First and foremost – Happy New Year, everyone! I hope you all had a tremendous holiday season with family and friends and everything that goes with it! I know I certainly did.

With a 10-day posting hiatus behind me, I am very proud and extremely excited to announce the fact that I have achieved my 2010 goal of becoming a Full-Time Virtual CEO..!!!

Before going any further, I would like to thank each and every one of you for all the support you’ve shown me on my journey over the last 12 months, since the Virtual Business Lifestyle blog was launched. The response and interest has been amazing, and although I am sure I would have hit my target without it all (its just the kind of guy I am!), it sure was more fun with you all in my corner, so thank you!

I’d also like to thank my wife for all her love and support and understanding - especially over the last couple of months – which demanded some very long hours from me, to make sure everything that needed to be in place, was, by the deadline.

Above you’ll see a quick note that I scribbled to myself about 9 months ago (after I had announced the goal, obviously), whilst enjoying a weekend at a resort here in Cebu, Philippines. It’s been in my wallet ever since, and every time I reached in to grab some cash, it reminded me, every time.., of my year long goal.

The funny thing is that whether I hit the target of getting this all set-up by the end of 2010, or not, didn’t really matter all that much to me. If it needed another month or two, or even six – it wouldn’t have bothered me. I would have put the extra time in to achieve the goal. It was the GOAL ITSELF which was the most important thing.

So, Ducker – What Now..??!

Good question! Well, first things first… I will be playing things very carefully in the first 4-6 weeks of the year, as I roll into my new set-up. I need to make sure that the systems and processes that myself and my management team have been working on over the last few months, more than anything else, actually do what they are supposed to do – keep me out of the office as much as possible!!!

The plan is to basically go into the office no more than three times a week, for around 2 hours at a time. This time spent in the office will be with management staff exclusively. Going over everything, making sure things are running well and that the quality aspect of working with our clients will not drop in any way.

Following this, I expect twice a week, maximum (again at 2 hours a time), in the actual office facility, is all the time I will need to continue to run, manage and grow my group of companies.

They’ll be a lot more along the way, obviously, which I will keep you all up to date with, here on the blog.

The Lifestyle Awaiting Me

Part of creating this goal for myself in the first place (in fact the main contributing factor behind it) was to be able to spend more time with my family. That will certainly happen. In fact, the last 10-days have been awesome, I have barely touched a computer (perhaps a little surfing and tweeting via my iPad has taken place, but thats about it!), so much so, that I find myself typing this post out at an alarmingly slower rate that usual…!!!

Over the Christmas break I was able to sit down with my family and plan out our travels for this year. Dates are yet to be confirmed, based on school holidays, etc., but we’ll be enjoying not one, not two but THREE family vacations this year, all in different parts of the world, which we are all super excited about! I’ll post more details on where we’ll be nearer the time, as I love the idea of trying to set-up some VBL Meet-Up’s to coincide with the trips (let me know if you think this is a cool idea!).

A New Year, A New Virtual Business Lifestyle!

One of the things I am initially very excited to get going with is the all new VBL blog, which will be launching in two parts this month…

The first part will be the unveiling of the brand new, fully customized re-design of the blog itself, which will go live on Wednesday! The second part of the re-launch will be towards the end of the month, with tons of new resources and additional sections covering every aspect of the VBL and how you can get going with planning, creating and realizing your very own VBL. All of which I need your help on – more details on Wednesday!

You see, last year was all about that journey for me… This year I am on a mission to not only live the lifestyle I’ve been planning for the last 365 days, but also promote it to the WORLD and help as many entrepreneurs to create a life they’ll love to live for themselves and their families.

And thats exactly what the VBL Blog will now become going forward… A huge, one-stop-shop and all-encompassing ‘How to Guide’, on helping you to create a lifestyle centered around business, but focusing on launching, running and operating your businesses (whether they be online, or off) from a distance and with a renewed focus on creating passive income, utilizing outsourcing and being a true-blue entrepreneur, in every sense of the word.

Closing Thoughts…

A few days ago I got this tweet from VBL fan @orvillejparker on Twitter. I replied saying that the biggest take away, above and beyond everything else from 2010 was quite clear to me… And that is that if you work very, very hard towards one particular goal, you will achieve it.

In fact, thanks again, Orville, for sending that tweet through. I did ‘think’ before I replied to it. That thought process alone was enough to help me realize just how incredibly lucky, and blessed, I was to have everyone around me that I did over the last year…

See you on Wednesday for the first part of the 2-part re-launch of the VBL Blog. I’m looking forward to seeing what you guys think of it!

Number of Days in the Office: 13, Total Number of Employees: 215

I thought I’d shoot a video for this months report – hope you enjoy it. Its been another busy month, with the large majority of my focus spent on working with my management team, to be able to hit that Virtual CEO goal of mine by the end of the year!

You’ll see in the video, a widescreen shot of the lovely desk that I had custom built a few years back. Although at first I loved this desk, I have slowly started to loathe it, and what it stands for. It has become way more than just a working surface for me, and has stopped me from living the life I have been wanting to for a long time now.

The funny thing is that I have actually found myself being more productive away from it, especially over the last few months, which excites me beyond feelings. In this video I go over a few things, such as:

• The things I’m doing to start detach myself from my office and staff in general.
• The finalization of my Passive Income product, which I’ll release in January.
• My excitement on filming my company’s first ‘Core Values’ video.
• Lots of podcast editing and recording!
• A tease on a ‘new’ VBL for next year.

I’ve been working even harder this past month on getting everything in place for next year – trust me, I feel it…!!! And, I have to be honest – this past month has been a lot of hard work. However, I truly feel blessed to have gotten this far over the course of the last 11 months.

It’s all going to be worth it.

In regards to my last point in the video – if there is anything you don’t like (please be honest!), or anything you’d like to see on the VBL going into next year – please let me know below in the comments section – I truly do value your opinions. Thanks for all the support, as always, this past month!

Number of Days in the Office: 7, Total Number of Employees: 212

Ah… It’s good to be back! October was a whirlwind of a month, I must say. Above you’ll find a little (4mins) montage of my trip to the USA. I actually have a TON of footage I shot over there this time around, hours and hours to be frank! However, I decided to keep this video short for digestion purposes! But – get excited, there is plenty of awesome video and podcast content coming in the next few months, thanks to my adventures at BlogWorld. So, onto the Monthly Report – strap yourself in – its a biggie!

First up, let me begin by saying a massive ‘thank you’ to those who submitted Guest Posts for the month of October. The idea to run a full month of guest posts came out of nothing but sheer laziness on my part, to be frank! I was traveling for almost three weeks of the month, and knew I was going to also be very engrossed in business, so wanted to not have to worry about the blog all that much. This laziness actually had some great advantages. First and foremost, it enabled me to highlight some of the awesome talent we have floating around in the growing VBL Community. You guys simply ROCK! Secondly, it did wonders for blog traffic, with our site’s Alexa rank growing from 109,000 to 89,000 at the time of writing this. So, again, thank you.

NEW: Guest Post Friday

In fact, I enjoyed getting you guys so much more involved in the blog in general (other than just tweeting, sharing and commenting) that I’ve decided to make guest posting a part of the regular VBL Diet of content. So, from now on, every Friday will be Guest Post Friday (as long as I have submissions, obviously!). So, if you didn’t get the chance to be included in October’s festivities, please feel free to submit your guest posts at anytime, going forward.

Old Style Networking – Still the BEST!

On the last day or BlogWorld I was asked to give a comment via video for a report that they were doing for their own blog (you can see the full video with everyone’s comments here). I was asked what was the one thing I took away from the expo, more than anything else. My answer, as you’ll see in the video, was the fact that even though I had met the majority of the people I hung out with at the expo, online, there was nothing better than forging those relationships by actually meeting up in person, shaking hands, talking, eating and laughing together. October was indeed a month of hand-shaking for me. Whilst in the US, along with the treasure-trove of bloggers and online marketers that I hung out with, I also met with three clients as well as two prospective clients.

Content, Content, Content

So, back to those upcoming videos and podcasts. I was supremely lucky to meet with a whole bunch of great people at BlogWorld, including (completely by surprise!) a new client that I had just helped find a Virtual Assistant via my Virtual Staff Finder service. From all the conversations, parties (thanks to Darren Rowse for invites to BOTH of the VIP Problogger Suite Parties, too!) and getting-to-know-you sessions, I collected a huge amount of great content for you. Coming up in the next few weeks and months you will be seeing interviews with, amongst others, the following people:

• Leo Babauta – Zen Habits
• Pat Flynn – Smart Passive Income (3-Part Video Series)
• David Risley – DavidRisley.com
• Maren Kate – Escaping the 9 to 5
• Jordan Cooper – Not a Pro Blog
• Vik Tantry – There’s Money Everywhere
• Eric & Seth – Frugal Theme
• Kevin Bates – We’ve Created a Monster
• Karol – Ridiculously Extraodinary
• Matt Gartland – Healthy Lifestyle Design

Zappos – Here I Come! (Exclusive Video Report SOON!)

Whilst in Vegas, I also got myself onto the Zappos Tour (along with social media guru, Mike Stenger, great guy!). They came and picked us up from the hotel and drove us right out to their HQ (about 20-30mins from the Vegas strip), and greeted us with open arms when we arrived. What followed was possibly one of the most eye-opening 2 hours of my life. Seriously. From a business standpoint, this 120 minutes has changed the way I look at things on a number of topics. You’ll find out how in November, when my full Zappos Tour Report goes live. Including a butt-load of exclusive video that I shot when on the tour itself..!

My First Full-Blown Passive Income Product – DONE!

Whilst traveling, I got down and dirty and worked my ass off finishing up a passive income product that I’ve been working on for the last year, literally, on and off. My first full-blown online product will be launched in early December (currently being finished up by my design team), and is a mix of an eBook, Videos, Audio and Webinar content. It’s totally unrelated to the VBL Blog, and is a true niche that I know a lot about, so I’m hoping that it’ll fly when launched. This is the first real step into the passive income world for me, so I am excited to see how it goes. I want to say a quick thank you to VBL Community member, Ben Lumley for motivating me to finish this thing up. Appreciate the confidence, Ben!

In Closing…

My monthly report wouldn’t be complete without an update on my ‘brick n mortar’ business, the Live2Sell Group, the 200+ employee business that I am attempting to unshackle myself from (on a day-to-day basis, that is!) and become that Virtual CEO. This month was a mixed one of losing a couple of small clients, but gaining two awesome medium-sized ones. It’s always tough when clients go, but its a fact of business life – it certainly helps to deal with it when you actually end up gaining ‘more’ out of it in the long run though.

Also, our new Operations Manager, Ben, who has now been with us for a couple of full months on the job, is doing a remarkable job rallying the troops together to finish off the year as strongly as possible. Lots of processes have been put in place, plenty of systems updated and I’m liking what I’m seeing from our growing management team. Im going to be giving you a sneak-peek pass into one of our upcoming MGMM’s (Monthly General Management Meeting) soon, so you can see exactly how I work with my team in growing and developing our team of outsourcing staff, as well as the company culture that we are putting in place, too.

All in all a very memorable, worthwhile, enjoyable and creative month…

I hope you enjoyed the update (if you liked it, please RT and Share!) and look forward, as always, to your comments, suggestions and feedback below.

Las Vegas - I'm Coming... Get Ready!

Number of Days in the Office: 19, Total Number of Employees: 211

This month literally flew by – faster than any other this year, without a doubt. And, if I was to be really honest, I probably worked harder and longer hours this month than I have over the entire year, too. People have even been emailing and tweeting me saying things like ‘Chris, everything okay… You’re very quiet!’ – mainly because I have been 110% focused on hitting this Virtual CEO goal of mine.

First up – good news. I finally found my Operations Manager. The hire that has eluded me for the best part of 3 months finally happened when I met our latest addition to the Live2Sell Group team – Ben Crisanto. Ben comes to us by way of Utah, and has over 10 years experience in the business world under his belt, as well as half of that team being spent in and around call centers. He’s a great match for the role, and I am genuinely very happy that we’ve brought him on board. I have big plans for this guy in the coming years.

Ben’s ‘Number One’ goal right now – his words, not mine – is to enable me to achieve my Virtual CEO goal. He is working tirelessly at getting all the processes and systems in place that we’re developing to make sure that our business runs even better than it has over the 5 years we’ve been in business. And we are definitely getting there, slowly – but, surely.

Secondly, the launch of Virtual Staff Finder just 5 weeks ago went really well. A barrage of entrepreneurs signed-up for the service, including some pretty big internet marketing names, and I am happy to say that we have to date matched 22 virtual workers with smart, savvy entrepreneurs using the service. I actually have another couple of business models I am going to spin off of this service in the coming months, so lots to develop.

Charlie, showing me how to Fight - Pinoy Style!

Other than my youngest Son, Charlie, proving that he can now out battle me with my Eskrima sticks. I had another pretty busy month. Other notable incidents this month:

• I sign-up for my first online related expo. I will be attending BlogWorld in Vegas from Oct 14-16. I already have plans to meet with several of the names and faces you’ve seen on this blog over the last few months, to do some face-to-face planning, videoing and chatting – so look forward to some great stuff coming your way in the remainder of the year. This will be my 5th trip to Vegas. Love the place!
• We unfortunately lost a client this month. But, the great news is that we signed up another three brand new clients almost immediately, and one in particular has amazing growth potential. I am very excited about the last quarter of the year, in regards to our continued growth.
• Started finalizing my first real ‘digital product’ (unrelated to this site), and I believe that I have hit on a niche that will be a nice little earner for me on a month-to-month basis. I have plains for several other products and online ventures going into next year (all part of that Virtual CEO lifestyle, as well as continuing to build the Live2Sell brand), so I am excited to see how this first one does.
• Myself and Tyrone Shum did a great free webinar on the subject of Entrepreneurial Outsourcing at the end of the month. In case you missed it, we recorded it for you, and you can get the full webinar for free here, which went on for a killer hour and fifteen minutes!
• We had an awesome discussion (probably the best ever) on our How Much Do I Pay My Home-Based Virtual Assistant post earlier in the week. Some very strong opinions were shown, and if you commented, thank you for making this post so successful.
• I finally folded to requests of posting a video of me and my band. You can see the video below.
• Waaaaaay more stuff that I can’t think of…

Click here to view the embedded video.

I am very happy to say that I also had a tremendous response to the ‘VBL Guest Post Month‘ post a couple of weeks back, and we simply just couldn’t go with just 8 posts in the end. So, we’ll be publishing 15 posts in October written, filmed and recorded by your guys, the VBL Community, and I couldn’t be happier with the outcome. They will be drip-fed to the blog whilst I travel the USA, putting the blog on auto-pilot for the entire month. I will, however, be touching base from time to time to respond to comments, tweets, etc.

Another jam-packed month. October is going to no doubt be a little quiet from me, not just because of the traveling I’ll be doing, but also because of the PLANNING I’ll be doing. A lot more to happen before I can assume the position of ‘The Virtual CEO‘, but hey – a great lifestyle doesn’t fall in your lap – you have to bust your butt to build it!

In closing, I’d like to ask you guys what you’ve been thinking of the content here on the blog recently, in all aspects. As you know, I’ve been trying out a lot of new angles. I plan to fine-tune the direction of the blog going into next year.

So, I’d really appreciate your feedback now, to make my planning a little easier and more productive. Tell me what you don’t like and what you want to see more of in the comments section below.

My desk at the Live2Sell Group HQ - Yes, the one I want to give away!

Location: Home Office – Reading Time: 6mins

Number of Days in the Office: 13, Total Number of Employees: 213

So, here we go with another monthly round-up as I get closer and closer to approaching my end of year goal, and becoming that (hopefully) full-time Virtual CEO. First up, I spent considerably less time in the office this past month, which is great. This wasn’t actually down to me making sure I did this, however, it simply ‘just happened’ as I have been focusing on different projects and have been working more from home to stay focused throughout the ‘creative’ stage on things.

The biggest part of August was the launch my of Virtual Staff Finder service. For a full run-down on the service and its features, you can visit the seperate website, or read my full launch post here on the blog.

We were, frankly, blown away with the response and I have been up to my eyeballs in consultation calls over the last couple of weeks. As we launched the service to the VBL subscriber list only we expected a certain number of people to sign-up, but saw a lot more sign-up’s than we anticipated. So far, so good… with over 20 virtual assistants already deployed to entrepreneurs around the world, through the service.

Although this is not 100% ‘passive’ income, it is to a certain degree. Meaning, nothing actually takes place until someone sign’s up and pays for the service. At that point, myself and my team work on things. I must say, I have enjoyed coming back from dinner and from being out on the weekend, to see emails from Paypal…!

Other going-on’s this month included:

• Two new client sign-up’s.
• Expansion on our sales and marketing team.
• Promoted 3 members of staff to mid-management level.
• I enjoyed spending time with a good friend that came into town from the UK.
• Finally found my Eskrima teacher, and a Grand Master, no less (more on this in a future post!).
• My Son is now a full-blown bodyguard for his Mommy, not even letting me get a little hug-time in!
• I’ve started planning my first full-blown online product, too.

We also surpassed our target of 1,000 RSS subscribers here at the blog, too (at the time of writing this report we are around 1,020, I believe). Thanks to all the subscribers and if you haven’t added us to your reader yet, please do so, to make sure you never miss an update on the blog. Be sure to also join us on Facebook and follow me on Twitter, too.

Another point to mention is that our iTunes Podcast has grown from strength to strength, and has been featured very predominantly throughout the last month in the ‘Noteworthy’ section of the Business listing consistently. You’ll see in the above image that we’re featured along with Pat Flynn’s great new podcast, too.

So, a pretty strong month. Thanks to everyone for their continued support on these reports. They won’t last forever, in terms of the current format anyway, and I do enjoy reading the feedback from you all, very much so. See you on the next post!

Featured on the same page as Steve Jobs and CNBC - Wow!

Location: Home Office – Reading Time: 5mins

Number of Days in the Office: 17, Total Number of Employees: 208

Happy Friday to each and every one of you! Wow. What a month… These monthly reports are always the posts that I enjoy putting together the most. What I do is jot down notes in my Moleskine throughout the month on things that I want to mention, and this month is a real corker!

Because so much took place this month, I am going to make this a bullet-point type of post to make it easier for you all the read and get stuck into. So, here we go:

• The VBL Podcast , which listed with iTunes just a month or so ago, was featured in the New & Noteworthy section of their Business category. This was actually brought to my attention by fellow blogger Pat Flynn, who also launched his own Podcast in July and also got listed in the same section (but at a slightly different time). Way to go, Pat!
• I took a mini-break with my family and spent 3 awesome nights at a beach resort here in Cebu. It was very impromptu, and thoroughly enjoyable. When we were there, I shot my 3-part ‘Why I want to be a Virtual CEO’ video series. You can check out the first one here.
• Our biggest client expanded, by adding another 10 full-time employees with us. Excellent!
• We brought on board two new clients, but unfortunately lost a couple of small ones in the US, too. Shame to see them go, but I believe they’ll be back soon. Certainly hope so.
• My son, Charlie, can now count from 1-10 unassisted (at the age of one-and-a-half), as well as recite Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star perfectly. Awesome!
• We had the Live2Sell United Nations Day (just for fun) at the office, where everyone got dressed up in different types of ‘national’ costumes from around the world. See the image to the right!
• I was interviewed by author Dave Crenshaw for his ‘Invaluable’ video series. Very proud to be picked by Dave, he’s a great industry thought leader.
• I flew up to Manila to interview candidates for the Operations Manager role I have been wanting to fill for the last few weeks. Unfortunately none really made the grade, so we’re still searching.
• I started making my first ‘real’ bit of passive income with affiliate links to a couple of email lists I own. All in all, from a couple of products, I made about $300. Not a lot of money, of course – but, the fact that it was happening whilst I slept was very cool, I have to be honest. I will be looking into this a little more closely in the coming months.

There were also a few other things that took place, but nothing as noteworthy as the above.

New VA Service – Update!

Some of you have been asking about my new Virtual Assistant service. This will be launching VERY soon. Sooner than you think, trust me. We’ve been testing out the process with a few select clients and everything has been going excellently! I will be putting together a special package JUST FOR SUBSCRIBERS in case they would like to utilize the service. So, if you haven’t made it onto the subscriber list yet, please do sign-up at the bottom of this post. You’ll get my free eBook, plus you’ll be on the launch list for the service, too.

Now… Reality check!

Bottom line, the hire for this Op’s Manager is a VERY important part of the plan for me to achieve my goal and become that Virtual CEO by the end of the year. I am going to be working overtime in the next 3-4 weeks to make sure I find him or her. Everything else up to this point has been BANG on target. And I know the few little things I’ll have to do AFTER the hire takes place are do-able pretty much on their own.

So, its crunch time.

Thanks, as always for supporting the blog by retweeting the posts and sharing on Facebook. I really appreciate it. And, as always I look forward to reading your comments below! Have an awesome weekend, and I’ll see you next week.

Very Small Selection of my Awesome Staff at Our Team Building Event!

Location: Company HQ – Reading Time: 5-6mins Number of Days in the Office: 19, Total Number of Employees: 214 This week has been crazy! In fact, the entire month has been pretty mad! As my quest to become a Full Time Virtual CEO continues, I am making more and more moves to make sure I not only hit the target and achieve the goal, but more importantly, that my company will be in ‘good hands’ on a day-to-day basis when I do ‘disappear’, so to speak! One of the big aspects for me to achieve my goal is in alleviating the stress of daily business management, whilst still focusing on growth. So, this month saw a new hire. Our new Business Development Manager will be taking a lot off my personal plate, in regards to working with prospective clients and our internal marketing team, too. Up until recently this has been ALL ME. As she becomes more comfortable, she will also be strategizing with our existing clients, and helping them grow their accounts with us, too. I am really excited about this hire. Nothing is more important in business than growing and getting bigger.

There is no ‘I’ in Team

Next up, we had our Annual Team Building Expedition in late June. A fantastically glorious day at one of Cebu’s most beautiful resorts. The entire staff was present and enjoyed a great day of team building activities, fun in the sun, as well as spending a certain amount of the day wet, too! The evening ended with dinner, some awards being given out, a couple of prizes up for grabs – including an iPod, and a quick speech by yours truly. This was easily the BEST event we’ve had for a while and I am already looking forward to the next one.

New Clients, New Growth

We also started business with two new clients in late June. Both clients started at a good number of employees, which has pushed us well over the 200 employee mark, and will both look at growing their accounts with us after we kick off with a good start – which we will obviously do, of course!

Lights, Camera, Action!

As you’ll notice, I’ve started shooting more videos again, like the Sneak Peak into My Business and the ‘What’s it Like’ post on the Philippines over the last couple of weeks. I’m actually going to continue to do this going forward for the blog. Some of them will be stand alone posts, some will be added to our new iTunes feed. Bottom line is I enjoy shooting these clips for you, and I enjoy the feedback they get even more. Thanks for all your kind words.

New ‘Virtual Staff Match-Maker’ Service on the Way!

We have also been forging on with the completion of the set-up of our new service, which has come about from nothing but sheer out and out demand. It’ll be launching in the third week of July. More about this in a future post. Plus a ‘special offer’ for subscribers of the blog. So, there you have it… Another month in the history of the VBL Blog, the Live2Sell Group and my personal goal to completely eliminate myself from the day-to-day operations of the company by the end of the year. Let me know what you think of this months’ going-on’s by commenting below. Would love to hear from you! See you next week.

Helping to Promote a Local Brand of 'I Love Cebu' T-Shirts!

Location: Company HQ – Reading Time: 5-6mins

Number of Days in the Office: 19, Total Number of Employees: 186

So, another month passes, and I am now officially just 7 months away from my target of becoming a Full-Time Virtual CEO. Will I hit it? You bet your ass I will…! I don’t set targets to not hit them, guys…!

Amongst other things this past month, a local company wanted me to help promote their new ‘I Love Cebu’ t-shirt range, via billboards, mall banners and newspaper ad’s (as above!), which I was happy to do – as I whole-heartedly DO love this great little city! The rest of the month wasn’t as busy as past ones, mainly because it wasn’t meant to be. Let me explain…

May 2010 was very much my ‘sit back and see how things are going so far’ month. And that’s exactly what I did. I contemplated. I thought. I planned, and actually re-planned certain parts of the next 7 months ahead of me. And I came to one big conclusion – although I have excellent local management around me (some of the best in the business, I believe), I am going to have to hire a full-time expat to come and work for me here in the Philippines, at my company’s HQ.

Anyone Want a Job…?!

Ideally – this person will be American (as much of my client base in from the US) and should have a minimum of 3 years call center operations management experience. Starting to sound like a job advert, right!? Good. It is – if you’re interested, let me know via the Contact Page. There’s a good US salary and a chance to make profit share in the business for the right candidate.

Another thing that I realized was that the interest in our Virtual Assistant service has gotten more and more intense. And I mean, REALLY intense. The problem is that although there are a lot of people showing interest, they either a) don’t have the budget, or b) want to pay the service fee we, as a company charge, for our full-time VA service. They obviously need to go the freelancer route. (Find out more about these two different routes in my free eBook)

However, a lot of people are a little dubious of taking this journey because of all the research, interviewing and other time consuming tasks required to try and find a VA that can a) do the work you need done to a competent level, and b) have the relevant experience and can be trusted to get the job done.

It’s rare to find the ‘right fit’ the first time around…

Launching a New Service

So, May 2010 turned out to not be so much of a quite month after all, as for the later part of the month, I was busy putting together a spin-off service from both my outsourcing company and this blog, where we intend to bridge the gap for entrepreneurs in finding the best Virtual Assistants that the Philippines has to offer.

Utilizing our corporate set-up (which will include setting up a second office in Manila), top quality people, second-to-none local business contacts and the years and years of experience in the outsourcing industry, the new service will be the perfect conduit between the ‘service provider and freelancer’ routes, I promise!

Hope you enjoyed this month’s round-up, and stay tuned for more details!

Our Welcoming Lobby at the Live2Sell Group HQ

Location: Home Office – Reading Time: 4-5mins

Number of Days in the Office: 14, Total Number of Employees: 179

This month went by faster than I realized… Hence the slightly late post! My Virtual CEO Goal is still moving along nicely, and again, I feel like I am getting closer and closer to it with every passing month. I have a plan in place, written down, and I am working that plan. It’s a 12 month plan of action including everything from automating certain aspects of my business as well as hiring of important, key employees, that fundamentally will ultimately allow me to remove myself from the business on a full-time basis. I have no doubt this year will end with my mission being accomplished.

We brought on board 3 new virtual assistant clients this month, and they have been going really nicely so far. One of our clients even sent greeting cards to his VA at the companies HQ, which put a massive smile on her face upon receiving them!

I also had the pleasure of hosting a potential new client, who will be starting with us around the middle of this month. It is always a pleasure when we have clients and prospective clients come in and visit us face-to-face - it doesn’t happen often (because it doesn’t need to!), but we always roll out the red carpet when it does.

The blog has really started to gain traction this month, with almost 3,000 visitors and close to 7,000 page views. Awesome! It was nice to see that my I’m Too Busy for Bullshit post was as popular as I hoped it would be. It seems that a lot of you liked the frankness of this, as it created an awesome 50 retweets on Twitter.

Other important milestones this month included:

• Tony Ruiz interviewing me for VentureMixx.com
• My guest post on HotBlogTips.com on How to Build Your Own Online Brand
• My guest post on How to Utilize Virtual Staff to Create Multiple Streams of Passive Income on Pat Flynn’s very popular SmartPassiveIncome.com blog. This came following my interview with Pat earlier in the month for this blog.
• My youngest Son, Charlie, starting playgroup…!

A great month all-round.

May will, hopefully, see the launch of my two upcoming online collaborations with a couple of very respected bloggers. The only thing that might slow this down is getting the development side of things finalized, as I expect to be traveling a little this month, which means I wont be ‘working’ as much as I usually do. However, the show WILL go on, and we’ll do our best to get things up and ‘out there’ as soon as possible.

I would like to end this report by saying a massive ‘thank you’ to each and every one of you out there that have subscribed to the RSS feed, joined up and got the free eBook, retweeted any of the blogs’ posts, shared any of the status updates and articles on Facebook and anyone else that has helped, in any way shape of form to continue to promote the blog and spread the Virtual Business Lifestyle word.

I am humbled by your loyalty. Thank you.

Recording a Segment of my Top 10 VA Tip's in Boracay!

Location: Home Office, Reading / Viewing Time: 6mins

Number of Days in the Office: 16, Total Number of Employees: 176

This last month was another real eye-opener for me. Amongst other things, I spent a whole week working from a beach resort in Boracay, with absolutely none of my clients actually knowing of the fact – I spoke to people daily, and even made calls to prospective clients without anyone batting an eyelid, so to speak. Another testament to the fact that a fully virtual lifestyle is very much do-able.

I made a couple of new key-hire’s in March, too. First up, we expanded our training and development team with a new Training Supervisor. She will be working with our staff more on a one-on-one basis, coaching on individual needs, so we are all very excited to see how that side of things develops. Secondly, our new Quality Assurance Supervisor will be working directly with our individual Team Leaders, Management and more importantly, our clients, to insure that the quality of work we produce for them i sof the highest standards, as always.

I guess the ‘big news’ this month is the signing of an agreement between our company and one of our long-term clients, who has just become our official US Partner. Eric Lightman, COO of On Hold, Inc., and a 20-year business veteran searched high and low for a decent outsourcing partner before he found my company and we have since forged a very unique client/vendor relationship, as well as becoming good friends! The North American market is a big one for us, and having this new partnership formed is the perfect compliment to the rest of our team here in the Philippines. I am going to ask Eric to write a quick article for the blog in regards to his journey in outsourcing work, so hopefully that will appear here soon!

Bit of sad news – we unfortunately lost two clients this month for different reasons. I guess the ‘shining light’ is that neither of the reasons were down to us! One simply had been fighting the economic woes for a while, and eventually had to cease operations. The second had an Outbound Telemarketing campaign with us and had to cancel due to regulatory changes in their local area in regards to cold calling. It’s always a shame to lose clients (it doesn’t happen often, thanksfully), but nonetheless it is part of doing business.

Good news, however, is that our Head of Client Services, Ray, has been doing a fine job bringing on board new clients and I am particularly excited on a couple of them as they look like they have massive growth potential, which is excellent for all involved.

We also celebrated two management birthdays in the Management section of our business, too, and so I am now left with a larger waste line because of this! Time to hit the gym, I believe. In regards to the blog, and its growth/interest levels online, we’ve had the following happen:

• Several cool guest posts around the web
• I’ve been interviewed three times by other bloggers (two more due, too!)
• My Top 10 Virtual Assistant Video Tips series of YouTube posts were received with open arms and created a lot of very positive feedback – thank you!
• I flew to Manila to spend time with Dan from OutsourcetothePhilippines.com and LifestyleBusinessPodacast.com, and recorded some great footage for the blog with him! He also recorded a podcast with me. hear it by clicking HERE.
• Increase in visitors, links, tweets, alexa ranking and overall interest across the board – awesome!
• The VBL Facebook Fan Page continues to grow and we’re getting close to that 1,000 fan landmark! Spread the word!

Another fantastically busy month, but also very productive one. The one thing that I am really enjoying on this journey of mine is being able to get it ‘out there’ via the pages of this blog. I receive so many great emails from people (some people say I’m nuts for being so transparent!) giving me a thumbs up and writing with such great comments, it is truly humbling to be able to produce the content and have it enjoyed by so many interesting, enthusiastic and appreciative people – thanks for all your communication guys.

See you next month for another VBL round-up!

If you liked this post don’t forget to sign-up for my RSS feed so you don’t miss a single post in the future. You can also “Be Sweet and Retweet!” if you like, too. Thanks, everyone!

All Work and No Play Makes Chris a Dull Boy - My Cop 'friends' on the Walk of Fame in LA!

Location: Home Office, Reading / Viewing Time: 6mins

Number of Days in the Office: 6, Total Number of Employees: 174

So here we are the second installment / update on what is happening in regards to my personal goal for 2010 – to become a Full-Time Virtual CEO by the end of the year. February has been a slightly less ‘hectic’ month, in terms of individual events – compared to the line-up of things that took place in January – as I was traveling for the majority of the month on my US Pleasure Trip (click link for the trip review!). However, that doesn’t mean that its been a slow month in terms of achievements!

The highlight for February was obviously the aforementioned trip to the US, where not only did I get the chance to relax and spend some QT with my beautiful wife, but where I also got the chance to meet with THREE of my clients with whom I had never had the pleasure of sitting face-to-face with before. One of them had been working with us for almost two years – so that was great.

I also got the chance to meet with a few prospective clients, too, as well as a couple of close friends, such as Sanjay Maholtra (the last video in our ‘San Fran’ series is coming later on this week!). Also, whilst snowed in, in New York, I met up and had a coffee with fellow entrepreneur and VBL blog follower, Doug – who lives there full time. Doug contacted me via Twitter whilst I was already on the trip, in San Francisco, and invited me for a coffee… Why not, I thought! It turned out to be a great conversation, and Doug graciously shot and sent the quick video below to me, too – I haven’t had the chance to post it until now – so, thanks Doug – much appreciated, and next time the coffee is on me!

Click here to view the embedded video.

And as if all this wasn’t enough, we also completed our latest expansion at our facilities, which I blogged about last week, and had some great comments on. As the year progresses and I enter the last month of the first quarter it is becoming more and more apparent for me to realize this goal. Not just because its what I want to do, but because I also feel its what I need to do, to be able to continue to grow as an entrepreneur, too. If you’d like to stay up-to-date with my journey, please do subscribe to my feed to make sure you don’t mess anything. So, here’s February’s round-up:

Important Things that Happened in February

• Was out of the office for almost 3 weeks with no major fires to put out (good test for my overall, yearly goal)
• Finished most recent expansion to our offices, adding another 50 agent stations
• Brought on board 2 new clients and had 2 client visits to the Live2Sell Facility
• Facebook disabled our original Fan Page, and so I created a new one. Join us HERE.
• Signed an agreement with one of our long-standing clients to become our US Partner! More new on that in a couple of weeks, after the ‘formal’ announcement has been made. This is awesome news for our growing company.
• Recorded the first FIVE Podcasts for a project I am working on with a friend and fellow blogger (details coming soon)..!
• Started pre-lim work on putting together a rehashed, kinda ‘premier’ Virtual Assistant Service – this is gonna be BIG!

Another great month, to say the least – and I did most of it (including recording the Podcasts!) on the road, as they say. That’s it for now. Got some great posts coming in the next couple of weeks, so stay tuned, and please spread the love! Feel free to touch base with me on Twitter, too!

If you liked this post, please do leave a comment below – I love hearing from my readers. You can also “Be Sweet and Retweet!” if you like, too. Thanks, everyone!

My End-of-Year Speech at the 2009 Live2Sell Annual Dinner & Dance

Location: Company Offices, Reading Time: 5mins

Number of Days in the Office: 19, Total Number of Employees: 171

So here we are with the first monthly report, encapsulating my mission to become a Full-Time Virtual CEO by the end of the year. And, just to clarify, when I mean ‘virtual’, I mean REALLY virtual, like no desk, no chair, no ‘office’ on my company premises. You can view the video post where I announced this goal here.

These posts are going to be as straight forward as possible, but with enough ‘meat’ on them so that you can see what I have been up to (without giving too much away, as I am aware that several of the principals of companies I would class as ‘competitors’ (even in a loose way) to my own company, read this blog (Thanks, guys – hope you’re learning lots! )

The two main points of business that really stick out this month are obviously the launch of VirtualBusinessLifestyle.com, and the hiring of a brand new Head of Operations for my company (we’ll be shooting a video post together sometime in the near future). This one move is a very important one in my overall plan for 2010, and one that will obviously continue to develop throughout the course of the year.

Couple this together with real in-depth planning for my upcoming ‘pleasure trip’ to the USA (check out the last post for my ‘mobile office’ video clip, to see what I’m bringing along) that will last just over 2 weeks, and take me to San Francisco, Miami, New York and LA – I’ve been a really busy bee.

Important Things that Happened in January

• Hired a new Head of Operations to start freeing-up more time and planning for the future
• Launched this blog
• Brought on board 4 new clients
• Had 2 client visits
• Worked closely with my PA on travel plans for upcoming US Trip (February)
• Began working on an Outsourcing related project with a fellow blogger and online marketer (details coming soon)

So, all in all, a very productive month.

Wish us a safe trip for the US, please! We (myself and my wife, Ercille) leave tomorrow. I’ll be shooting a ton of cool video posts (subscribe to my feed to make sure you don’t mess anything!), and don’t worry – there are a few posts already scheduled for you, when I’m away. However, if you’d like to stay up-to-date with my ‘happenings’ whilst on the trip, feel free to follow me on Twitter – I’ll be tweeting regularly.

If you liked this post, please do leave a comment below – I love hearing from my readers, and reply to pretty much every one! You can also “Be Sweet and Retweet!” if you like, too. Thanks, everyone!