Giveaway Dates:
Thursday February 23rd 2012 @ 10:00:00 AM EST
To
Monday March 12th 2012 @ 10:00:00 AM EDT SO HURRY! 

JUST CLICK ON THE BANNER BELOW TO TAKE YOU THERE!

Welcome to Virtual Assistant Business Solutions-MVA Certified - Certified Virtual Assistant Solutions for all of Your Business Needs at "OUR" Fingertips!

Get The Fundamentals Right

To succeed in business on the Internet, or in the off-line world, requires an understanding of the fundamentals of business and using them to your advantage. In this article, I will outline what I consider the fundamentals of business success are.

Believe in Your Product or Service

First, you need to believe in your product or service. If you don’t believe in it, you will have a great deal of difficulty selling your product or service to other people. You also need to have confidence in your ability to provide and promote your product or service. An old saying sums this up best by stating: “All things are possible to he who believes”.

Aptitude for the Business

Secondly, you need to have an aptitude for the business. You will also need the motivation to acquire at the very least basic skills and experience before you start your business. If you were to set yourself up as a web designer but did not have any skills or training in this area, then you will almost certainly fail. However, if you are employed as a bookkeeper and you enjoy the job, then setting up your own bookkeeping service would be a sensible choice with a greater chance of success.

Be Responsible

Thirdly, you need to be responsible to your customers. This is achieved by only making commitments you can keep and by not engaging in misleading or dishonest advertising. If you want to build long-term success in your business, then you need to develop long-term satisfied customers. When their needs are being satisfied, customers are at their happiest.

Aim for High Quality

The next principle is that you need to have a high quality product or service. This will be your best advertisement. Inferior quality products usually generate poor customer satisfaction. A dissatisfied customer can be very dangerous for your business. Usually they tell on average about fourteen other people who will then be disinclined to buy your product or service based on the experience of that one dissatisfied person. Therefore, always aim for a top quality product or service.

Make a Profit

However, it is not enough to have a top quality product or service. You also need to have a product or service that will generate enough income to cover all your business expenses and give you a satisfactory wage. A friend of mine once said that business is only about two things: satisfying customers and making a profit. A simple statement but very true.

Sufficient Start-up Capital

You also need to have access to enough cash to set up and run your business, and enough income to meet your private expenses during the start-up phase. A major problem with many home and small businesses is that they fail to have enough money available to ensure their success. There is nothing more discouraging than having a great idea, getting it started on a shoestring, not being able to expand due to cash shortages and seeing a competitor come along and steal your market.

Start Small

Another fundamental principle of home business success is that you start small. This will enable you to minimize your overheads until you are confident of your success in the marketplace. For many of you, this would mean starting part-time while retaining your full-time income source. When you can, expand your business into a full-time venture. This is a great way of minimizing the risk of failure.

Be Well Organized

Successful businesses are well organized. They have a system for keeping track of expenditure and earnings. This level of organization in your business will help to ensure that you are providing your customers or clients with a top quality product or service. It will also ensure that you have enough information available to maximize your profitability and to satisfy your legal requirements for record keeping.

Be Prepared

Preparation is another key ingredient in your business success. This preparation will include being aware of the regulations and laws affecting small and home business. Armed with this knowledge, you should not have any nasty surprises from unintentional violations of the law.

Have a Business Plan

Finally, successful businesses have developed a comprehensive business plan. This is their road map to success. It tells them where they are going and how they are going to get there. There are a number of good resources about business planning on the Internet. Here are some:

www.bplans.com

www.businesstown.com/planning/creating.asp

www.bizplanit.com/vplan.htm

Conclusion

It has been said that genius is one percent inspiration and ninety-nine percent perspiration. The same can be said about business success. Without having the fundamentals in place, a great business idea will usually fail. Set yourself up for success by considering each of the points raised in this article.

Author Bio

Article by Kevin Sinclair, CPA, of Personal & Business Success Resources. Visit his website at www.business.ksinclair.com.

Article Source: http://www.ArticleGeek.com – Free Website Content

Welcome to Virtual Assistant Business Solutions-MVA Certified - Certified Virtual Assistant Solutions for all of Your Business Needs at "OUR" Fingertips!

By SARAH E. NEEDLEMAN And PUI-WING TAM

If you haven’t heard of Pinterest, you likely will soon.

Traffic to the website—which lets users create online scrapbooks to share images of projects or coveted products—has grown tenfold over the past six months. In January, the number of visitors on Pinterest.com was almost a third of that on Twitter.com.

Pinterest has found favor with e-commerce retailers, many of which have added its “Pin it” button to their websites, but also become the subject of blogosphere chatter over use of affiliate marketing. Sarah Needleman has details on The News Hub.

There is one problem: The 16-person Palo Alto, Calif., start-up isn’t sure how it is going to make money.

“Pinterest’s monetization strategy isn’t in the oven and it’s not even off the baking table,” said Jeremy Levine, a board member of Pinterest and a venture capitalist at Bessemer Venture Partners. “We have one hundred ideas but no execution as of yet.”

Pinterest’s situation isn’t unusual for an Internet start-up; some may even call it cliché. After watching the growth of Facebook Inc. and Twitter—both of which grew quickly at first without having a business model—Pinterest co-founder Ben Silbermann said he is following the same path and will worry about details later.

“My hope is that if we build a service that a lot of people use to plan and discover things, that will be really valuable,” said the 29-year-old entrepreneur, a former Google Inc. employee.

An Introduction to Pinterest

 

Mr. Silbermann co-founded Cold Brew Labs Inc. in 2008 and launched Pinterest, the company’s only product, the following year. It has raised $37.5 million from Silicon Valley angel investors including Yelp Inc. Chief Executive Jeremy Stoppelman and top venture firms such as Bessemer and Andreessen Horowitz.

The closely held company wouldn’t disclose financial figures, but isn’t yet making much revenue and is unprofitable. Pinterest is currently valued at around $200 million, according to a person familiar with the matter.

The prospect of making money off of social-networking sites, which are usually free to users, has been a challenge. The options for Pinterest suggested by analysts so far, which center around selling targeted advertising and data on users’ interests, aren’t terribly original and run the risk of alienating users—problems faced by bigger social-networking sites such as Facebook.

But people are flocking to the site. Pinterest last month attracted more than 11 million unique visitors, more than double the 4.9 million who visited the site in November, according to comScore. Those who visited spent nearly 100 minutes on the site in January, compared with 19 minutes on professional social-networking site LinkedIn, it said.

“I haven’t seen another stand-alone site that has reached 10 million visitors faster,” said comScore analyst Andrew Lipsman.

The research firm said roughly 68% of Pinterest’s users are women and many are in the Midwest. Users must be invited to join.

Retailers are looking to piggyback off its popularity. Bergdorf Goodman, a unit of Neiman Marcus Group Inc., has begun actively trying to develop a following for its high-end clothing and accessories on Pinterest, and Lands’ End Canvas, an extension of Lands’ End, part of Sears Holdings Corp., last month added a widget to its product pages, making it easier for browsers to immediately pin, or repost, images of the looks they like to their Pinterest profiles.

Etsy.com, an online crafts marketplace with 50,600 Pinterest followers, is using Pinterest’s price display feature. That means that when Pinterest users “pin” say, an Etsy chair on a board for their followers to see, the image of the chair will automatically include the chair’s title, and a banner showing the price.

It has also been a boon for some small businesses. “Our traffic converts to sales,” said Amy Squires, co-founder of The Wedding Chicks LLC, which posted about $540,000 in revenue last year, up from $340,000 in 2010. The four-year-old online retailer of wedding-party gifts, which joined Pinterest last summer, said Pinterest now brings in more than double as many monthly visitors to its website than Facebook and Twitter.

Warby Parker Inc., an eyewear brand sold online, has seen the number of visitors to its website coming directly from Pinterest quadruple over the past four months, according to Warby’s co-CEO, Neil Blumenthal. Pinterest allows us to market the company’s products “in an organic and authentic way,” he said.

Like other websites with user-generated content such as Google’s YouTube, Pinterest has procedures in place to deal with the posting of copyrighted images and other material, where content owners can report a violation and have the content taken down. Pinterest said copyright problems “haven’t been a significant issue so far.”

In recent days, Pinterest has attracted some online ire for not disclosing the use of what is known as affiliate marketing, a prevalent form of online advertising that companies such as Amazon.com Inc. also use. Affiliate marketing lets merchants place links to their Web stores on related sites in return for giving up a percentage of every sale that results from those links.

However, affiliate marketing isn’t a major part of Pinterest’s business model right now, according to the company and its venture capitalists.

Another concern raised by some: Pinterest’s terms of use include broad language giving it the right to “sell” and “modify” its member content, creating the potential for future privacy issues.

So far that hasn’t stopped UncommonGoods LLC, an online gift retailer in Brooklyn, N.Y. UncommonGoods began using Pinterest in October after noticing traffic coming to its website from the social network, according to David Bolotsky, its founder.

In recent weeks, traffic from Pinterest to the UncommonGoods website has begun approaching and even rivaling traffic that comes from Facebook, Mr. Bolotsky said. “The overlap between Pinterest users and our customers is just perfect,” he said. Near logos on its website linking to the retailer’s Twitter and Facebook pages, the company recently added a new icon.

“Follow me on Pinterest,” it reads.

Source:  http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204792404577225124053638952.html?mod=dist_smartbrief

So the question is…Have YOU been pinned?

Welcome to Virtual Assistant Business Solutions-MVA Certified - Certified Virtual Assistant Solutions for all of Your Business Needs at "OUR" Fingertips!

Have a free report to giveaway?  A free E-book?  Paid E-books?  Whatever you are giving away or selling, remember that PRESENTATION MAKES THE SALE!   We can create customized E-book, reports, disc and box covers just for you!  Here are a few more designs, but they are not limited to just these!  Just tell us what you need!

SPECIAL PROMO!  3 COVERS FOR JUST $10.00!

Welcome to Virtual Assistant Business Solutions-MVA Certified - Certified Virtual Assistant Solutions for all of Your Business Needs at "OUR" Fingertips!

(NewsUSA) – No matter your profession, you must act the salesperson. When you’re in a meeting, you’re selling your ideas. If you’re teaching, you’re selling concepts. At a job interview, you’re selling yourself.

At its core, selling — or the ability to persuade a group towards your point of view — is an essential skill in both life and business. In his latest book, “Pink Slip Proof: How to Control All Future Paychecks,” Paul J. Meyer says that all master salespeople possess certain traits in common. “When you look closely, it’s no secret how they arrived at their present income and position.”

Meyer suggests that Americans looking to become better salespeople should develop five basic abilities:

1. Become persuasive and convincing. All great leaders have the ability to convey their visions. Skilled salespeople use stories, dreams, color and humor to sway opinions.

2. Focus on service. It doesn’t matter if you’re a barista, an accountant or a salesperson — you can’t succeed if people don’t want to work with you. All master salespeople act upon a variation of the Golden Rule, “Serve others as you would like to be served.” Create one happy customer, and you’ll likely find more through referrals and word-of-mouth advertising.

3. Be honest and dependable. If you don’t build trust, you’ll close more doors than you open. No one wants to work with someone who’s a known two-face. Be honest, responsible and dependable in all of your dealings.

4. Learn to self-motivate. No matter their circumstances, master salespeople stay confident and focused on their goals. “Self motivation requires the development of inner strength, conscious willpower, overwhelming desire and the determination to reach any goal you personally want to achieve,” says Meyer.

5. Love people. You need to care about your clients and co-workers to build the relationships that lead to success. Think about the little things that concern others, not just the big problems that need to be addressed. “The best salespeople always care about their clients,” says Meyer. “They genuinely want to leave them better off than they found them.”

To find out more about

Paul J. Meyer or his new book, “Pink Slip Proof: How to Control All Future Paychecks,” visit www.pauljmeyer.com.

Welcome to Virtual Assistant Business Solutions-MVA Certified - Certified Virtual Assistant Solutions for all of Your Business Needs at "OUR" Fingertips!

Have you created an e-book, or software product/ item that is literally just sitting collecting virtual dust?  Then you’ve come to the right place.  Recently I posted about the saying, ” A picture is worth a 1000 words” and so it truly is, even in this instance.   No matter what you are selling, be it clothing, jewelry, or in this situation e-books, etc.,  if it doesn’t look good, it just won’t sell, no matter how good the content is.

Here is an example using food as the item.   You might have the best cut of beef with all the fixings in paper plate looking rather bland, or you can have that same cut of beef in a stunning plate,  with all the fixings properly placed next to each other topped off with a garnish or two looking extremely inviting.   Now which would you chose?  I highly doubt that the poor looking bland meal would get chosen.    The same holds true for selling just about anything, including yourselves!

Since Virtual Assistant Business Solutions is in the business of services and solutions  - this is exactly where we come in.  Let us create customized e-book covers, box covers, and/or disc covers specifically for your items and businesses!    We can create anything from professional covers to cook books if you need it.   Don’t take my word for it, take a  peek…

Drop us an email if you’d like to us to create customized covers for you!  Stay tuned for some more creations coming up!

See YOU at the Top!

Ellen Levinas, MVA, CMA

www.vabizsolutions.com 

Welcome to Virtual Assistant Business Solutions-MVA Certified - Certified Virtual Assistant Solutions for all of Your Business Needs at "OUR" Fingertips!

I am certain that many of you have heard of the new fad these days called Pinterest. However, there is more to Pinterest that meets the “eye” so to speak. They say that a picture is worth a 1000 words and with Pinterest that is so very true!

Information overload is completely upon us and has been for quite some time; however, Pinterest is something completely different in that the photos and images captures the eye and makes you want to view more.   A unique avenue for getting people to follow you,  share your interests, comment, and more.

While Pinterest is really not meant as a promotional tool – in other words the idea is to share interests rather than self-promote,  it is in fact a fabulous tool for any business to utilize.   Pinterest adds a creative perspective to information, creations like crafts, statistics,  and really any product or service that you can think of.  So rather than looking at loads of reports and countless articles, you are looking at a photo or image of something that may interest you, all pointing back to the location that the pin came from.   So for example, if  I pinned a photo to my board, and it came directly from my own Website that is where people might go to, to view it, and other things.    What does that amount to?  Extra traffic naturally combined with potential leads and sales.

Smart marketers will surely use “The Power of the Pin” to their advantage, and what’s not to love?  We all get to share what interests us, while also commenting, making new friends, and viewing fabulous photos and creations.

My advice….Use “The Power of the Pin” wisely,  and you might just be ahead of the game!    Remember…A picture is worth a 1000 words!

I invite you to follow my own boards: http://pinterest.com/ellenlevinas/

Let’s use “The Power of The Pin”

See YOU at the Top!

Ellen Levinas, MVA, CMA

Welcome to Virtual Assistant Business Solutions-MVA Certified - Certified Virtual Assistant Solutions for all of Your Business Needs at "OUR" Fingertips!

Here is a quaint facebook landing page geared towards home-based businesses.   This is not 100%  finished as of yet, but a wonderful start to something BIG!   Entreleader’s tag line is “Hitting a Home Run With Home Based Businesses”  Thus you can see where the batter fits right in!   If you’d like to join The Entreleaders just click here:  Entreleaders and stay tuned for something wonderful!

Welcome to Virtual Assistant Business Solutions-MVA Certified - Certified Virtual Assistant Solutions for all of Your Business Needs at "OUR" Fingertips!

Here are a few snap shots of some of the Facebook business pages that I’ve created for different individuals and businesses!   This particular one below is a Real Estate Business page with all the bells and whistles attached to it.  This page even has one listing in there and when viewed it is like a virtual tour of the exterior and interior of the house!  Pretty cool if I can say so myself!  Along with the business page, I’ve also created a matching large banner where anyone’s profile picture or banner would go,  this in itself is a bit of  ”real estate” that we should all use!   So in combination you have one great looking Facebook business page, attracting new leads and people to fan the page.

Welcome to Virtual Assistant Business Solutions-MVA Certified - Certified Virtual Assistant Solutions for all of Your Business Needs at "OUR" Fingertips!

26 Promising Social Media Stats for Small Businesses

By Phil Mershon
Published November 8, 2011

Is your small business “all in” with social media? New research shows incredible opportunity for small businesses.

Keep reading to discover why social media is changing small business for the better.

Six months ago, I highlighted many benefits of social media for small business, but several new research articles add urgency to this message.

Swiftly Changing Landscape -

A fab post by the social media examiner has prompted me to post it here.  It is just amazing at how we are all hooked to social media, and why it is absolutely working for us!

Social media marketing is a rapidly changing environment, as we all know. But the good news is that your customers are embracing social media as a normal part of their lives. Even the over-50 population is adapting at staggering rates.

The following 26 stats should impress upon you the importance of developing a social media strategy for your business.

#1: There are now more than 800 million active Facebook users, with over 200 million added in 2011. Notice the growth trend traced by Ben Foster.

Facebook is growing rapidly. Which side of the wave are you on?

Nielsen found the following in their 3Q 2011 Social Media Report:

#2: Over 80% of all Americans use a social network.

#3: Americans spend more time on Facebook than any other U.S.website.

#4: Approximately 40% of social media users access their accounts through mobile devices.

#5: Nearly 23% of online time is spent on social networks.

#6: Facebook is the top destination among social networks and blogs:

Nielsen found U.S.users spend nearly 10x more time on Facebook than Twitter or LinkedIn.

#7: Social media users are more active and influential offline:

Social media users are more active offline and have greater influence than their peers (Nielsen).

What Does Facebook Say About its Users?

At Facebook’s recent F8 Developer Conference, Facebook shared the following statistics:

#8: More than half of Facebook users log in every day – that’s more than 400 million people.

#9: The average user has 130 friends and is connected to 80 pages, events and groups.

#10: There are 900 million objects that people interact with (pages, groups, etc…).

#11: Facebook hosts over 7 million apps, and over 20 million apps are downloaded each day.

#12: Around 75% of Facebook users are outside of North America with accounts available in 70 languages.

#13: Comscore released a study earlier this year that showed how business brands that post at least once every day will reach 22% of their fans in a given week.

Comscore shows the impact of consistently posting to Facebook.

How Are People Using Social Media?

Experian recently released their 2011 Social Media Consumer Report. The following trends help paint a picture of how people are using social media.

#14: Experian estimates that 91% of online American adults (approx. 129 million)access some form of social media each month.

#15: And get this: 98% of 18- to 24-year-olds access social accounts monthly.

#16: This confirms their stat that college towns log on to Facebook the most.

#17: The average Facebook user spends 20 minutes on his or her account during each visit.

Note that Facebook users spend nearly twice as much time on the platform as Twitter users. The jury is still out on Google+, as data hasn’t been accumulated to show the effect of the public release.

#18: A majority of Facebook users log in 3-4 times per week.

Notice that Twitter users are nearly as likely to login once per week as they are three to four times per week.

#19: One out of 5 social network users is likely to visit another social site after leaving one.

After visiting a social network, 45% of users will visit another social site, a multimedia site like YouTube or use a search engine.

Small Businesses Moving Toward Social Media

So what are business leaders doing in light of the obvious shift toward social media in online behavior?

Zoomerang interviewed 1,180 small- to mid-sized business (SMB) decision-makers and 500 consumers in September to release this study in an attempt to answer that question.

#20: The 3 most important reasons small businesses leverage social mediaare:

• Connecting with customers
• Visibility
• Self-promotion

81% of small business leaders use social media to get in front of customers and find new customers.

#21: 44% of SMB decision-makers use social media.

This graphic highlights how important it is to integrate social media with your website, email and direct mail efforts.

#22: Of those SMB decision-makers who use social media, 86% use Facebook vs. 41% LinkedIn and 33% Twitter:

Small- and medium-sized businesses are investing the most effort in Facebook.

Small Businesses Getting Results Without Spending Much

Social media is good for business, not just relationships. Mediabistro published aninfographic produced by Crowdspring that reveals the following findings:

#23: 50% of small business owners reported gaining new customers through social media – most notably through Facebook and LinkedIn.

#24: 51% of Facebook users and 64% of Twitter users are more likely to buy from the brands they follow.

Twitter fans are more likely to buy from a brand they follow (Crowdspring).

#25: Small businesses don’t have to spend much to get results: Zoomerangfound that nearly 60% of all small business decision-makers spend less than $100 on social media and 74% of businesses don’t employ anyone to manage their social media marketing.

Small business owners can get results without spending a lot of cash.

More Good News for Small Businesses

#26: Ning has found it only takes 20 people to create meaningful many-to-many interactions and bring an online community to a significant level of activity. That’s something almost any business can achieve.

How to Bring It All Together

There are numerous conclusions to draw from these statistics. Clearly, small businesses are increasingly leaning on social media to grow their businesses. Many of your customers are using social media almost every day. The opportunities toconnect directly with your customers are unprecedented, but so is the competition.

www.socialmediaexaminer.com 

Welcome to Virtual Assistant Business Solutions-MVA Certified - Certified Virtual Assistant Solutions for all of Your Business Needs at "OUR" Fingertips!

Welcome to Virtual Assistant Business Solutions-MVA Certified - Certified Virtual Assistant Solutions for all of Your Business Needs at "OUR" Fingertips!

Welcome to Virtual Assistant Business Solutions-MVA Certified - Certified Virtual Assistant Solutions for all of Your Business Needs at "OUR" Fingertips!

(NewsUSA) – When people see closed storefronts in the neighborhoods where they live and work, they’re reminded that the toll this economy has taken on businesses affects their own lives. And yet some companies — faced with the same adverse headwinds — seem to rise to the challenge and go on to prosper as never before.

Why is that? And could there even be a lesson to be learned here if you’re thinking of starting your own business as a result of either being unemployed or just plain fed up with your current job?
The “i-word” keeps popping up among experts as the answer to that question. “The whole engine that drives any economy is innovation,” says Stephen Gnass, executive director of the National Congress of Inventor Organizations, a non-profit for inventors and inventor groups.
Take IBM, for example. It practically reinvented itself years ago — going from a stodgy seller of large, pricey computers to a global software and consulting giant — and just recently celebrated its 100th anniversary. And then there’s the more under-the-radar case of New Jersey-based GAF.
North America’s largest roofing and ventilation manufacturer is celebrating its own anniversary this year — 25 years longer in business than IBM, but who’s counting? — and one way it got there is by coming up with unique answers to consumers’ and businesses’ desires to go green. In fact, it made quite a splash last summer when it teamed up with New York City’s Department of Buildings to paint 1 million square feet of roofs white — GAF supplied the reflective paint for one of the many projects of the initiative, as well as materials and labor — as a way of cutting the city’s energy costs.
To GAF’s CEO, Bob Tafaro, that kind of nimbleness is key. “When you put customers first by ensuring that they get quality products and service, and when you keep your employees focused on innovation, you’ve got the formula for surviving long term and throughout even the toughest economic times.”
The company’s commitment to service and innovation has actually produced a number of “firsts,” including: the first ready-to-lay asphalt roofing, the first to use color granules in roofing materials, and the first to offer a lifetime shingle warranty. And, oh yes, for those concerned about the outsourcing of American jobs, everything’s made in America. For more information, visit www.GAF.com.

Welcome to Virtual Assistant Business Solutions-MVA Certified - Certified Virtual Assistant Solutions for all of Your Business Needs at "OUR" Fingertips!