10 reasons to Outsource your tasks

Time is precious for any entrepreneur. Spending it on time-consuming tasks is definitely not a better choice for any business person. You should outsource certain tasks that can be done by others, to get some free time for yourself to focus on building your business.

Many people summarize that there are 10 main reasons to outsource your tasks.
1. You are an individual entrepreneur and have very less money to invest on a full time employee.
2. You are a small business person, but don't need a full-fledged office set-up to run your business
3. You find yourself spending time on simple administrative tasks that could be handled by others
4. You get irritated and frustrated to sit in front of your computer when you could attend a business meeting.
5. You spend too much time on reading emails that don't need your immediate attention
6. You miss important emails and fail to respond to your clients immediately
7. You burn the midnight oil and find yourself stressed out for the early morning client meeting
8. You find yourself married to work 24/7
9. You need help on some tasks that you are not good at.
10. You don't want to do repetitive tasks every day.   

10 Things to Outsource to a Virtual Assistant

Using a virtual assistant can shave hours from your workweek, but knowing which tasks to delegate can be tricky, whether you're starting or growing a business. Most virtual assistants are contract or freelance workers who do their jobs from home and focus on administrative tasks that are similar to those of an executive assistant or secretary. Websites that specialize in contract workers, such as odesk.com and elance.com, have thousands of listings for virtual assistants.

With the number of virtual assistants are growing, their expertise now runs the gamut, making it easier to find someone who fits your organization, says Jaleh Bisharat, vice president of marketing at oDesk.com, which is based in Redwood City, Calif. In 2012, oDesk had 25,000 postings for virtual assistant jobs, compared to about 2,500 in 2008.

Entrepreneurs can use virtual assistants for everything from making vendor or customer service calls to sending out thank you cards to prospective clients. It's important to build trust, just as you would with a permanent employee. "They become a team member who just happens to work remotely," Bisharat says. Not sure where to start? Here are 10 ways you can use a virtual assistant to improve your business.

Bookkeeping: Keeping tabs on bills and other bookkeeping matters can be one of the easiest things to assign to a virtual assistant, says Kathy Colaiacovo, marketing director for the International Virtual Assistants Association, a Henderson, Nev.-based trade group. Many small businesses choose to share their bookkeeping systems with their virtual assistants who can then follow up on tasks such as outstanding invoices or unpaid bills. "You will need to hand over some control [including] passwords and access to accounts," Colaiacovo says.

Online Research: You can easily farm out Internet research to virtual assistants. Common requests include finding information on corporate websites, exploring new products and vetting potential employees or business contacts, says Sue Kramer Harrawood, president of Peace of Mind Virtual Assistance, an Orland Park, Ill., firm that provides companies with virtual assistants. Be sure to send clear instructions, along with user names and passwords so assistants can get access to specialty search tools or paid websites. Tristen O'Brien, an eBay marketing expert in Westfield, Indiana, asks his assistant to help him find blog topics, as well as occasionally proofread his blog [link: www.theebayentrepreneur.com] on eBay selling. "She researches what is trending and reports back to me," O'Brien says.

Database entries: Whether it's a slew of new business cards picked up at a conference or updated information for existing contacts, keeping databases current is a suitable task for virtual assistants. Be specific about your needs and expectations, and make sure the virtual assistant has done this type of work before so there's less room for errors, Kramer Harrawood says. "Follow up is a huge thing for business owners. Sometimes clients will fax or scan business cards to us, and [virtual assistants] will plug them into the database."

Data presentations: Turning raw data into a clear PowerPoint presentation or summarizing research findings in a Word document can be a huge timesaver when prepping for meetings, says Rich Pearson, chief marketing officer at eLance.com, a jobs website for freelancers in Mountain View, Calif., who uses a virtual assistant himself. The data "comes back in a format I can share," he says.

Managing email: To keep you from wasting time in your email inbox, some virtual assistants will filter your most important emails and respond to the rest on your behalf, Colaiacovo says. Such email management is easy to do remotely, but you need to provide guidance on how to pick out key emails and ask the assistant to copy you before sending out any responses to reduce the risk of errors. 

Social tasks: Virtual assistants can be a good bet to handle tasks such as writing holiday cards or sending thank you notes, says Bisharat, who notes that social chores have become a very common assignment. Such tasks can become "all consuming" for business executives, she says, "but a good virtual assistant can take care of all of it." 

Travel Research: Virtual assistants are a great resource for finding hotels, booking airfares and mapping out trip itineraries both for business and pleasure, Pearson says. The assistants can take advantage of the growing number of travel research tools and review sites on the Web. They can also deal with the hassle of navigating time zones when booking or researching international travel options by phone.

Scheduling: Because many scheduling tools are available online, virtual assistants are managing the calendars of many clients, says Kramer Harrawood. Tasks include dealing with meeting invitations from others, scheduling appointments with clients and helping to plan events. "It's about being comfortable and letting go of that calendar" to a non-staff person working remotely, Kramer Harrawood says.

Chasing business: Prioritizing potential business opportunities can be challenging, but virtual assistants can help with the process. When deciding what to sell on eBay, for example, O'Brien asks his virtual assistant to look around for products that can be profitable to resell. "I give them quite a few websites to visit, and they take it from there," he says. "They look for clearance items and other types of products."

Industry knowledge prep: With limited time to keep up with industry news, some small businesses have turned to virtual assistants to keep tabs on the most important happenings. Many executives then use the industry information to update their Twitter feed or bring up interesting developments in conversation with customers and prospects. This helps "executives appear to have timely news," Pearson says.

Source: 

http://www.entrepreneur.com

http://outsourcing2vietnam.com 

7 essential skills to make a good virtual assistant

Outsourcing is the trend in all over the world. There are many kinds of outsourcing services: content writing; advertising posting; data entry, internet research; online marketing; trading promotion, software design, … But in my point of view, VA- a kind of outsourcing service is very creative and smart.

What is VA?

VA stands for Virtual Assistant. According to Wikipedia.com, the definition of Virtual Assistant is:

“A virtual assistant is generally self-employed and provides professional administrative, technical, or creative (social) assistance to clients remotely from a home office. Because virtual assistants are independent contractors rather than employees, clients are not responsible for any employee-related taxes, insurance or benefits, except in the context that those indirect expenses are included in the VA's fees. Clients also avoid the logistical problem of providing extra office space, equipment or supplies. Clients pay for 100% productive work, and can work with Virtual Assistants, individually, or in multi-VA firms to meet their exact needs. Virtual Assistants usually work for other small businesses but can also support busy executives.”

With these roles of a Virtual Assistant, many people agree that there are 7 essential skills to make a good virtual assistant.

Organizing: 

Good organizational skills are also important because you may be working on several different projects for several different clients all at the same time. You will need to be organized in order to ensure that everything goes smoothly.

Time management: 

Of course, time management is not only important to a virtual assistant, but also everyone. Virtual assistants must be able to prioritize work on a daily basis, and multi-task when necessary. Plan your day according to deadlines and schedule blocks of time to complete each task. Set a timer if you need to. Recognize distractions and find ways to minimize the interruptions.

Typing:

The role as an assistant, obviously, typing is imperative.

Writing and Grammar:

As a virtual assistant you should also have good writing skills. Clients will need a wide variety of projects written for them (everything from articles to business letters and email messages). Such projects not only showcase your own professionalism but your client's as well since you are doing their writing tasks for them. Grammar is correct that will guarantee the professionalism of business emails in the eyes businessmen.

Networking:

As a virtual assistant, networking can provide the critical link to the outside world in an otherwise solitary profession. In addition to regular contact with like-minded individuals, networking is the key to acquiring new business and referrals. People like to work with people they know.

Computer skills:

Since all of your work is going to be done on your computer, you will need to have excellent computer and Internet skills. Not only will you need to know how to run the various programs, especially MS Word, Excel, Publisher, Google, Skype… that you will need to use as a virtual assistant but you will also need to know how to do basic computer maintenance as this is important because if your computer goes down, both you and your client's work will come to a halt.

Sales and Marketing:

Last but not least, as a virtual assistant, you are your own sales and marketing team. Home-based business owners must generate business by cold-calling or otherwise prospecting for new leads. If you are uncomfortable with sales, consider attending a workshop to build your confidence.

These knowledge and information that I learned when working in an outsourcing services agency, I hope it’s useful for you when starting a job as Virtual Assistant.

      Source: http://www.outsourcing2vietnam.com/blog/110-7-essential-skills-to-make-a-good-virtual-assistant.html

Why should outsource to Vietnam?

There's no doubt that outsourcing is here to stay. Companies large and small are sending out their non-essential tasks so they can focus on their core business. With the explosive advent of the Internet - and lately the mobile web - the world is becoming smaller by the minute. Geography is less and less of an issue, and the global worker is emerging as a force to be reckoned with.

Two main destinations for the outsourcing needs of the world have emerged in the last decade: Eastern Europe and South-East Asia. Both have their strengths and weaknesses, and knowing which one to choose could save you a lot of headache along the way. In South-East Asia, Vietnam continues to be a top choice because of the relatively low labor and other costs and because of highly attractive government incentives and an improving legal and business environment.

1.Outsource to Vietnam for Low labor costs

Obviously one of the main resources to outsource work is to save money, so naturally you will be interested in the price quoted by the offshore provider. Vietnam’s low-cost, diligent, educated and large labor force has been a major factor in its rapid rise as a destination of choice for foreign manufacturing firms. Vietnam’s wages are believed to be among the lowest in the world.

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_minimum_wages_by_country

*One U.S. dollar equals approximately 21,105 Vietnamese Dong (VND)

For comparison, Shenzhen has China’s highest monthly minimum wage level at RMB1,500 (US$245), while Delhi has India’s at INR8,112 (US$147) per month.

2.Outsource to Vietnam because of Good Education and Training

According to International Labor Organization (ILO), compared to many other developing countries, Vietnam has an outstanding literacy rate of 90.3% and its educational expenditure is an impressive 3.5% GDP. The government is continuing to invest in the basic education system along with targeted improvements to its professional training programs and higher institutions.

3.Outsource to Vietnam because of Government and Economy.

Arguably, the stability of a country’s government and its macroeconomics policies and conditions has the greatest impact on the foreign investment in the country.

The country is governed exclusively by the Communist Party of Vietnam whose major priority for the last nearly 40 years has been to increase economic development and transform a state-owned and directed economy to a market based economy.

The Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in Vietnam expanded 5.54 percent in the third quarter of 2013 over the same quarter of the previous year. GDP Annual Growth Rate in Vietnam is reported by the General Statistics Office of Vietnam. Vietnam GDP Annual Growth Rate averaged 6.55 Percent from 2000 until 2013, reaching an all-time high of 8.48 Percent in December of 2007 and a record low of 3.12 Percent in March of 2009 .

Source: Why we should outsource to Vietnam?

“2W” Outsourcing: What and why?

What is outsourcing?
Outsourcing is the act of onecompany contracting with another company to provide services that mightotherwise be performed by in-house employees. Often the tasks that areoutsourced could be performed by the company itself, but in many cases thereare financial advantages that come from outsourcing.

 Many large companies nowoutsource jobs such as call center services,e-mail services, and payroll, virtual assistant, Online relatedtask... These jobs are handled by separate companies that specialize in eachservice, and are often located overseas.

Why we should outsource?
Thereare many reasons that companies outsource various jobs, but the most prominentadvantage seems to be the fact that it often saves money. Many of the companiesthat provide outsourcing service are able to do the work for considerably lessmoney, as they don't have to provide benefits to their workers and have feweroverhead expenses to worry about. Depending on location, it may also be moreaffordable to outsource to companies located in different countries.
Outsourcing also allowscompanies to focus on other business issues while having the details taken careof by outside experts. This means that a large amount of resources andattention, which might fall on the shoulders of management professionals, can beused for more important, broader issues within the company. The specializedcompany that handles the outsourced work is often streamlined, and often hasworld-class capabilities and access to new technology that a company couldn'tafford to buy on their own. Plus, if a company is looking to expand,outsourcing is a cost-effective way to start building foundations in othercountries.

Source: “2W” Outsourcing: What and why?