5 Ways a Virtual Assistant Can Help Maximize Your Business’s Productivity

Virtual
Assistants are administrative professionals who work remotely for your
business.  Hiring a Virtual Assistant can
significantly and positively impact your business’s productivity.

Virtual
Assistants are:

1. Cost
   effective—because they work remotely, virtual assistants are extremely cost
   effective; there is no need to rent extra office space to accommodate a new
   worker.  Whereas an in-house, full-time
   assistant may cost you upwards of $65,000, employing a virtual assistant is a
   great opportunity to reduce costs because you only pay for hours worked.
2. Specialists—VAs
   are often specialists.  Of course, they
   are experts in administration, but in addition, many VAs also possess unique
   skillsets—and they’re great at them.  Photoshop
   and InDesign expertise can be extremely beneficial to a business that focuses
   on digital and/or direct mail marketing. 
   Videographers and media editing experts are great additions for a
   business looking to video blog.
3. Partners—trusting
   your VA the same way you would an in-house assistant streamlines your business
   and non-business operations.  A VA who
   understands your personal and professional responsibilities can be more
   effective in scheduling and meeting coordination, decision-making, and
   long-term planning.

Here
are 5 (of many) things you can outsource to a Virtual Assistant to boost your business’s
productivity.

1. Have
   your VA check your emails.  According to
   a 2012 study by McKinsey Global Institute, we spend nearly one-third of our
   work time managing emails.  By
   outsourcing your email management to a VA, you will instantly gain over 2.5
   hours of your work time back—imagine the innovation and creativity you can
   foster for your business in that time!
2. Delegate
   repetitive tasks to your VA.  Ad
   placement, weekly newsletters and scheduling are just a few of the daunting,
   repetitive tasks we take on week after week. 
   Outsource these boring, monotonous tasks to a VA effectively by
   providing them with templates and step-by-step procedures to abide by.
3. Everyone
   loves a good deal, but searching for the best flight and hotel options, even
   with the help of travel sites, is time consuming.  If you’re always on the go, hiring a VA to
   research travel deals for you will free up a significant amount of time you already
   can’t afford.
4. Customer
   support and mediation.  Not everyone was
   born with impeccable patience and people skills.  Hiring a patient, customer service-oriented
   administrative professional to handle your customer service inquiries, moderate
   blog comments, or respond to email queries not only saves you time, it may even
   reduce the speed of that receding hairline, too.
5. Website
   SEO is a never-ending task.  Meta-tagging
   your pages and images, and optimizing for keyword searches is a daunting task
   even for intermediate web designers. 
   Hire a VA who specializes in webpage design, or understands the basics
   of HTML.  As your search ranking
   increases, so will the customers, and now you’ll have ample time to interact,
   build relationships and sell, sell, sell.