A Virtual Assistant is someone situated in a remote location who either works out of their home or an office, providing general, administrative, creative & technical assistance. A VA assists with a wide variety of tasks. Each individual - professional or non professional, each organization - commercial or non-profit have their own definition of "tasks." So far you may have read a generic description of what a VA does, for example, calendar & email management, research & marketing, data entry etc, however there is more to what a VA does than these simple descriptions.
Some of the general tasks a VA receives:
"I recently bought an Antique Black Prairie Dining Table.Can you see if you can find matching chairs?"
"Need some research on Pasadena, California."
"In my twitter account, go through the last 20 pages of users and un-follow any user that is not following me."
Some of the administrative tasks:
"I need to have each slide from the first attachment cut and pasted onto a more generic power point deck."
"Need you to convert the faxed document into a MS Office Word document."
"Attached is a PDF with pages of participants who have been through our training program. We'd like some of this data to entered into our constant contact account."
Some of the personal tasks:
"Can you please contact Burton snowboards warranty department and see if they can send me a replacement toe strap for my left foot snowboard binding?"
"I find it hard to keep track of all my payment due dates. Can you set it up so that payments are deducted monthly out of my checking account?"
"Please look online for any reviews for doctors in the Portland area that do hernia surgery."
Some complex tasks:
"Do a competitive analysis on the list of company websites."
"Can you create three more blogs like you did on topics such as finance, home living & the outdoors?"
"Can you create a campaign on my AdWords account and make a list of relevant keywords?"
When you hire a VA, consider training them to better understand your business needs. For example, share training decks, power point presentations & e-learning courses.
If your request is simple, general or personal, please be sure to mention all details in your requests so that the VA understand your specifications leaving nothing to assumption. When you're interacting virtually and expect first time resolutions, it is advisable to include all information/details that you think are necessary.
As you may have noticed, one VA is able to do all of the above tasks, with the help of online information and lots & lots of research, making him or her a valuable assistant/employee.
Sameena Khan is a Dedicated Virtual Assistant [http://www.va24x7.com/]. Her company comprises a team of experts who, while working from a remote location, provide Virtual Assistance [http://www.va24x7.com/services/].
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