video communication

Francis

I would like to go back to the basic research that you were not able to get overnight and that was not making you happy at the beginning.

Assuming that you have read the transcript from this interview and you’ll say, “Okay, at the beginning, start with very basic tasks.”

Even if you say, “Okay, now I finally hired a virtual assistant. It took me a week to find the right candidate and lots of time to hire and interview. And now, we finally have them and have given them the Dropbox account and whatever.” Now you just want to get to work.

I can’t totally relate to that since now I’m looking for a full-time VA to expand my team because I have so many ideas just itching in the back of my head wanting to get them out. But, I need the assistant to invest the time to get those ideas running. Because, to be honest, I, myself am not disciplined enough and willing to put the time into it, nor effective enough at working online in comparison to my assistants that I can do it myself.

Eric

Right. One of the things that I thought that I should have done was be on Skype more with my virtual assistant.

At the beginning, I was a little apprehensive to get on Skype with them. I thought that I could just basically use the chat function in Elance or the program that you use and that would be sufficient. And just send them over a text document and then they could just get to work.

And I realized that’s not how things need to be. There needs to be a one on one communication with each other just like we’re doing right now talking with your virtual assistant.

Let them hear your voice, let them see your face so that they can get to know you a little bit better. So that you can know them and make form that relationship with one another.

And also one thing that I wish that I would have done was started using Skype share screen.

Because, I think that if they can follow you and you can show them exactly what it is that you’re doing. And, then if they have any questions, they can ask you right then and there.

Well, you know, “Okay, Eric, I don’t understand exactly what you’re doing. Could you show me that one more time? Or could you explain that in a different way so that when I do that I won’t have to ask you another question later.”

I think if I have done that at the beginning that I wouldn’t have had as many problems. Because, then it would have kind of gotten rid of the whole delay process of back and forth questions between the two of us.

Francis

Okay. It’s funny that you say that because I have heard the same feedback from a friend of mine, another entrepreneur, who said it’s crucial to him that the virtual assistant has Skype access and is willing to Skype.

Eric

Yeah.

Francis

Because, even when you watch videos, you expect a lot of going back and forth question and answer. And to be honest, the feedback I received almost always from my virtual assistants, even new ones when I make videos, is that they say everything is clear and it’s much better than emails.

Then, in general, they just give some feedback of work and then I make another video commenting the new skill level. And then after sometime, it really is optimized.

And, I believe that if I put the time into connecting with Skype, waiting until the other party has set up their mic, etc; it would take much longer. And so to speak, my time is very valuable.

So, I try to find the most time effective way to communicate. And perhaps, it’s my way of talking in the recordings that’s different than others. I do not know.

But, in my experience, screen recording were always sufficient and it did not leave open very many questions. So, perhaps, we have to talk about how to record a screen recording so that we can communicate effectively.

Eric

Well, yeah. I think my issue was that because I tried to do the screen recording and it seemed to be okay, there was still a couple of questions that they would have.

And  I think,  as the person who’s used to doing that task, if somebody who’s familiar with that task and is used to doing it over and over again, I think that it’s harder for us to explain it to somebody who’s never done it before.

Francis

Oh, yeah. That’s true especially with propriety systems like content management systems or especially the SBI! system. But, as a side bar, so to speak, the SBI system has the big advantage that it has lot of training materials built in.

And just tell him, “Here, read this guide. Read this article then watch this video. Then come back if you have a question.”

Eric

Yeah, definitely. But, I think the problem is that like I’ve done something 150,000 times so when I go to explain to them, I’m not going to be as detailed because to me it seemed simple to me compared to somebody who’s never seen that platform before. It makes absolutely no sense.

So, I think that one of the things that we need to remember as employers when we’re hiring a virtual assistant is to remember that the virtual assistant may have never been exposed to anything like that before.

We need to be a little more careful when we’re explaining and not go too fast or not to skip these steps. Because, a lot of times, we’ll do little tricks or whatever that we’ve learned from using the software or using whatever it is and then skip over steps that leave room for confusion or places for misinterpretation of what we want done.

Francis

I also have made the experience of encouraging my assistants to look for the solution themselves and its good. So, for example, let’s say at the basic task, you have a research.

You have a research that’s more complex than you think yourself. But, perhaps you can tell me. Are you willing to tell me about the research and perhaps leave out critical information that’s sensitive to your business?

Eric

Yeah, definitely not a problem. Basically, what I wanted my assistant to go in and look for is, I wanted him to do research on different backlinks of a competitor and then give me a spreadsheet so that I could go through it and contact the people who were linked in to my competitors site.

I can’t remember exactly what the program was at the time but it was just a basic backlink checker software or a website and I would have them go in and type the URL of all of my competitors and then go in and find what is linking back to them.

And then find the contact forms and contact information for those people in those sites that I could send them an email to possibly get a link to my site.

Francis

Okay. Yeah. This is actually not so complicated for a research but I can see a few details that might put off the virtual assistant or take them longer than you imagine yourself.

So, if you have a small task like this, especially in the beginning, it would be more helpful than if you start with more complicated stuff.