Justifying the Cost of Subcontractors Part 2 in “Using Subcontractors to Take Your Business to the Next Level” Series

In our first article of this series, we explored how a subcontractor can help you, and when it is time to bring on a subcontractor.  This month, I want to answer the question everyone asks, how can I justify the cost of a subcontractor?   While the old adage of business is “You have to spend money to make money,” that’s no longer the whole story.  Today’s new entrepreneurs have discovered that it’s not about spending money to make money, it’s about spending time wisely and investing in your own business (and sanity).   “Once we rid ourselves of traditional thinking we can get on with creating the future.” James Bertrand   When most of us set up business, we set out to fill our workday – however long we wanted it to be in the beginning – with paid work.  We knew we’d be investing some additional unpaid time doing marketing, bookkeeping, filing and the like, but we also knew how much time we needed to put in to make our business worthwhile.  As our businesses grow and our workdays get longer, our actual days, tragically, do not.  And, since no one as of yet perfected the perfect day-lengthening machine – and trust me, I wish I could and patent it, I’d be rich! – the only real option to keeping our sanity, our customers/clients happy and our families happy is subcontracting (or, “subbing”) out some of our work.   “There is no such thing as a self-made man. You will reach your goals only with the help of others.” George Shinn   As industries differ greatly, I’m just going to use some “test figures” to illustrate justifying the cost of subcontracting out work:   If you normally charge $100/hour, and you pay someone else $40/hour for that work, you are still making $60/hour on the work that someone else did for your clients/customers.  If you are also working during that same time, you’ve actually made $160/hour.    By using a subcontractor or a team of subcontractors to carry out your overflow work or the work you don’t especially like doing for your clients or business, you free up time for the things you love in your business, your life, and your family.  Best yet, you can be making money while you’re spending time with your family, while you’re on vacation, or even while you’re sleeping.   “If I could solve all the problems myself, I would.” Thomas Edison   The last article in this series will explore Addressing the Pitfalls of Subcontractors.   Patty Benton runs a training program for new entrepreneurs interested in venturing into the virtual assistance industry that is affordable to all, and she has also written an e-book that takes virtual assistants through the process of setting up their business. Visit her coaching site at http://www.virtualvacoach.com/ for program details and great business resources. Additionally, Patty is the owner of JERPAT Virtual Assistants and JERPAT Web Designs, http://www.professionaladminteam.com, which provides affordable administrative and web design support to coaches, small businesses, religious organizations, and more. She has also partnered to establish the ministry Acknowledging Christ Together at Work http://www.actatwork.com/ and is co-owner of Virtual Business Group http://www.virtualbizgroup.com/ an online networking organization for Virtual Professionals. © 2003-2008 JERPAT You have permission to reprint this article electronically or in print, as long as the text and byline remain unedited. A courtesy copy of your publication would be appreciated. Upcoming JERPAT Training & Coaching Courses   Don’t forget to sign up for our FREE upcoming “Squashing Your Fears” Workshop, led by Patty Benton!   For more details and to register for any of the classes, visit us at http://www.virtualvacoach.com/. Individual coaching also available!   F*ree Workshop hosted by JERPAT Training & Coaching and presented by Patty Benton. Squashing Your Fears - In Patty’s coaching experience, she has found that fear is the number one factor holding business owners back from reaching their dreams and the success that is completely within their grasp.  Whether it’s fear of failure, fear of success or fear to take risks, you can't accomplish your dreams without acknowledging and overcoming those very real fears!  Take the first step in overcoming your fears by signing up for this complimentary workshop.  Scheduled for Tuesday, August 12th at 10 am MST OR Wednesday, August 13th at 5 pm MST.   Create a Website Class – In this instructor led class you will learn how to create your own website by choosing a template design, adding site content, images, documents, & PDF files and a user interactive contact form using our web design tool.  Upcoming presentation scheduled for August 5th at 5 pm MST.   Simply Grants - During this course you will find where to look for grants, the parts of grants and how to determine if your project/program is a “good match” for a particular funder.  You will come away from this course with a better understanding of the process of writing grants and how they’re funded.  Upcoming presentation scheduled for August 20th at 6 pm MST.   LIVE GROUP Advanced "Failure is NOT an Option" – Our advanced program goes beyond just teaching you how to set up your business, but delves into how to make your established business successful by exploring client relations, communication, fear, subcontractors, and much, much more!  Content is live coaching based upon YOUR needs! Upcoming group scheduled for September 10th at 10 am MST for 8 weeks.   LIVE GROUP Beginner's "Failure is NOT an Option" Group Coaching – The "Beginner's Failure is NOT an Option" is our beginner's group coaching program, conducted live over the phone, that will teach you how to successfully set-up and build your VA business.  Now registering for group beginning the week of September 15, 2008.  Time and actual class days have not been set yet.  If you don’t want to wait for the upcoming group, don't forget to check out our Online Beginner's "Failure is NOT an Option" that can be completed any time, day or night!

Computer Tips from the Computer Guru

Setting Up Automatic Backups If you have ever lost data due to a computer crash, like my wife and I, then you NOW know how important it is to do some sort of backups. If you haven't experienced this pain and misfortune, then please take the time and learn how to set up automatic backups from the below instructions before it happens to you.  If you have experienced this pain, then take a moment to make sure you never have to live through it again.   It is very easy to set up manual backups using an external hard drive, but we sometimes forget to do them. You can easily schedule an automatic backup by following the instructions below: Click Start / Run and type in ntbackup and the backup wizard will appear.   Click next on the Welcome screen. Make sure Back up files and settings is selected and click next. Choose what you want to back up - My documents and settings, Everyone's documents and settings, All information on this computer, or Let me choose what to back up and click next. Choose a place to save your backup from the drop down list or browse your computer to locate (i.e., external hard drive) and then type a name for the backup and select next. Select a type of backup from normal, copy, incremental, differential and daily. On the When to Back up window, select later, and then click the Set schedule button. You can choose from daily, weekly, monthly or other routines. Under Start Time pick a time when you computer is usually not in use, then click okay.  It will ask you to enter a password. After you've entered the password, click OK and click Finish on the following window.   That is all there is to it.  Now you can be safe, instead of being sorry. Your files will be backed up regularly and you can have peace of mind.   Don't forget - Keep your back-up in 2 places for the best security.  I talked about Mozy in our April Issue.  For only $4.95/mo you can have that added extra security.  For more details go to: http://www.virtualvacoach.com/resources/mozy.html   Note:  NTBackup from Windows XP and later includes Volume Shadow Copy (VSS) support and thus can back up locked files. In case of Windows XP Home Edition, NTBackup is not installed by default but is available on the Windows XP installation disc. [1]   In Windows Vista and later operating systems, NTBackup was replaced by Windows Backup, which uses the Virtual Hard Disk (VHD) file format and supports backing up to modern media such as CDs and DVDs. For reading older backups, Microsoft has made available the NTBackup Restore utility which can only read BKF files.   Jerome Benton is the owner of JERPAT Web Designs, http://www.jerpat.org. He specializes in web design and has partnered with his wife's virtual assistance business to give every company the quality services they need at an affordable price. You can read Jerome's weekly tips at http://blog.virtualvacoach.com.

Recommended Resource

I don't know about you, but I am sick of the spam that clogs up my Inbox.  The worst is the "Mail Delivery Failures", meaning people are using my email address to send spam.  How do they do this?  They use email harvesting tools to pull your email address from your website.  I found the coolest tool to use to combat this, and it is simple to use.   Email Scramble allows you to enter your email address, and then it produces code to scramble your email address.  This prevents the harvesing tools from getting your email address.   Now you can start drastically reducing your spam!   Go to http://www.virtualvacoach.com/resources/emailscramble.htm for more information.