Hire a Virtual Assistant

Building a business can turn into an exhausting treadmill if you’re not careful. The more business you do, the more administrative tasks you have; the more time you spend on administrative tasks, the less time you have to generate new revenue.
The only sensible solution to growth is to multiply your manpower. Yet, you may have a multitude of reasons that prevent you from hiring an administrative assistant, even though it's obvious you need one. Wouldn't it be great if you had an assistant that was always ready to work for you, but only when you need him or her? Meet the virtual assistant, a creative new labor force that provides practical solutions for small businesses and busy professionals and job growth potential for outsourcers.

Hire an entrepreneur

The virtual assistant takes the role of the temp and elevates it to the status of entrepreneur. Because the virtual assistant is self-employed, bills only the hours they work or by tasks completed, and is dependent on referrals and steady work flow from existing clients, she/he can be the perfect solution for a busy agent.

A virtual assistant offers several advantages over a paid employee. When you hire a virtual assistant you get all the benefits of outsourcing - no employee tax and benefits issues, coupled with the loyalty and steadiness of a company employee.
If you have found that traditional staffing solutions don't work for you there may be many reasons. Temps are a transient solution, and they can be expensive. If you need someone only a few hours a day or week, a temp can prove more costly in terms of training than she/he is worth. Most are also looking for full time employment, so as soon as you find someone you like, she/he has left the temp service for greener pastures.

Paid employees come also come with a host of issues. You not only must provide tech equipment and furniture for them, you also have state and federal obligations, and employer compliance and unemployment liabilities. Then there are the benefits packages - sick leave, holiday pay and vacation time. It is estimated that the true cost of an employee is over double and sometimes triple the cost of their annual salary in terms of benefits and liabilities. Significant for some is also the loss of privacy and personal issues - you are sharing your small space with others. Do they make good roomies?

How practical is a virtual assistant?

As more businesses move their marketing and communications to the Internet, virtual assistants become more and more the obvious solution to staffing problems. For an hourly fee of $35 to $50, less than the overall cost of temps or employees, businesses can take advantage of professional assistance and a variety of skills at the click of a mouse.

Virtual assistants are already computer trained, and can assist with your specific needs from traditional office support services to highly specialized areas including website design and maintenance. Call upon your virtual assistant for basic word processing, phone answering, bill paying, appointment scheduling and calendar maintenance. You can train your virtual assistant to go beyond administrative support to client development and marketing support.

There is no need to share space or even for the client and the virtual assistant to live in the same city. Work assignments are communicated through e-mail, phone, fax, "snail mail," or diskette. The client can take advantage of Web-based tools such as instant messengers, like ICQ, and online calendars and planners are often used as a means of keeping in touch. Schedule changes, project reports, or customer-service alerts can be performed immediately. The virtual assistant can lend "size" to your company, which will impress potential clients.

For more information please contact Deborah Webb-Hyre, President & Owner of Virtually Indispensable Inc. in Virginia Beach, Virginia. Deborah may be contacted via email at: deborah@virtuallyindispensable.com or through her website at: http://www.virtuallyindispensable.com.
Phone: (757) 593-6713

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