Virtual assistant is a type of an online job in which a person works from his or her home office in an independent capacity for the client. The tasks performed by virtual assistants are diverse in their range and includes administrative services, digital marketing tasks, bookkeeping, web designing, blogging, graphic designing, scheduling client’s customer base or supplier chain activities, making phone calls on client’s behalf, looking after client’s email addresses, managing client’s events, social media campaigns management and even involve managing client’s personal tasks. In the recent years, many people have become more inclined towards working from home. Also the pandemic has forced people to continue their business activities in limited physical boundaries. This factor has created a sharp rise in the demand for virtual assistants.
Reasons Behind Hiring Virtual Assistants:
Some of the reasons for which virtual assistants are hired by employers most often by small start-ups and entrepreneurs instead of increasing workforce at the office place are listed below:
Enhancing Work Force Productivity: The key in any business either on small scale or large scale is to first focus on the technical details of the business venture and after that to focus on managing daily routine clerical tasks. Though businesses cannot afford to overlook the latter category of work, still it is observed that entrepreneurs can accelerate their profit stream if they manage to perfect the technical details of a business. This is the chief reason behind why businesses toady outsource back-room tasks to virtual assistants in order to be able to focus on enhancing technical work force productivity and responding to their requirements in accordance to rapidly changing business dynamics.
Outsourcing is Cheap: Outsourcing costs less in comparison to opting for permanent staffing by eliminating expenses related to in-house training, provision of office space and office supplies and amount incurred on infrastructure and number of personnel needed by HR department to hire and train new employees. Hence, making use of virtual assistants as online employees is cost efficient.
Faster Service Provision: Virtual assistants help entrepreneurs in faster provision of business service to the target customer base by eliminating the need to invest time on secondary tasks. Thus by saving time, businesses are able to focus on technical production refinements which enhances productivity and consequently boost company’s bottom line figure.
Developing a Career as a Virtual Assistant:
Most people assume that freelancers or virtual assistants are in this field on a part-time basis just to make a side income. However with the shift in world’s dynamics towards online workers, more and more people are adopting this field as a full-time job. There are few tips and tricks which virtual assistants can use to match their income stream to the income stream generated by a professional vacancy.
Online Certifications: There are a lot of online courses and certifications that are available now with the purpose of providing proper educational training on various technicalities involved in this field. An individual can complete such a course at his or her own pace within a specified time and at the end of the said time period, a test is conducted after which digital certification document is issued. This not only enhances your knowledge base as a virtual assistant but also establishes your credibility in front of clients even if you are just a beginner in this field.
Professionalism at Home: Majority of virtual assistants carry out their assigned tasks from their home space. While on the one hand this practice saves times spent on commuting and gives flexible working hours, on the other hand, it is very difficult to operate from the comfortable and interactive home environment. Successful virtual assistants are observed to follow the practice of dedicating specific hours for their work completion at a secluded disturbance free space within their home. This practice helps freelancers in effective and efficient time management which is one of the most important factors in virtual assistants’ work life.
Specialization Makes You Pro: Rather than working on a number of different projects belonging to different niches, try to figure it out which niche attracts you the most and in which you feel comfortable working in. Focus on a particular area of interest and make yourself an expert in it. Since experts get the highest pay rate in any niche, this strategy will help strengthen your income in the long run.
Summary:
Virtual assistants provide numerous benefits to entrepreneurs and also this field can be adopted as a professional career.
Frequently Asked Questions:
1) What does a virtual assistant need to know?
Virtual assistants must possess the know-how of basic software tools like MS-Word and MS-Excel. Also, they need to have thorough understanding of the search engine tools as finding content is the most important aspect of freelancing and VA’s job descriptions’.
2) What can a virtual assistant do for you?
Virtual assistants perform a diverse range of jobs for their clients including administrative services, scheduling clients’ appointments and meetings, supervision of email accounts, supervision of social media accounts, digital marketing services, blog posts’ writing, data entry and similar clerical nature tasks.
3) How many hours a week do virtual assistants work?
There is no hard and fast rule in this regard. Actual time spent on this job depends on whether an individual is pursuing his/her career as a virtual assistant on a part time basis or as a full time job. Generally, people perform their virtual assistant job as a part time position.
4) What educational requirements are needed to become a virtual assistant?
Virtual assistants are hired on the basis of their skill set and portfolio. Education does not play a direct and active role in the hiring process of virtual assistants. Writing and communication skills are of utmost important in this job area.
5) From where entrepreneurs can hire virtual assistants?
Upwork, Freelancemyway, Guru, Fiverr, PeoplePerHour, Freelancer, Simply Hired, Aquent, are some of the most popular websites to hire virtual assistants. In addition to freelancing websites, there are freelancing agencies from which clients also hire virtual assistants.
6) Are virtual assistants considered employees?
Virtual assistants also known as freelancers are usually not hired as full time employees. Rather they are viewed as contractors for a specific task.
7) What are virtual assistant skills?
Since virtual assistant job is a remotely based position, ability to communicate your ideas to recruiter and ability to effectively listen recruiter’s instructions are the two most essential skills. Another important skill for freelancers is self-discipline and time-management as there is no one to supervise them directly, they need to act like their own boss and ensure quality service provision.
8) How much does a virtual assistant make?
Pay rate of virtual assistants depend on a number of factors like their experience level, specialty field, knowledge base of various SEO tools, geographical area, type of virtual assistant, full-time or part-time preference and rating provided by freelancing websites.