Haven't yet become a mobile business? Now's the time to run your business while having a life—rather than having your business run your life.

Update your customer database during downtime at an airport. Take care of delivery problems while you're at key industry conferences. How about having seamless communications with partners in Seoul or Dubai?

Increasingly, online services let you operate your business from the road without a lot of extra hassle. The latest services from Microsoft Office Live Small Business  offer easy-to-use mobile options that you really need to know about. Why? Because this means you, the 24/7 small-business owner, can now take actual vacations—knowing that you can manage most every task from the road.

A real-life "work-ation" tests the benefits of mobile options

Skeptical? Then check out Jeff Zbar’s recent "work-ation," as he calls it.

Zbar, a technology consultant and writer based in Coral Springs, Fla., decided to test just how effectively he could work remotely while on vacation with his wife and three kids.

He and the family set off on a month-long adventure along the East Coast while living in an Internet-connected, 23-foot RV that boasted a home office outfitted with a laptop, printer, wireless Internet router, files, storage, and more. All the gear was stowed in a compact, rolling cabinet that could be moved under a counter when not in use.

Along the way, Zbar stayed in touch with clients, working for a few hours early in the morning and after dinner. Daytime was reserved for family and fun.

He also leveraged the concept into a new revenue stream.

Dubbing his trip the "Home Office Highway," Zbar recruited sponsors to fund and advertise his experience. Throughout the journey, he also posted blogs and videologs with tips and advice for other professionals about how to take care of business on the road (see homeofficehighway.com).

Here are his been-there-and-done-it tips:

• Rehearse beforehand. "Remote work is a learned experience," says Zbar. "Ask yourself: 'Do I have the mindset to work from the road? Am I able to adjust my rhythm and handle the distractions?' Practice using your laptop at a local coffee shop or WiFi hotspot."
• Inform clients. "Let clients know you'll be on the road," he suggests. Also, explain when it's best to reach you. "Tell them about blackout times in advance via e-mails or voice-mail messages."
• Maintain balance. A successful work-ation, Zbar says, "is about letting the family know you'll be working a bit—and listening to the family when they say you’re working too much."
    

Choosing the smartest tools for remote work

What do these new tools really deliver and how much effort is required to set it all up? Answers: A lot and not much.

Office Live Small Business services offer online management of customer information and communications, the ability to track and share information in private online workspaces, and control over e-commerce transactions:

1.  Stay on top of customer info and sales with Contact Manager

Contact Manager can be used anywhere you have an Internet connection and a Web browser. It provides access to customer information such as accounts, contacts, and opportunities.

Contact Manager also organizes and consolidates every customer interaction, including e-mail messages, tasks, appointments, sales calls, special requests, and other documents.  This allows you, for example, to see views and analysis of customer preferences, buying histories, and personal quirks.

2.  Read and send e-mail on a Windows Mobile device

Accessing e-mail night and day has just about become essential. Mobile phones make it easier to receive time-sensitive messages or requests, and they also provide flexibility, through text messaging and instant messaging.

At Strategic Vision, a public relations firm with four offices in the United States, co-founder Laura Ward explains: "Our cell phones allow us to receive e-mail so we can stay in contact when we are not in a place to use our laptops. We use text messaging from the offices to our cell phones when a voice call wouldn't be appropriate during a meeting.

"We also use instant messaging for internal purposes to help keep down phone costs and ask and answer quick questions."

You can set up an e-mail account with Office Live Small Business and then access e-mail messages from a Windows Mobile device, using either Microsoft Office Outlook Mobile, the Windows Live application, or your Web browser.

3.  Collaborate faster with Business Applications and Workspaces

The Business Applications and Workspaces feature allows employees, customers, business partners, and teleworkers to work together from remote locations. Document Manager, for example, enables you and your team to have a central location to store and update documents and avoid having multiple versions make the rounds.

Similarly, Workspaces  are essentially private Web sites that help employees collaborate on documents or presentations. You can manage projects and teams from a workspace.  Members need passwords to access these secure web sites; you can also create permission levels for different types of files that you store on your site so that everyone who has access to the site can't see everything.

Workspaces can house a wide range of formats, including text documents, spreadsheets, images, Web pages, and discussion boards. In addition, Office Live Small Business offers several pre-configured templates for customers, teams, Wikis (brainstorming and knowledge-sharing), and basic agendas.

4.  Open and close your e-store with Store Manager

Whether your own Web site is set up for transactions or you sell through eBay, Store Manager  from Office Live Small Business is an easy-to-use e-commerce solution that lets you create a rich product catalog with up to 10,000 products.

Store Manager also automates sales transactions, generates invoices, and sends e-mails confirming purchases and fulfills and manages orders.      

Like Contact Manager, you can access Store Manager from any location with Internet access and a browser. That gives you the option of quickly activating or deactivating the store whenever you choose, depending on your schedule.

Activating your store displays the Product List and Product Details pages on your Web site so customers can see what they want and buy products.

Deactivating the store simply temporarily removes the Product List and Product Details pages until you're ready to "open doors" again. For details, see this page.

Get the mobile business mindset

"Fortunately, running a virtual business is something we can all do easily," says coach Nancy Michaels, who founded GrowYourBusinessNetwork.com in Concord, Mass. "You can receive e-mail messages, surf the Web, make calls, conduct research, do teleconferences, schedule appointments, and do webcasts."

All you need is wireless access and your mobile device of choice. The tougher challenge, of course, is figuring out how to balance your personal life with your new flexibility of doing virtually any business task from any location.

As well, it's a good idea to set some personal rules: An important business call made from Disneyland with your kids might be better saved for your quiet hotel room that evening.