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Should You Really Hire a Virtual Personal Assistant? Here’s Your Answer

Posted on May 9, 2023June 6, 2023 by officebeacon

With the growth of a company, its demands, and needs also grow. Therefore, keeping track of daily mundane tasks and expanding your business becomes difficult. There comes a considerable need for external support that you might not get from your in-house team. It is where virtual assistants come in.

Thanks to the pandemic, their popularity has increased, and more businesses have realized the true impact of hiring a virtual personal assistant. Let’s look at what these virtual personal assistants can offer and if hiring them is worthwhile.

What Do You Mean By Virtual Assistants?

As the name suggests, a virtual assistant is a remote working employee that offers additional support to your business. Their goal is to free up your time so you can focus on crucial tasks like increasing the profitability of your business.

A virtual assistant performs a myriad of valuable tasks, such as managing emails, handling administrative tasks, scheduling meetings, and more. They are well-versed with the latest tools and software that may help them work smart and offer quick turnarounds. A virtual assistant can help you improve productivity by 13%, making them a valuable asset for your company.

What Are the Responsibilities of a Virtual Personal Assistant

Let’s say you want to hire a virtual personal assistant, but you don’t know how their services can be relevant to you. In a broad sense, a virtual personal assistant can carry out any back-end or admin task, remotely. Read below to understand a few basic tasks a personal assistant can help you with.

1. Email Management

As a business owner, your inbox is often flooded with promotional messages, client queries, meeting requests, and whatnot. There's not enough time to skim through the spam and reply to each mail. A virtual personal assistant organizes your inbox, so you can quickly respond to the priority emails and ignore the spam. Furthermore, the assistant can reply directly to simple customer emails and carry out mundane communication tasks to free your time.

2. Social Media Management

If your business has a social media presence, it's imperative to build on that to increase brand awareness. Virtual personal assistants help you strengthen your social media strategy through regular social media posts, responding to customer queries, and even running social media ads.

3. Bookkeeping

Don't have the budget to hire a full-time accountant but need someone to carry out your basic bookkeeping tasks? Hire a part-time personal assistant to take care of such needs! Most virtual personal assistants can complete bookkeeping tasks such as entering data, reviewing inventory, reconciling bank accounts, maintaining financial records, approving invoices, etc.

Also read: 9 Practical Ways Virtual Accounting And Bookkeeping Can Improve Your Bottom Line

4. Travel Arrangements

Constant traveling is part of growing your business, but it can get tricky and time-consuming if you take care of such arrangements yourself. Hire a personal assistant to complete such tasks while you focus on other essential things. From booking tickets to arranging a comfortable stay, a virtual assistant makes your life easier.

5. Scheduling Appointments/ Meetings

As a busy entrepreneur, you do not have the time to keep track of your daily engagements and coordinate with other parties. Moreover, delegating this task to any of your employees will waste their productive time. A virtual personal assistant is a team player who will take care of back-end tasks to enhance your company's productivity. They will create e-invites, coordinate with clients and organize meetings/appointments at a suitable time for you.

Outsource Your Day-to-Day Hassles to an Office Beacon Personal Assistant

The Benefits of Hiring a Virtual Personal Assistant

Hiring a virtual personal assistant has been a game-changer for several business owners. Essentially, they are the external support your business needs to complement what it lacks internally. Here are some compelling benefits that will convince you to hire a virtual personal assistant today.

1. Work-Life Balance

The constant hustle of running a business can often blur the boundaries between work and personal space, making it challenging to balance both aspects of your life. Hiring a virtual personal assistant will lessen the workload, giving you more space to stay balanced and focused. According to the Harvard Business Review, learning how to delegate puts you one step closer to being a great leader. It enables you to spend time on other priorities like building your business and focusing on your personal life.

2. Cost-Friendly

Hiring a full-time employee is cheaper than hiring a virtual personal assistant. Full-time employees need high salaries and are entitled to employee benefits. At the same time, a virtual assistant doesn't require high-end benefits. Furthermore, your virtual personal assistant wouldn't need an office or other physical resources because everything would be done remotely. Thus, hiring a virtual personal assistant is not only beneficial but also affordable.

3. Expertise

Virtual personal assistants usually specialize in multiple domains due to the nature of their work. However full-time employees generally come with a special industry background. Thus, your versatile personal assistant can replace multiple in-house positions at a nominal rate. This is especially useful when you are cash-strapped or just starting up. Virtual personal assistants are a sure-shot way to get more done with minimal expense.

4. Time-friendly

Hire a virtual personal assistant to work on time-consuming administrative tasks and decrease your workload. They specialize in several areas and can quickly adapt to your business requirements. As a business owner, it helps you quickly free up your time and focus on your core responsibilities.

5. Flexibility

You can hire virtual personal assistants from anywhere, so they are compatible with working in different time zones. You are not limited to your business hours to complete your workload. These hardworking virtual personal assistants are available according to your schedule and can complete the job within your deadline.

6. Scalability

Another attractive benefit of hiring a virtual personal assistant is that you can tailor their services according to your needs. As your business grows, you can scale the assistant's workload. Whether adding more tasks or decreasing them, the assistant will adapt to your needs accordingly.

This flexibility makes it easy to manage your budget and ensures you only pay for the support you need when needed. Additionally, by scaling your virtual personal assistant's workload, you can ensure they can always provide high-quality support and that you are getting the best possible value for your investment.

The Drawbacks of Hiring a Virtual Personal Assistant

Here are some foreseen challenges you might have to face if you're hiring a virtual personal assistant.

1. Potential Miscommunication

Working with a virtual personal assistant eliminates the possibility of face-to-face contact, which can result in miscommunication. Dealing with delicate or complex jobs that demand a high degree of knowledge and clarity can make it more difficult. These risks can be minimized by following clear communication guidelines and scheduling frequent check-ins.

2. Security Concerns

Most business owners are worried about data breaches when they hire a virtual personal assistant. Sharing highly confidential information becomes difficult and interrupts the workflow. Putting data safety measures in place or outsourcing these assistants from a company that guarantees data protection is recommended.

3. Technological Problems

Since all of their work is online virtual personal assistants must have reliable access to technology. Any technological problems will interfere with their daily communication and completion of tasks. These assistants must have some knowledge or training to troubleshoot simple tech issues to improve their workflow.

4. Building Relationships

It can be challenging to connect and build a strong working relationship with a virtual personal assistant as they are not physically present at work. Moreover, they might feel alienated as they don't get a chance to socialize with other employees and participate in the company culture. Virtual social events and team-building activities can help you solve this issue.

The Solution to Your Pain Points

Now that you know the benefits and drawbacks of hiring a virtual personal assistant, you have a good idea about their potential. However, these drawbacks may hold you back from hiring them. What if we told you there's a way to hire a virtual personal assistant without any hassles?

Office Beacon is an industry-leading company that helps businesses outsource required services. Our virtual personal assistants are heavily trained and have years of experience working in several industry verticals. We have legal checks in place to protect any sensitive client information that's shared. Moreover, our assistants are internally managed, so you don't have to go through hiring, managing, or training them.

Get your time back with Office Beacon VA

To Conclude

It is fair to say that in today’s competitive landscape, virtual personal assistants have become indispensable. Many business owners have attested to the fact that hiring a virtual personal assistant has changed their life. Not only are they observing much more positive changes in their business, but they also have time to relax and focus on their personal lives. Based on the information presented above, it is highly recommended that you should hire a virtual personal assistant from Office Beacon.

Is a Remote Assistant Worth the Investment?

Posted on February 17, 2023July 25, 2023 by officebeacon

Many successful business owners believe that true leadership lies in delegating. When you are too busy building your empire, it’s redundant for you to spend your valuable time, money, and effort on small, mundane things. However, this doesn’t mean that the said tasks aren’t necessary.

Administrative tasks are crucial in the company’s grand scheme to work smoothly. It would help if you had someone in your corner. Meet remote assistants; they are the pillar of support for businesses worldwide. So what does a remote virtual assistant do? Are they worth your money? Read more to know!

CTA to download Office Beacon's virtual assistant service guide

What is a Remote Assistant?

A remote assistant is someone a company/ entrepreneur hires to outsource all their admin/business operations. Outsourcing has been one of the biggest trends of the past year. According to Deloitte's 2022 Global Outsourcing Survey, the total outsourcing expenses will exceed $971.2 billion by 2023. Think of remote assistants as a personal all-in-one tool. Whether sending out emails, scheduling appointments, or handling calls, your remote executive assistant controls everything.

What Services Can a Remote Assistant Offer?

The remote assistant can provide many services depending on the company's needs and wants. Some of the most common ones are:

Email Inbox Management

Answering emails and communicating with your clients will keep your business running, but you will notice that most of the correspondence exchanges add more workload. Your virtual executive assistant can save time and keep emails organized by sorting them priority-wise, forwarding or replying to emails, sending e-invites, managing your subscriptions, and sending follow-up or reminder emails. A dedicated remote virtual assistant ensures you are directed toward emails that need your attention and lessens your burden.

Appointment Setting

As a busy business owner, it can be hard to keep track of all the dairy bookings/appointments, let alone find ample time to coordinate these meetings. While you focus on building your corporate empire, your remote assistant will handle all the back-end tasks for you. They have got you covered, from managing your day-to-day calendar to organizing virtual and in-person meetings and scheduling appointments. Furthermore, you can also task them with handling your travels and planning trips.

Social Media Management

Why hire a social media manager or agency when your remote assistant can do the job for you? Many remote assistants are skilled and have years of experience handling social media accounts for businesses. Your company can benefit from inexpensive but efficient social media marketing strategies. A virtual assistant remotely working can create content calendars, track analytics and help your account grow.

Content/CRM Management

CRM systems can be tricky to handle and take up a considerable amount of your time. Instead of overwhelming yourself with these CRM platforms, let your remote assistant handle it. They will manage and polish your content on various platforms like WordPress, Drupal, Magento, etc. These assistants are also skilled in preparing presentations for projects or meetings, conducting content research, publishing blogs, and more.

Transcriptions

A remote assistant can come in really handy if your business model relies heavily on audio and video recordings. They will edit the audio and visual recordings into 100% accurate written content. A remote executive assistant can provide transcription services for various industries, such as interrogation transcription for legal purposes, time coding, subtitling, documentaries, medical transcriptions, etc. It saves your time and gives you the information needed efficiently.

Workflow Coordination

Get back hours in your workday by hiring a remote assistant. They will carry out mundane tasks like tracking deliverables, compiling meeting minutes, filing and organizing e-files, managing spreadsheets, and cleaning up any cloud or drive accounts. These activities may seem trivial, but they significantly impact your workflow and increase productivity. Your remote assistant makes your business easier to manage by coordinating with your employees, vendors, and tasks.

Event Management

Planning and organizing a conference, team event, or workshop is tiring and stressful. There are a lot of aspects to it, such as finding a venue, catering, promoting, inviting guests, and so on. You need an assistant on your team who can help with all the details. A remote assistant will help you find the best vendors for your event at a budget-friendly price. They will ensure that every part of the event is perfectly organized and oversee the successful execution.

Human Resource Support

Your remote assistant can lessen the workload of the HR team by helping them with various administrative activities. They can post job listings on social networking websites like LinkedIn to attract talented people. Remote assistants also pre-screen these potential applicants and set up interviews for you. Other than that, they can also lend a hand in employee management and workforce planning.

Data Entry

Data entry can be highly complicated and time-consuming, and if it’s not done right, it can lead to business problems. The remote assistant will precisely enter any numerical or alphabetical data into the database. The information is presented so that it can be easily accessed and understood. A skilled remote virtual assistant is on top of the current data entry norms and technology standards to cater to your data entry requirements.

Bookkeeping

It is yet another helpful service provided by remote assistants. Any financially competent business y needs meticulous bookkeeping. Unfortunately, most business owners have too much on their plate or do not have the required knowledge to carry out accounting tasks. Additionally, hiring an accountant can be expensive. Your remote assistant can be your in-house bookkeeper. They can perform tasks like processing invoices, taxes, monitoring cash flows, etc.

What Qualities Should a Remote Assistant Possess?

There are specific criteria the remote assistant must qualify for before you hire them. These criteria are a benchmark of a great remote assistant. Evaluating the individual based on them tells us if they have potential and are suitable to work with you. Some of these qualities are:

Communication

Since the work will be completely offline, strong communication forms the foundation of a good working relationship. The remote assistant should be proficient in English and any other language relevant to your business.

Time Management

You're investing in a remote assistant to save time and money, and they should be able to do the same. Prioritizing tasks, daily appointments, scheduling meetings with clients, etc., should be made to make your life easier. Furthermore, the remote virtual assistant should be a stickler for deadlines.

Tech-Savviness

Digital tools are the backbone of a world of virtual assistants. A 2022 Statista report states that 79% of remote assistants have been using digital tools for digital transformation. Being well-versed in technology will make the assistant's daily tasks more efficient and increase the company's productivity.

Attention to Detail

The remote assistant should have a keen eye for intricate details. They should double-check any form of content or communication that goes out publicly or to the clients. Small mistakes in scheduling or messages can harm the company's reputation.

How Will Hiring a Remote Assistant Benefit You?

In today's cut-throat corporate world, you need someone to help you manage your business. Remote assistants are the all-in-one go-to individuals for several companies worldwide. Now that you know what to look for in a remote executive assistant, let's talk about the benefits you will reap by hiring a remote assistant.

Higher Productivity

The data collected by Stanford University shows that remote workers are 13% more productive than in-house employees. They take fewer breaks and have more time, space, and energy to work. It means they can complete all their tasks efficiently, which leads to increased profits and helps your business grow.

Work-Life Balance

Throwing yourself at work will eventually lead to burnout. Since you will be delegating mundane tasks to a remote assistant, it frees up your schedule to spend time on something worthwhile. In an interview with VirtuDesk, 84.4% of the business owners said their business had a positive impact since hiring a remote assistant. Furthermore, 3.1% of the entrepreneurs also witnessed a similar effect on their personal lives.

Cost-Savings

Even though you might have to pay them a little more than your in-house employee, remote assistants save you money. You save a lot on operating benefits (about 78%, according to data!) It is because they are not liable for benefits like insurance, training resources, and other employee benefits.

Greater Flexibility

Hiring a remote assistant allows you to build an efficient team and help you retain talent. Since their schedule is flexible, they will be less prone to stress or burnout, which invariably allows them to carry out all tasks successfully. Moreover, business owners don't have to worry about constant absenteeism or tardiness with a flexible work schedule. A survey suggests that 43% of these workers felt that flexibility helped them be more productive.

Why Business Owners Find it Challenging to Manage Remote Assistants?

After several interviews, you might have found the ideal candidate. However, the process doesn't end after hiring them. Just like any other employee, remote assistants need to be managed too. Many employers face a fair share of hassles while working with them. Below mentioned are a few common challenges:

Performance Gap

The applicant might have gotten the job due to their stellar interview and resume, but when it comes down to it, you might notice they are not delivering their tasks. The deadlines are never met, the responsibilities are never fulfilled, etc. This underperformance could end up hurting your business, and the whole recruitment process would end up being useless. Therefore, one needs to be careful while choosing the candidate.

Unreliable

If you're outsourcing the job to a freelancer or an individual with no tie-ups to a virtual assistant agency, there's a possibility of abandonment. It had happened to business owners before where the remote assistant disappeared on them in time of need, leaving them high and dry. This is another hassle you have to handle, which means directing more of your precious time cleaning up the mess.

Security Concerns

During their time at the company, it is natural that the remote assistant will handle private and sensitive information regarding the company. They will have access to passwords and confidential data since they will work closely with you. It may raise some privacy concerns if they are unethical and unprofessional. It's advised to do legal work carefully before sharing any such information.

Quality Issues

Initially, it's understandable that remote assistants will take time to adjust to your company's style and culture and deliver the kind of output you expect. However, it may take longer for some, and a lot of micromanaging and training will be required. Sometimes even after all that training, there will be quality issues with the work. So there's a waste of company resources and decreased productivity, which again is a loss for your company.

…but is there a way to overcome them?

All these issues are common in today's business world, but you won't have to face them if you choose to hire from Office Beacon. With about a decade of experience in the industry, Office Beacon has been a trusted agency to outsource remote assistance needs. Our assistants are fully trained and have the professional skills needed to work in the industry. You can rely on our virtual assistants anytime, from meeting deadlines to establishing a solid communication line. You won't face any hassle regarding onboarding or managing. The company legally protects your sensitive data, so there are no privacy breach concerns. You can pick from personal remote assistants to executive assistants remote specializing in specific roles to meet your requirements.

Final Verdict

As a business owner, your time is invaluable, and you need someone to help you achieve your goals. With all the data supporting the facts, it's a no-brainer that remote assistants are the future and worth every cent. If you are looking to outsource work, then Office Beacon has several trained and experienced remote assistants. These professionals are highly qualified and specialize in different fields. Whether you are looking for executive virtual assistants or remote operations staff, Office Beacon scouts for them easily and onboard them in no time!