What is a Virtual Assistant?

A virtual assistant is a professional working for a company at payroll and he or she is offering assistance to various departments of an organization. This is one of the popular beneficial services taken by both small and big businesses to cut-short expenses and enhance productivity.

Some of the common services offered by a virtual assistant are data mining, eCommerce management, virtual administration management, project management, market research, information retrieval, general to advance back-office jobs, customer care support to name a few.

A virtual assistant can be a freelancer too. Though they have a less chance to be hired as big companies look for a registered company to play the role in offering services. It is observed that the number of companies hiring such companies increased in number because of their infrastructure and services that practically assures complete replacement of physical employees of certain fields.

Many of the popular services given by a virtual assistant can be subscribed by startups because of its affordability and delivery of work via the internet. As the internet is promising new opportunities for entrepreneurs to try their luck, this group of virtual professionals is also striving in this age of the internet.

What is a virtual assistant according to TaskVirtual’s CEO?

A virtual assistant is a multi-tasker working online and offering virtual services to various businesses. He or she has the capacity to learn quickly and deliver resolution on time so that a company’s productivity gets increased and extra expenses are curved. Such professionals are usually flexible and go through a series of combined training to fulfill the process of the various tasks of businesses.

What is a Virtual Assistant Service?

A virtual assistant service is a service offered through electronic platforms that include; email, project management system, secured server arena, and internet-based phones. This means the person involved in offering assistance and communicating with a client works virtually and there is no physical involvement. 

A team of virtual office assistants offers his or her service to businesses related to real estate, law firms, designer houses, professionals like doctors, writers, painters, busy CEOs of top companies, and many more. Some of the leading businesses of garments, beverages, sports gears, etc hire such professionals for their specific purpose.

The services offered by a virtual assistant does not depend on any contract. You can leverage them as long as you want them to. You can remove them out of their service whenever you would want. They work on either pay per hour basis or project basis. 

A virtual assistant is hired by popular companies like Amazon, Google, Walmart, and many more. They help in enhancing business productivity, reduce extra expenses, accelerate smooth communication between several corporate houses, induce effective management of projects, and there are many more.

What is a Virtual Assistant Benefit?

Here are the awesome benefits of a team of virtual assistants that are worth considering

#1

A virtual assistant gives you a completely stress-free life. Being an entrepreneur means so much to handle every day. Phone calls, meetings often become troublesome to handle and personal life often gets affected. So the benefit is here as you can put the weight of responsibility to someone who could manage most of your work and life goes easy.

#2

A virtual assistant helps you save money in business. When you hire an office assistant, a huge costing is involved in the name of training, casual leaves, recruitment, infrastructure, etc. While if you hire a VA then there is no involvement of additional infrastructure and training. They already have those and you also do not have to pay for insurance, bear the cost of yearly leaves. Besides, the hiring cost is based on – Pay/Hour, Pay/Project, and others.

Grab this opportunity to get huge savings on all our VA PLANS

#3

A virtual assistant company offers you a one-stop solution to all your needs. You do not need to reach several other companies to meet your digital needs. Such a company can provide you services ranging from appointment scheduling, digital marketing, eCommerce management, email management, content writing, and many more. The best part is that all the services are based on a subscription where charges are applied hourly or minutes basis.

#4

A virtual assistant company can help you manage your projects efficiently. You do not need to pour so much time on it. They are experienced and trained in organizing tasks and respond to queries at the earliest. 

#5

A virtual assistant can also manage your personal wanting. He or she can find out the best deals of products or services from the internet. Moreover, you can also use them towards fulfilling personal needs such as online shopping, flight booking and securing a seat at a baseball game, and many more.

#6

A virtual assistant can ease your pressure towards managing 1000+ products in your online shopping store and compare pricing with your competitors. The best part is that when you will hire them the work can be processed overnight and there could be no chance of any delay. This can be taken as an advantage. 

#7

Lastly but certainly, a virtual assistant can remind you about day to day tasks, upcoming meetings, planned holidays ahead of you, attend vital phone calls when you are busy, etc. Besides, one of the assured benefits of hiring such people is a well managed and balanced system will be there in your corporate life.

What is a Virtual Assistant’s role in Business?

The answer to what a virtual assistant does from a virtual office platform to develop business are given below with detailed explanations.

#1

A Virtual Assistant performs a wide range of administrative tasks. They perform appointment scheduling and phone call answering so that you don’t miss any important messages or meeting of clients. He or she can also book a flight/bus/train for you so that you get the best deal and easily reach your goal on time.

Moreover, a team of virtual office assistants can perform project management, work as a virtual coordinator, track multiple tasks, record data in the database, maintain daily attendance records, perform data processing, and miscellaneous administrative work such as calendar invitation and scheduling appointments.

#2

A virtual assistant is an efficient calendar manager, he or she can organize daily routine and makes sure there is no gridlock in your schedules. Life in the office and at home could appear very easy in the beginning due to less work pressure, however, as your business would expand, pressure and schedules would enhance more, one mistake could lead to disaster, and here a virtual assistant could organize everything such that you set off for your goal in a systematic manner.

Besides, a group of virtual executive assistants can remind you from time to time about periodic schedules, update necessary changes related to official meetings and holidays, write notes about your plans for a specific data, and many more. Calendar management is very important for startups and top-notch CEOs.

#3

A Virtual Assistant is also a Virtual Marketing Assistant when it comes to marketing on the internet. These virtual assistants can do social media marketing for your business. Social media platforms include; Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Tumbler, and many more. A virtual assistant can be area-specific. Based on your requirements, they can design eye-striking posts and help you reach the right audiences on various social media platforms.

What makes a virtual assistant different from an ordinary digital marketeer is that he or she can play an important job role as an internet marketing and brand advisor. You can observe their logical insights towards providing a good strategy that can enhance brand exposure online. Furthermore, they can use analytics to understand the market, consumer behavior, and device an ad campaign accordingly.

#4

A Virtual Assistant, being area-specific too, can write compelling content for your website, advertising campaigns, and products. They can perform blog posting and manage them at the same time. They can skillfully insert keywords in the content such that it helps in search engine optimization. You can instruct them to write good product reviews and get a viable output.

Then again, a virtual assistant can do copy-writing and proofreading. They use advanced software to detect sentences and grammatical errors. You can also leverage them to write persuasive content for taglines, slogan, video content, transcript, and many more. Content is king and they know how to make the right one for you.

#5

You can hire a virtual assistant to perform business research for you. Such research includes; competitor’s products and reviews, manufacturer or supplier of a particular niche, the modern format of any official document, reliable professionals in the market, and many more. Today, everything happens fast, markets are volatile and customer demands are unpredictable, for researching the smartest way to catch viable data is what is needed to shine.

A virtual assistant can perform comparative analysis, document verification, data analysis, flaw findings, information retrieval from multiple journals, and authentic sources for the next business strategy. You can also leverage their research skills to track the pricing of products across various eCommerce stores so that you can buy the most cheaper one. They can further give your information about the opinion of clients from several relevant sources as well.

#6

Virtual executive assistants can play a pivotal role in handling your customer queries after a short concise training from your side. We all know customer’s queries are very important and as the stats say that 2 out 5 customers would not do business with you if their queries are left unattended. So you need some virtual assistants team working on this particular task 24 hours and 365 days so that no stones are left turned.

As you can understand that, a virtual assistant can also work for you as a virtual receptionist where he or she can perform basic to advance data entry, manage your office virtually, perform appointment booking, etc. You do not have to recruit an office receptionist as when you hire such individuals from a company then you can be rest assured that your back-office job is handled by an experienced and talented person working remotely.

#7

It will be unwise to hire a graphics designer to create social media posts. Any Virtual assistant is trained in online graphics tools like Canva, Gravit designer, etc to create super quality infographics, brochures, business cards, and other designs for stealing the glances of your potential audiences.

A powerful graphics can help you earn more brand trust and convey your product/service message to the relevant audiences. They can also analyze and evaluate your ideas and make an illustration that could convey your ideas to the public. A virtual assistant company verily train their professionals in the creative art where they can think our of the box and make something compelling and eye-catchy.

#8

A perfect email marketing strategy and management can yield plenty of leads that could be converted to establish a robust network of clients. A virtual assistant can skillfully set up your email, reply to any relevant query, filter out spam and other unwanted emails, and the same time fire email marketing campaigns to bring loads of sales. They know how to create a perfect Email Subject that sells.

#9

A virtual assistant could also work as an excellent personal assistant. He or she will find you the best deals and present them in front of you so that you can buy it for a birthday present and make your dear one happy. They can also book a travel tour package and help you collect information about the places you want to visit with your family or friends.

This virtual assistant can manage your wellness, find the best doctors or salons for you, collect information about the places you want to visit. They can act as a reliable tour planner, book flight or bus tickets for you at an affordable price, harmonize your personal and corporate life, and many more.

#10

A virtual assistant can format any documents, edit the structure, and reformat them according to your instruction. Besides, they can record data on spreadsheets efficiently, and based on your requirement they can also perform V Lookup & H Lookup. You can also find these remote assistants to be excellent database managers.

They have in-depth knowledge about data mining, data processing, database management and online tools to record sensitive data. After a basic idea of the subject matter, they can process your data as you will mention in the dashboard.

Are they Reliable?

Virtual Assistant is Trainable

They work under team leaders and supervisors. A virtual assistant is given the necessary training and efficiently complete the task handed over to them. Since the products and services of different companies vary, all you need to do is to give a short training over your task and they are all ready to go. Common tasks such as database management and bookkeeping do not need training.

Virtual Assistant can be Anybody

Because we are trainable, we can be effective virtual receptionist processing customer support tasks or effective personal assistants. As long as a virtual assistant have the right tools and given precise goals and instructions, they can get the job done.

Virtual Assistant works while you sleep

A virtual office assistant can work while you sleep or even during your business hours, depending on the client’s request. Yes, VAs are versatile and flexible like that.

Virtual Assistant provides recommendations

If we think your current system or methods aren’t providing enough, it is a virtual assistant who can suggest ways and methods that can help you reach your goals better.

Virtual Assistant is Resourceful

We are a go-to person for information. A virtual assistant might not know everything about your business, but we have a system in place which allows you to get the best fit virtual assistant for your process. We have an adequate task force with us which can help you in many streams like Digital Marketing, Content Writing, Transcription, Data Entry, Receptionist, etc.

 Virtual Assistant offers Scalable Service

There will come a time when you need to keep up with demand, which will require more hands-on deck. A virtual executive assistant is skilled and trained in crafts and are ready to hit the ground running as an when required. They are flexible and ready to work on your project no matter how challenging it is. Besides, they are open to feedback and they operate in a high tech advanced ambiance.

We have given a lovely info-graphic highlighting the summary of why a virtual assistant is reliable..

What are the different types of Virtual Assistant?

Virtual Office  Assistants are classified into 10 types. Their remote services depend on the business requirements in question.

Virtual Assistant for Real Estate

This type of virtual assistant deals with the remote tasks corresponding to real estate administrative tasks, data mining, spreadsheet maintenance (dealing with recording taxation, information of properties, property owners, and documents about deeds), calendar management, appointment booking, manual property booking, call forwarding and many more.

Such individuals specialized in these works and is hired by real estate businesses to meet their demands. The most important work of a real estate virtual assistant is optimizing the work of property builders, brokers, agents so that they can reduce costs and invest more focus on business expansion.

Virtual Assistant for Social Media

This type of virtual assistant deals with social media handling and other works associated with it. Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and others are very important platforms to reach the right targets. Brand promotion is not possible without social media platforms.

Such specialized virtual assistants know where to target the right audience and what type of post could steal their glances. He or she can also advise you on the right social media tactics and maintain your social media accounts so that you can ease your focus there and contemplate more on your business services/products.

You can leverage a group of virtual assistants to run paid ad campaigns and periodic social media posts to reach potential audiences across the Globe.

Virtual Assistant for Research

Research is mandatory for any business to find the right data and act accordingly. A virtual assistant specialized in market research can fetch the finest information on practically anything there on the internet or beyond that too.

Research can be on anything, it could be on a product suitable for your business in the wholesale form, it could be also a relevant supplier of your product and many more. The most vital function of such dedicated virtual assistants is in firing a marketing campaign. You need tonnes of data to target a particular section of target and convert them to sales.

Research work could be done quickly by such a virtual assistant working 24 hours as a team. You can also leverage them to find the best deals and discounts offered on flight booking, topnotch electronic items, movie tickets, and many more.

Virtual Assistant for eCommerce

One of the popular business trends is eCommerce. At the onset of online business, you can upload products, manage them, write content, and process other works. However, as the online shopping platform would expand who then will handle such a mega store? Here a virtual assistant can do the job at a very affordable rate and perform vital tasks such as order processing, shopping cart management, and managing new arrivals. They can also do content creation.

At that time, eCommerce virtual assistants will play a huge role in managing and running your entire online store. You can find a virtual executive assistant expert in uploading product images, coupon codes, managing new arrivals, putting off “out of stock” products, and many other task processing. They can even write relevant content of products and update the old ones as required.

Virtual Assistant for Graphics

This type of virtual assistant could design excellent graphics for your social media and blog posts. They leverage online graphics tools such as Canva, Gravit, Easely.ly, etc to create super quality infographics that convey the deepest insights of your business to the right audiences.

If you strive to hire a professional graphics designer then he or she might charge huge, whereas a virtual assistant can do the same but at a very affordable rate and also fast. Besides, virtual assistant companies assign agents for 24 hours in order to finish your tasks efficiently and on time as well.

Virtual Assistant for Technical Troubleshooting

Nowadays it is expensive to establish a technical team on the work floor and subject technical troubleshooting. Moreover, as businesses are getting more and more reliant on technology, enabling technical professionals on each task is more difficult in terms of quickness and other factors.

A technical virtual assistant can offer complete technical resolution anytime you wish. You can get a remote assistant, set up your Gmail client, enable DNS configuration, create a blog out of WordPress, and several other technical things at the same subscription plan displayed by them while signing up.

Virtual Assistant for Personal Demands

When your business will be more experienced, you might hardly get time to focus on your personal needs. A personal need could be anything, it could be your dream to give your wife something beautiful or looking for a ticket at the front seat of the cinema hall or anything else.

Here a virtual assistant would play the perfect role in fulfilling personal needs. they can find you an ideal gift present online or book a perfect hotel for your vacation at the best rates.

Virtual Assistant for Bookkeeping

Such a virtual assistant could help in maintaining the account details of your company. They can process any tasks related to your Paypal, Payoneer, and other payment gateways, especially in those areas where you need the expertise of an accountant. Other works that could be processed by them are taxation and preparing the papers of it.

Usually, these professionals are hired by law firms, real estate firms, and several other small businesses to multinational companies. They are also effective in dealing with eCommerce accounts related tasks. Bookkeeping is very important for businesses. The presence of an adroit accountant can help in managing and processing daily or monthly bookkeeping tasks.

Virtual Assistant for Internet Marketing

Such a virtual assistant would perform digital marketing for your brand or business. They also do search engine optimization and social media marketing so that your brand gets maximum exposure to the right audiences ion the internet. Since the internet is a potential platform you can easily hire them to start internet marketing campaigns quicker. Such a virtual assistant is also an expert in analyzing the audiences with the accurate and quick help of analytic Software tools such as Google Trends, Google Analytics, and many more.

Virtual Assistant for Administrative Tasks

Such a virtual assistant performs various administrative works of an organization that ranges from project management to handling client’s live issues to email handling. They are hired by small to big companies in order to make their daily work easier. A virtual administrative assistant could further help in maintaining smooth communication between organizational hierarchy.

One of the important tasks of this type of virtual assistant is to process paper works related to administration. This can involve human resource work, recruitment, preparing a checklist of manufacturing items, analyzing supply chain, tracking work progress inside the organization, playing the role of a virtual manager, coordinating between the management and employees, and there are many more.

What is the Difference Between Virtual Assistants & Office Assistants?

Virtual Assistant is a virtual employee. There are 5 differences to be precise. This will make you understand what will indeed make you save more money and accelerate the revenue figures.

#1

Virtual Assistants work virtually, therefore no need for any investment in setting up relevant infrastructure and medium of processing tasks. Office Assistant works inside the office, therefore there is a need for investments in terms of relevant infrastructures such as a computer, chair, and others.

#2

Virtual Assistant does need any insurance, casual leaves, weekly offs, and bonuses, and thus you do not have to bear extra expenses here also. However, in the case of Office Assistant, you need to bear the extra expenses of the aforementioned parts.

#3

Virtual Assistants come with years of experience and skills. You do not have to train them as only a short training over your company’s intent would do a lot. In the case of an Office Assistant, you have to hire different employees for different types of work. However, if you hire a virtual assistant company then you just need to subscribe to a plan, let’s say – 120 minutes plan. Here, if you have two tasks to process, then will assign two types of assistants who would work virtually over two different tasks, one hour each and the charges will on minutes spend.

#4

When you shall hire a Virtual Assistant then you will be charged in 4 ways – Pay/Hour, Pay/Minute, Pay/Project & Pay as you Go. On another hand, you have to pay a salary as you hire an Office Assistant. Thus, you can observe, on hiring the former you are spending less compared to the expenses involved in the latter.

#5

Virtual Assistants work on the basis of a task, so if you have a task that needs to be operated for 30 hours, then in the same charge you will be assigned 2 VAs. The charges remain the same. In the case of Office Assistant, separate expenses are involved if they are to work in different shifts or overtime.

Throughout this section, you have realized the main difference is in how much savings you are getting from a Virtual Assistant in contrast to an Office Assistant. This article explains and clears many doubts of people. On complete reading, it will slowly and steadily help people understand how these virtual professionals can help businesses grow. 

TaskVirtual is a reliable and experienced virtual assistant company successfully working and coordinating with a large number of small to medium-sized businesses in North America, Europe, Middle-East, and South Asia Pacific. In this corona-virus crisis, we are reaching thousands of businesses and helping them keeping us in their work process. We are offering a good offer to the businesses willing to join us.

Each and every virtual assistant of our company are experienced and talented. they are ready to hear from you. Once you have subscribed and offered us a task, we are ready to make the move. We are ready to show our skills and make you thrive.