eSoup

The Virtual Company: What Is It?

People ask me this all the time, and it's a great question.

If you're not used to working online, then the idea of something being real and invisible (not right before your eyes) can be a hard concept to wrap your brain around.

A virtual company can take a few forms:

It can be an internet business where the team of staff work from their own locations.

Not sure what an internet business is?

Think of Amazon.com, Woot.com, any online membership site, and tons of other types of sites where the website itself is the "marketplace".

An internet business can survive without a brick and mortar store--the "store" is the website.

How Artists Do The Web Differently

I know that most of us are on the web because this is where our work is, but for a lot of us there is an artistic element to our online aspirations that gets stifled when we follow the herd who tells us all the stuff we should be doing and worrying about technology-wise.

This is why Robert Bruce turned me upside down (in a good way) with his guest post on Problogger called 27 Thoughts On Blogging For The Artist.

He doesn't pull any punches, and his points just made me think and acknowledge--are my activities/ways of approaching the internet leading me closer to or away from what it means to be an artist?

My faves of Robert's thoughts on Art and the Web:

6. If you’re spending more time on Twitter than on your novel/painting/film/poem/play/sculpture, you’re dead.

7. The creation of great art has nothing to do with Community.

9. If you’re the real thing, you’ll be around in 30 years, still working. Most of these services and sites you now admire will not.

13. Aim for Greatness, not the front page of Digg.

15. Though tempting, you’ll never crush your own mediocrity working only four hours a week.

I'd like my crayons back, please

  Box-o-Crayons for Tricia [83/365] 
  Originally uploaded by turbojoe

Everyone is born creative. Everyone is given a box of crayons in kindergarten. Then when you hit puberty they take the crayons away and replace them with books on algebra etc. Being suddenly hit years later with the creative bug is just a wee voice telling you, "I'd like my crayons back, please."

So you've got the itch to do something. Write a screenplay, start a painting, write a book, turn your recipe for fudge brownies into a proper business, whatever. You don't know where the itch came from, it's almost like it just arrived on your doorstep, uninvited. Until now you were quite happy holding down a real job, being a regular person...

Until now.

~Gaping Void

How napping can stimulate creativity

  poetry boat 
  Originally uploaded by bbmarie

Creative ideas are the bread and butter of any entrepreneur. A great problem solving idea can become a large part of your livelihood, and the continuing growth of your business is depended on your ability to create more groundbreaking ideas.

It's not always easy though. Some ideas seem to come out of thin air, some are spurred by our own experiences (necessity is the mother of invention), and still other ideas come about more mystically. Since we're so dependent on new ideas, wouldn't it be nice if we could take some specific steps to increase our chances of coming up with an earth shattering idea?

I'm thinking of two particular creative thinkers whose greatest ideas resulted during or immediately after a time of sleep:

101 Killer Resources for Virtual Business Owners

Blogtrepreneur has a very helpful post listing 101 of the services/references/resources that most online entrepreneurs will find handy.

Included in the master list is:

• Online Communications Tools
• Data Backup Systems
• Invoicing
• Financial Management and Accounting
• Time Management and Project Management
• Contact Management
• Hiring Freelancers
• Online Reputation Management Tools
• Accepting payment
• Shopping Carts
• Social Networking
• Finding Funding

...And like a gazillion other things. Check it out: 101 Useful Resources for Online Entrepreneurs

No Mere Mortals

One ordinary looking, mild mannered man who worked in an everyday boring job finally garners the confidence to come out of his everyday quiet life to show his gift. First, everyone looks at him like, "Please, do I have to endure this boring man's attempts at singing?".

He doubts if he is good enough. He has serious issues with confidence. He is used to people making fun of him for being different. But one day he finally gets up the courage to be himself and to risk the mockery of a panel of judges and a live audience.

This is what happened on that day:

How to save money running a virtual business (9 really helpful tips)

  Piggy Bank 
  Originally uploaded by Odalaigh

If there's one thing an internet entrepreneur needs to know, it's how to pinch pennies. It's not like in the corporate world when you just put everything on the company credit card--the money is coming out of our own pockets, so we've gotten darn good at knowing when to save and splurge!

Think back to your first business--did you spend money needlessly in any area? I think we all probably have :-) I remember how I was obsessed with fancy stationary, business cards, and a sophisticated phone system. I thought I would need that stuff, but I've never actually used any of it.

Jason Calicanis, who has some experience in running a start up business or two ;-), has a great post called How to save money running a startup . He has 17 tips, and I've picked the top 9 that I think really apply to virtual business owners.

Here they are...drumroll please:

Six Figure Blogging Course Is Back! FREE Preview

Professional blogging is a cutting edge, emerging career possibility, and to those of us who grew up thinking that our job alternatives were doctor, lawyer, accountant, secretary, and fireman, the thought that someone might truthfully wear the job title of "problogger" is kinda space age (and exciting!).

In case you're wondering what the in's and out's are in breaking into this field, you might wanna check out the free preview call for Darren Rowse's and Andy Wibbels' tour de force professional blogging course.

Here are the details:

What: Six Figure Blogging Preview Call

When: Wednesday April 2nd @ 8pm EST

How do I get in on this? Click here and sign up

Cost: FREE

Oh, and btw, I've already taken this course, and can vouch for it. In fact, this is probably my favorite online class I've ever taken. These guys definitely know what they're talking about, and the actual course is broken down into easily digestible pieces. There's tons of practical and priceless info in the course, and even the free preview call is hugely enlightening, so even if you don't take the course, you should definitely go to the free preview call. I'm going to it--hope to see you there!

The top 5 classic problogger myths: EXPOSED!

  Is that a unicorn on your shoulder ...
   Originally uploaded by tartx

You've probably heard mythical tales about folks building sites from scratch, earning enough off the site to quit their day job, and later selling the site for a gazillion dollars or more.

We love those stories, because it sounds like every office renegade's fantasy--work in your pajamas, write from your heart, play around for most the day, rake in embarrassing amounts of cash. Ahhh, that's the life!

The truth is that there is as much myth as fact mixed in with that fantasy.

I've studied problogging, worked with some of the biggest blog rockstars in the business, and have even tried my own hand at it, and one thing I've learned is that behind the myth, behind the fantasies, behind the growing amount of media attention this hot new internet career is garnering, there is a solid, legitimate, long term business opportunity for those willing to invest the significant time, resources, and energy needed to start with nothing and grow a site into a cash cow.

If you've ever had the inkling that you might be able to turn your blog into a business but just aren't sure, you might wanna confront these classic problogging myths first:

9 really convincing reasons NOT to be a workaholic

Let's see a show of hands--How many of us when we were growing up had the dream to one day work in a sweatshop? Hmmm?

I don't think any of us when we were first creating our virtual businesses and dreaming about the lifestyle we wanted ever decided that it would be a healthy, life-enriching thing to work 14 hour days 6 or 7 days a week. And yet somehow many web workers find themselves in just that sort of situation.

Small business owners are extremely diligent and dedicated--that just goes along with being an entrepreneur :-). It's a very admirable trait to have a vision and be willing to work hard to attain it, but we need to pull back sometimes and remember that there are definite benefits to NOT being a workaholic.

Signals vs Noise has a great post outlining 5 reasons why it's not a great idea to work with workaholics (or be one yourself).