Let’s get started, shall we?
From managing finances and scheduling appointments to event management and social media marketing, virtual assistants can do a wide variety of different tasks.
But before we dive into the services offered by virtual assistants, you can skip ahead to this section if you want to know who a virtual assistant is. You can quickly scroll back here when done.
Let’s take a look at few types of tasks you can delegate to a virtual executive assistant:
Your role as a small business owner or an entrepreneur is to ensure business continuity.
To take your businesses to the next level, you should focus on core operations, strategic thinking, and creating new products and services. And for that, you need to clear your schedule of mundane tasks.
Fortunately, you can hire an administrative assistant to handle mundane tasks like:
It’s nearly impossible for an individual to handle multiple tasks like answering phone calls, emails, and scheduling appointments — while ensuring that they aren’t double booking.
This can lead to severe mismanagement that can affect an organization’s growth in the long run.
To avoid this, you can hire a virtual assistant with excellent organizational skills for managing common tasks like:
A virtual bookkeeping assistant can help you manage the day-to-day finances of your organization. They take the repetitive accounting load off your shoulders and help you focus your time on other essential tasks.
Additionally, bookkeeping VAs are experts in handling accounting systems that help them speed up their tasks.
You can delegate virtual assistant work such as:
Quality content writing has become one of the best digital marketing strategies. Blog posts can help boost search engine optimization and drive traffic to your website.
A VA who is skilled in content writing will be able to do the research, find engaging and beautiful images, upload articles to your blog, and more.
Additionally, your content writing VA can create content for:
Research is crucial for your company’s growth strategy. It provides insights into your business performance and market.
But whether it’s analyzing consumer trends, pulling info from a colocation data center or researching a potential client, data analysis can be time-consuming.
To save you time, you can utilize virtual assistance for research and business development tasks like:
Social media platforms like Twitter and Facebook have evolved into a driving force for digital marketing and SEO. They have not only provided a platform to connect with your followers but also increase your market reach.
You can engage with a larger audience by replying to comments, researching hashtags
creating relevant content, and more.
Though these social tasks are significant for marketing, they can be time-consuming for you as a business owner.
Don’t worry. You can hire a social media virtual assistant to:
Planning a business trip can take a lot of time and energy.
Virtual assistants are an excellent resource for finding hotels, booking airfares, and mapping out trip itineraries using research tools and review sites on the internet.
You can trust your virtual assistant with travel-related tasks like:
It’s a common misconception that you can hire a virtual assistant only for an office specific task.
However, this isn’t the case.
VAs are also perfectly capable of performing all the tasks that your in-house personal assistant can.
A virtual personal assistant will help you carry out the below list of tasks:
Now that we’ve discussed what a virtual assistant does, let’s explore more about them — who they are and how you can manage them.
A virtual assistant (VA) is an independent contractor who can carry out a variety of tasks like administration, management, and marketing for a business owner or organization.
These virtual professionals work remotely and can be based in any country, depending on your requirements and business hours.
And typically, virtual assistants are self-employed and offer services they are specialized in. These are trained professionals with certification for their VA work and could be running their own virtual assistant company.
But why should you hire a VA?
Here are some key reasons why you should hire a virtual office assistant to handle your tasks:
With the advancement in technology, several dedicated virtual assistant job boards and freelance marketplaces are now available to connect you with VAs across the globe.
With virtual assistants working remotely, communication can be a challenge.
Emails and chats are a great way to convey your messages. But navigating through endless email threads can become a hassle.
Moreover, you have no way of knowing which tasks your VA is working on in real-time.
To avoid this, you need some smart and dedicated software solutions.
Here are six essential online tools that can make collaborating with your virtual assistant a cakewalk:
Time Doctor is a powerful employee productivity and time management solution suitable for businesses of all sizes. It allows you to monitor your VA’s work hours and analyze their productivity.
Time Doctor’s paid plans start at $7/user per month. It also offers a 14-day free trial (no credit card required).
Slack is an online communication platform that helps you connect with your virtual assistants, teams, and clients.
Use this tool to create individual channels for each task, project, or team. You can also send direct messages to communicate urgent project needs with your VA.
Slack’s free plan includes access to a message history of 10,000 recent team messages, 10 app integrations, and one-on-one voice/video calls. Premium plans start at $8/user per month.
Zoom is a video conferencing tool that allows users to connect and collaborate through chats, audio calls, video meetings, and more. You can use this tool for one-on-one conversations, team meetings, and webinars.
Zoom’s free plan can host group meetings with up to 100 participants with a time limit of 40 minutes. Its paid plan starts at $149.90/license.
Google Workspace, formerly known as G-Suite, is a suite of tools like Docs, Sheet, and Slides. It can be used by individuals (for personal use), freelancer workers and, business professionals.
Gmail, Google Drive, and other Google apps are free for personal use. However, business plans start at $6/user per month and offer a 14-day free trial.
Asana is a project management tool that helps streamline tasks and project collaboration. You can use it to manage all project-related activities like file sharing, planning, setting goals, and more.
The Asana project management tool offers a free plan with unlimited tasks, projects, messages, and more. Paid plans start at $13.49/user per month.
Calendly is a calendar management and scheduling app that helps create available time slots and allows users to choose a meeting time via a link.
Free plan limited to one calendar connection per user. Paid plans start at $10/month.
Whether it’s calendar management, customer service, or managing finances, a good virtual assistant can help you with it. They allow business owners to focus on critical business activities while maintaining a healthy work-life balance.
But remember, security is also important for every business. While working remotely with virtual assistants increases the risk of security breaches, make sure to securely store passwords and keep the backup of important data.
You can only get the most out of virtual assistant services with effective communication and collaboration. Check out our list of essential tools above and choose the ones that fit your needs to get started right away.
