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Calling on virtual assistants to help you set up your project can be difficult if you have just started your business, and your budget has also just started … But as you develop and your time will become more and more precious, outsourcing certain aspects of your business to independent professionals can be a great source of help.

Some tasks may be left entirely to a third party, while others are part of a whole in which you must also participate. Either way, being able to rely on someone else makes you less stressed, more productive, and even earns more money (because you’re focusing on what you’re really good at). What else?

The right person can sometimes even ensure the proper development of your business without you having to intervene too much. But while you will have to get involved at one point or another, the benefits are indisputable.

Let’s take a closer look at how you go about finding all the help you need, including areas you might not have thought of.

Recruitment and administration

Most businesses, whether internet-based or not, usually use an assistant first. Virtual assistants work exclusively online and do all your administrative tasks for you. They are sometimes specialized in a particular field, for example, the management of social networks.

A virtual assistant can perform several administrative tasks for you, such as:

• Organize meetings
• Process your emails
• Train your new recruits
• Respond to your customers’ emails
• Sales/appointment management Manage your documents and keep your databases up to date
• Schedule interviews/guest posting opportunities
• Perform customer service
• Manage social media
• Reach out to potential joint venture opportunities
• Update your web site/post blog posts

Some of these tasks may take you a minute to get comfortable with having someone do on your behalf.  But take it from me.  The more you use your VA, the easier and more effective your relationship will be for both of you.

Encourage them to ask you as many questions as he needs before throwing him in the deep end. The clearer that you are on what you want done, the better job they will do.

Research

Having your VA perform research for your business is one of the most useful tasks to have them do and which can have a massive impact on your business. . Some of the things that can be researched by your VA are:

• Find relevant links and statistics to publish a blog post
• Create a comparative report on prices, advantages and disadvantages, and all other data to help you better manage your business or make you more aware of what your competitors are up to.
• Monitor the news in your sector to select the best information to relay via social networks

Your VA (aka “research assistant”) is your Google in the flesh. When you’re ready to hire a virtual assistant, think about the research you need for projects you want to accomplish that will take you time (without requiring a high level of expertise). Then write out general guidelines for the information you seek, as well as useful resources and your preferred presentation format.

Design and graphics

If you have little or no graphic design experience, don’t try to learn everything in record time when your time would be more profitable doing something else. Knowing the basics is good. But let the professionals do their job. You’ll get better results, faster.

The term “design” can refer to many things, depending on your business and your needs. Here are the fundamentals common to all companies:

Graphic design: brand assets (logos, style guide, letterhead), social networks (cover image), blog post graphics, etc.

• Web design: the look, feel, and structure of your website.
• Photography: portraits and stock images for your website.
• Video: content (to explain how your products work, for example) or marketing,

Whether it is scheduling, performing the task, editing/touching up, many VA’s can perform this at a high level.

Marketing

Without marketing, no one will know the products and services your business provides. Because to prospective customers, your business doesn’t exist.   In other words, you need to be marketing your business at all times.  When you first start out in business, it is typical you are doing either marketing or sales.  Having a VA can let you do the things that bring in more profits into your business as you focus on those activities.

There are many aspects to a marketing strategy. How can a VA help your marketing efforts?

• Engage with consumers via email
• Optimize the organic SEO of your website to increase traffic
• Use marketing content to convert your visitors into customers
• Use social networks to build good relationships with your customers and increase your sales
• Automate reminders and follow-ups based on your customers’ behavior on multiple channels
• Appear among the relevant results of internet searches thanks to CPC-based advertising (cost per click)
• Use press relations and influencers to reach new audiences
• Keep information on all these channels up to date.

This is an area where having a VA work on your behalf can put you ahead of your competition.  I have listed some very different skill sets above, so expect that you may need more than one to get everything done.  That is the beauty of having a VA.  They don’t have to be a 40 hour a week expense.  You can hire them part time to do a few hours a week (or whatever your budget can handle at the moment)

Sales

Hiring a full-time sales person or team for many companies can be a non-starter.  Especially, if you aren’t earning a bunch yet.  You might consider bringing in affiliate marketers to get the word out about your business and the products/services you offer. They will target and promote your services to their (usually large) audience in exchange for a commission on each sale.

Use your VA to research, find and built those affiliate relationships to the point they will bring you in to close the deal.

Create processes /polices

Perhaps you have been going so hard at your business that you either haven’t sat down (or just procrastinated doing so) implementing repeatable processes that insures your business runs smoothly.  Or maybe you never got around to creating terms and conditions for sales, return policies, customer service tracking, etc. (you can see the list can be long).  Maybe you need to implement a workflow that automates the work to move from one person to another?  Use your VA to do this for you by drafting documents that you sign off on.  There is nothing worse than a policy that you do not agree with being implemented on your behalf that puts you in a bad light with customers/prospects.  Take the time to review these items before putting them into practice.

Your takeaway…

Whether you hire one or a team of virtual assistants, there is no end in the ways they can help you automate your business processes and boost your business like never before!   Offloading the non-income generating tasks to a VA can be like jet fuel for your business when done correctly.

To do it right, start small and plan as your business grows, based on your needs. Start with the mundane, repeatable tasks.  When you see how much time that frees up for you, you can begin to expand on the concept.

Call To Action

Hiring a virtual assistant can be made easier when you follow an on-boarding procedure.  And you are in luck!  I have a free Virtual Assistant Onboarding Checklist for you.  Don’t minimize thinking that you got this.  A surprisingly high number of VA’s leave because they haven’t been properly given everything they need to do their job. It gives you guidelines and a checklist of everything you need to get your VA up and running as soon as possible.  Click here for the checklist.

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