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If you work from home or you own your own e-commerce business, chances are you work from a virtual office. A virtual office can be as grounded or as virtual as you make it. Most online businesses have only a computer, printer, scanner, and maybe a few sundry office supplies in the real world. The rest of their office, the office that everyone sees, is online, or virtual.

There are many advantages to the virtual office. Some advantages free up money, other advantages free up time, and still other advantages just make running your own e-commerce business much easier.

Now, not all virtual offices will have the same components, and not all virtual offices will be entirely virtual. However, you will find that the more your office trends toward the virtual and the less in a brick and mortar location, the lower your costs will be and the easier it will be to be successful in your online business.

Let's talk first about the biggest advantage. The virtual office frees up money. When you have a website for a store front, you have to pay for website hosting and a domain name, but you dont pay rent, insurance, and the accompanying utilities. The costs for the later are really much higher. For example, the use of email as the primary point of contact with your customers cuts out exorbitant long distance charges as well as postal and printing charges as well, something that other global businesses find very taxing on their budgets.

Another advantage to the virtual office is your ability to appear as a big time corporate presence, when in reality it might just be you working as just one individual working alone with one or two freelancers.

Numerous virtual office systems abound on the internet that allow anyone to record a voice mail greeting and program extensions, that then are direct to yourself, your freelancers, or your field people wherever they need to go.

Callers can call an 800 number, get a professional recording, several touch tone options, then be directed to the correct person. Even if that person is always yourself, you can still take advantage of the fact that you know what the person is calling about before you ever pick up the phone. Additionally, these types of virtual office programs are very inexpensive; costing at only a few dollars more per month than other traditional 800 numbers.

One of the truly hassle saving advantages to the virtual office is that you do not have to hire employees. Hiring employees requires a lot of time, effort, and money. You have to place advertisements to start the hiring process, spend time interviewing and reviewing resumes, and increase your paperwork tenfold when you hire someone on.

Of course, then there is insurance to buy, worker's compensation to purchase, payroll requirements, and federal, state, and local tax requirements. By running a virtual office, you have no need for a receptionist (you have your virtual office program), and you have no need for salespeople (you have your website store front).

Instead you can use outsourcing as a way to staff your virtual office and avoid all the issues that come with employees.

Don Schnure is the founder of Cyber Samurai Marketing Inc, a leading provider of online business and online shopping cart software and the 1AutoWiz Ecommerce fourm

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