Finding the Right Online Secretary

Do you cram to finish everything before the day ends?

Do you feel like you need an assistant yet hiring staff is just way too expensive?

Maybe it’s time for you to consider getting an online secretary. It could be an instant solution to all your worries. A back up person can sure turn your life around.

Finding the Right Virtual Assistant

An established relationship with an online secretary will ensure more consistent, full-time help and will reduce the high cost of hiring and instructing short-term or temporary staffing solutions. You can work in crisis with someone whom you have established a good relationship with even if the person is miles away from you. Appropriate tasks delegation to your online secretary is the key.  You can get additional help without the overhead costs of hiring an office secretary.

An online secretary is just like any employee with various expertise and professional experience.  The following are some guides which will help you on finding a suitable online secretary, how to work with them and what help can they give you.

How to find an online secretary

As with other employees, recommendations are the best referral.  In case of the absence of referrals, you can try to search for some trusted websites on the net. Various results will sure be shown; you have to be vigilant of course and make proper enquiries to know more.

How to choose the right online secretary

This process is no different from hiring an in-house employee; aside from you don’t get to see them personally. The interview process is commonly conducted through Skype with a video cam to allow you to meet, and work with them face to face through the computer. An online secretary need not be in the same city as yours. You could ask similar questions as for any staffing interviews, you can ask for sample work and likely give a test of ability. This will be a working relationship, so you should look for someone with a compatible style to your own, and your goal is to establish a sound working partnership wherein your online secretary can actually anticipate your needs just like your in-house secretary.

Technologies that you will need

Since an online secretary works from home, most of their tasks are sent through email. If you consider your online secretary as your primary assistant, you can also set up a computer at your office where your online secretary can access using encrypted remote access.

How to explain tasks

Having an online secretary is no difference from having a new in-house staff member. Since your online secretary works off-site, clear communication is always very essential. Follow up verbal instructions after sending an email. Do not assume that your online secretary understands what you want, make sure you are on the same wavelength. Breaking down the task into distinct stages that must be checked before proceeding to the next, especially early in your relationship, allows you to be sure that there are no misunderstandings before the work and time committed has progressed too far off track.

Anticipate that more misunderstandings happen especially you both work at a distance. As with all staff, the more you work together, the less likely misunderstandings are to happen, but there will be an initial learning curve.

What can an online secretary do for you?

This actually depends on what you need. There are numbers of online secretaries and they have their own fields of expertise. An online secretary can do just almost everything  just like an in house secretary, aside from preparing coffee of course. But, generally, online secretaries can lessen up your workloadsand gives you more time to deal with more vital issues for your company. It’s also an idea if you are extremely busy to have 2 or 3 VA’s on hand in case your primary VA isn’t available at any given time.

Tasks that you can assign to your online secretary

There could be various tasks that you can assign to your online secretary; it will depend on the needs of your business. You can assign small yet time consuming tasks to your online Assistant, like Data Entries, managing your emails, sending letters and fixing your schedules and reminders.

With enough training, your online secretary can become your best asset.