What is a VA? How can a Virtual Assistant help your business?
A VA or Virtual Assistant can be many things. It’s a broad description,similar to how a tradie or tradesperson can be an electrician, a plumber, or a builder.
Watch the video for more (or read below).
What is a VA?
A virtual assistant can be anybody who is doing work remotely, virtually. It could be a bookkeeper, graphic designer, admin, phone customer service, web designer or sometimes a virtual assistant can be an all-rounder or a general VA (GVA).
Another type of VA is an Online Business Manager, or OBM, who usually helps online businesses that sell courses or digital products and services. They do a lot of website updates, regular updates of various sales pages, organising emails for new product launches etc. They are often also project managers.
A virtual assistant can be a lot of different things!
My entry to the world of VA's
I’ve recently jumped into a role of being a VA. I'm doing website changes and updates, accounts work like invoicing, financial claims, filling out forms, and other various admin work. I love the variety!
I’ve also hired my first VA! Louise has been helping me with my clients and my own business. It has been a big help. There’s a huge learning curve to delegate and manage work not just for myself but for someone else as well, making sure we have processes in place and being on top of when things need to happen.
Helping to Grow Your Business
Hiring a VA is a great way of taking your first steps to growing your business without having to hire a full-time staff member or an employee. VAs usually work as independent contractors.
You could sign someone on for a one off project or hire someone for as little as 1 or 2 hours a week. You can start as slowly or as quickly as you need to. It’s a great way to start growing and take some workload off yourself without the stress of having to have enough work (or pay for!) for a full-time employee.
You can even get a VA to help you start to document your processes so when you are ready to hire a long-term VA or an actual employee it's all set up. They give you that flexibility.
Different levels of VA support
You can get help from other countries like the Philippines who have a lower running costs, so they can afford cheaper hourly rates. Depending on what you need and your budget, you can also get a local VA, and then there are different levels of expertise that will affect pricing.
You can get inexpensive help for tasks that do not require a huge amount of skill but is time-consuming like transcribing a video so you can have it documented. There are a lot of possibilities and options.
If you have any questions, let me know in the comments below!
I am planning more posts about different types of VAs, how I got started and how I found my VA, but would love to answer any specific questions you have.
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