„How to Choose the Perfect Virtual Assistant for You?

There are very many virtual assistants worldwide. Most of them are specialized in one or more business fields, for example: administrative and secretarial jobs, personal assistance, marketing & SEO, legal consulting, accounting advising, development of software applications etc.
You have access to the unlimited market of virtual business services via Internet. In the same time, you have to make a very important decision when it comes to choosing your Personal Virtual Assistant. Of course, you need to find the perfect virtual assistant who meets all your requirements and specific criteria and will get the job done on your behalf in the best possible way. Try the following steps:

Professional Experience

Try to objectively evaluate the professional background of the virtual assistant. On the one hand, you need a virtual assistant who is experienced professional who knows what and how he is doing. It would be great if you find a narrow specialist in the relative field who perfectly understands, analyzes, prognosticates, summarizes, improves and amends the essential core of his work activities.
Working experience of above 7 years in the relative industry would be enough period for every virtual assistant to reach a high level of expertise. You need to investigate if his previous working experience and activities are similar to the working tasks you want to assign to him when you hire him.

Educational Background

Remember to check for the educational background of the virtual assistant. Also, you should not underestimate the educational background of your virtual assistant. The more educated he is, the greater the expertise and the quality of his job is. That is why you have to carefully check for his competencies, know-hows and knowledge that are relevant to your requirements and business tasks.
The education of the virtual assistant has to be relevant to his professional experience in order to fulfill gaps between theory and practice. Lower or higher degree obtained from the university would be useful – minimum requirement is a Specialist degree, average is Bachelor, recommended are Master or PhD certified virtual assistants. The more educated the virtual assistant is, the more you would be satisfied with the results of his job.

Personal Psycho Profile

It is important to get to know the personal traits and character of the virtual assistant. What is the nationality of your virtual assistant? Do you want him to be from your country and to support you locally? Or may be you need a virtual assistant from a different culture and mantality who will support you to expand your business contacts abroad? Try to learn more about his family, folks and childhood. It would be nice if you have similar interests or hobby. Having a friendly and open-hearted communication will help you build a strong relation on the basis of humanity, mutual agreement and sympathy.

How to Make a Final Decision?
Do you know how to get all the important information about your virtual assistant?
CV & Cover Letter – First thing to do is to require and preview his CV in order to see what is his previous professional experience and education. It is compulsory to ask him to prepare a Cover letter to make sure that he is motivated, devoted and he loves the job he would be doing for you.

First Interview – It is reasonable to have a discussion and a first interview – online conference call, phone call or a meeting face to face if possible. If you feel harmony and synchronization of your role-models, work activities and life style, you can move to the next level.

Test work task – The next step is to test his knowledges, competences and skills. The best thing to do is to assign to him 1 or more working tasks that you would usually need him to do for you. In this way the virtual assistant will be able to fix his time for reaction, use his skills and competences, determine if this job is acceptable or stressful to him and if he can deliver excellent results to you. If you are happy with the results, you can go ahead.

Second Interview – In case you think he is the perfect virtual assistant for you, you should appoint a second discussion when you can make an official proposal and fix the working conditions together with your virtual assistant. You should consult with your lawyer and accountant. It is recommended to conclude an agreement either for some virtual services, or have a subscription contract on a monthly basis. It is great if you agreep upon a testing period which may be from 1 week up to 1 or more months.

Start a Working Together – You are now ready to start a successful cooperation with the Virtual Assistant whom you have chosen to work with. It is possible that the execution of the previous few steps and stages may have taken to you at about 1 month. So now you feel closer to the individual character of your Virtual Assistant and you can build a stable, loyal and friendly atmosphere of the working process and routines.

We know how hard is to choose the most suitable Virtual Assistant for you who can do various jobs for you in the best way fitting your needs. It is important to evaluate not only his educational and professional background but also get to know his individuality better. We hope that the above ideas and tips will help you choose the right Virtual Assistant for your business and private needs.

May be there are other details you should consider when choosing the perfect Virtual Assistants, so please feel to share your comments, ideas and feedback.

Have you ever heard of Virtual Offices? Are they suitable for your business and what that alternative office workspace can offer you?

In fact the only common thing between the two types of offices is that they both offer you workspace to rent. Lets try to find the main differences between the innovative Virtual Office and physically based standard office. In this way it would be much easier for you to decide what kind of office fits your needs better and to rent it.

Main Characteristics of the Virtual Office

Virtual Office is a physically based office. It provides virtual services as well as on site support on a physically located address. It can be rented for a few hours monthly only whenever you need it. It is suitable workplace for entrepreneurs, start up companies, business rangers who need trading representative office in a foreign country or busy businessmen who travel worldwide most of the time.

Virtual Office provides wonderful and creative office facilities: nice and ellegant reception, conference hall with multimedia, private cubical for confidential conversations and work tasks, coffee lounge for informal meetings, broad terraces for evening cocktail events and wonderful view. Workspace in the Virtual Offices is always flexible and can be changed and amended at anytime, depending on your specific requirements and needs.

Virtual Office offers you a great opportunity for business and social networking with other businessmen and professionals who use the office facilities. Each one of them comes from various business industries and interacts with one another. That gives you the opportunity to share and exchange your ideas and experience with other members of the Virtual Office.

Another different aspect is that you have access to complex and various business services that your business needs and may get very good discounts. Moreover the Virtual Office saves you money because you do not pay extra administrative monthly costs for electricity, water, Internet, office consumables etc. You only pay monthly subscription fee based on the number of hours spent in the Virtual Office, including only services that you used.

Another difference is that Virtual Office provides an international local VoIP telephone number of your company which you can keep forever and use at anytime no matter where you are located physically

Main Characteristics of the Physically Based Standard Office

Standard physically based office is usually rented for a long-term period – one or more years on the basis of an agreement concluded. If you want to terminate the contract, you are required to notify your land-lord at least 3 months earlier.

Another difference is that you pay monthly rental fee which also includes extra administrative costs for electricity, water, Internet, office consumables etc. You also have to pay additional monthly fee for the maintenance of the building. You can dispose of the standard office at anytime during workdays and non-working days and you pay for those days, no matter if you use it or not at that time.

Only your employees and team are located in your office, thus the number of professionals you have access to is limited. Most times networking and social contacts are possible only between the members of your team without external participants.

Office workspace in such office is limited to what you rented and can not be rearranged without the consent of your land-lord, unless you are lucky and he agrees to amend the property. It is possible that you need to purchase in addition special office furniture and various office equipment and machines which requires big investments in your business. In the same time, you have to conclude additional contracts with providers of office consumables such as paper, coffee, tea, pens etc.

It differs from the Virtual Offices because your company telephone number is local and stationery. You must change it and can not transfer it every time you move into a new location of a physically based office.

In conclusion…
It is up to you to decide which office would be more suitable for you, your business and team – Virtual Office or standard physically based office. Which one do you think is more cost effective and costs you less?… Please feel free to share your opinion and comments.

CGArt.bg is represented by Nikolay Mihaylov who is Editor-in-Chief. He is one of the business mentors, who supports this initiative and actively encourages young entrepreneurs. All the winners of the competition have the opportunity to use his services for creation of a professional vision and design of their marketing and advertising materials, as well as overall corporate identity.

Vanya Osmanlieva and her idea related to virtual assistance and services provided by “Virtual Assistants”. She changed the design of her website and the vision of her company several times, without any success. For a short period of time, she worked with several designers, which did not help her choose the right direction for having an effective and attractive design and overall vision in a long-term perspective.

CGArt.bg supported Vanya to search and find the most suitable designer for her. On the one hand, it is important that the designer understands the specificity of the innovative virtual services, on the other hand – there should be a synchronization between their characters and working manners in order to be able to have a successful long-term partnership.

CGArt.bg suggested to Vanya some of the best designers in the network and she chose a few of them. Inquiries were sent to Amity Studio, Dimitar Stefanov, Stoyan Daskalov, Dimitar Petrov, Veselin Dochkov and Svetlana Tsoneva. As a follow up, a few meetings took place. In this way, it was easier to determine whom is the most suitable designer and if the conditions for cooperation were well-balanced and in accordance with the mutual wishes and opportunities of the parties.

All of the designers gave evidence of their professional approach but finally only one was chosen amongst them. That is Svetlana Tsoneva from “PixelHouse”. She and Vanya reconciled their partnership and fixed all working terms and conditions together. They already put a successful beginning, starting with the creation of a new logo, business cards and company blanks of the “Virtual Assistants” company.

Svetlana Tsoneva graduated at New Bulgarian University, studied specialty “Visual arts – Graphic design” in 2006. She has always been keen on drawing and involved in crazy design projects since she was a child. She was so engrossed in her web design activities that there came a moment when her hobby turned into her profession.

In 2008, she created her own studio Pixel House , specialized in website development and graphic design. Her team offers complex services – creation and design of websites, graphic design, creation of corporate identity – logo, blanks, business cards, as well as advertising web banners. All projects created by her studio are unique and depend on the individual needs and requirements of every client. Svetlana and her team already worked together with SDI, Naturpharma, Enthusiast, Grand Optics, Joy Optics, Demax, Baby Mall, Neterra, Virtual Assistants and other companies.

CGArt.bg, having the position of a mediator, aims to make communication between designer and entrepreneur / manager easier. On the one hand, there is Svetlana who loves to express herself visually and on the other hand, there is Vanya who needs to be introduced to a certain frame of the working process, that will help them both achieve effective communication and positive results.

Scheme, frame and technical specification of the new website of “Virtual Assistants” are being developed and prepared with support of CGArt.bg . That will give a clear direction to Svetlana in her creative work on the website, as well as on all details of the corporate identity.

In conclusion, Svetlana has freedom to take care of the best design vision of “Virtual Assistants”, whereas Vanya does not burden her and trusts into her professionalism, opinion and job.

The work on this project will continue even more actively in the next few months and we will present the next stages of all activities in a series of articles and video materials. The vision of the new website, as well as all marketing and advertising materials are expected to be prepared before the next round of the competition – „Seed Challenge“ in November.

I will not try to prove that the one profession is better or worse than the other. It is important not to underestimate any of the both professions because both Virtual Assistant and Personal Assistant may be of great help to any kind of business depending on its specific job requirements and location.

Advantages of the Virtual Assistant’s profession:

- Virtual Assistant can organize his time more effectively
- Virtual Assistant spends more time with his family at home or outside
- He has unlimited freedom to work at every place, under the condition that he has access to Internet
- He can choose customers whom he want and can work with
- Virtual Assistant decides himself which type of services to offer to his clients
- Virtual Assistant considers if his education, professional qualification and competences are relative to the requirements of the customer in order to do his job properly and meet all needs of the customer
- There is no initial period of training and introduction to job duties and responsibilities
- Virtual Assistant is more independent when he makes expenses on his job
- Virtual Assistant does not have to communicate with a lot of people in office
- He may be assigned working tasks of a private character
- Virtual Assistant is responsible and reliable and has the right to refuse a working order, in case there is a risk of failure or unsuccessful completion
- He saves time and does not have to travel for long hours to the office daily
- Virtual Assistant can approach the business of the client more precisely and objectively because he sees is from the outside, gets acquainted with its profile and after that he is actively involved in his working activities
- Employer of Virtual Assistant saves fixed administrative costs for office maintenance and consumables, as well as monthly salary
Advantages of the Personal Assistant located in office:
- Personal Assistant is physically located in business office and welcomes visitors and guests on site
- Personal Assistant operates with office equipment faster and it is easier to personally hand documents to management, colleagues or other third parties
- The position of the Personal Assistant is to stay inside of the business of the client and he can keep track of all internal working activities and processes

Disadvantages of the Personal Assistant’s Profession:

- They often communicate with colleagues on topics that are not related to business;
- Personal Assistant executes private tasks during his working time
- Personal Assistant spends too much time surfing online on the Internet
- There is possibility for late arrival, early departure as well as and longer breaks for lunch;
- Usually, there is an initial training period that is around one month and there is no guarantee that employee will hold the job position for long-term period;
- Personal Assistant sees situation inside the company and there is a risk of subjectivism towards working activities, decision and overall attitude.

Disadvantages of the Virtual Assistant’s Profession:

- Income is not fixed and its level is not permanent on a monthly basis;
- Customers are different and it is difficult to predict all their specific needs and requirements;
- There is a risk of inability to adapt to working as a Virtual Assistant at home-located office;
- Virtual Assistant has to be flexible and offer a variety of innovative services to his customers, having in mind the fast development and growth of the market for virtual business services.

 

Main differences that characterize Personal Assistant

The first key difference between those two job positions is that the Personal assistant is located in the office of the employer. He performs different working tasks that are assigned to him only by the management of the company he is working with, and also reports about the results to the management.

Personal assistant has the role of an inter-mediator between the management and subordinate divisions and departments of the company. He observes and keeps track of whether rules, regulations and orders issued by management are followed and executed properly. Personal assistant is also expected to be creative and initiative person, while being the right hand and trusty partner of the management.

His main goal is to provide and assure comfort and convenience of the management, on site, for successful performance of business activities in or out of the office. Personal assistant takes care of the business Schedule, coordinates meetings and events while making efforts to optimize effectively the time of his direct manager.

At some stages, depending on his education, experience and expertise, Personal assistant may be used as a personal or a company advisor. His independent and objective opinion and stand-point may be very precious and considered before making any decision or taking actions by the management.

Main differences that characterize Virtual Assistant

Virtual assistant is an entrepreneur, who works independently from a home-based office and thus his physical presence in a business office is not compulsory. He offers remote support in a virtual way via Internet, e-mail, fax, telephone calls and may use courier services.

Virtual Assistant is specialized in a wide range of administrative-secretarial activities, as well as other types of virtual services that refer to various spheres of business. That offers him the opportunity to work with his own team of specialists and get support by external resources. His working activities can not be limited by a job description.

Virtual assistant does not have a single employer, but may work with several employers – individuals as well as corporate clients. Consequently he reports results of his job separately to each one of his customers. He works on the basis of orders, projects or offers subscription services.

Virtual assistant himself takes on all administrative expenses related to the working process and pays for office materials that he consumes. His working time is not fixed but flexible and he may have days off at anytime he wants. In the same time, his remuneration is not fixed and may very.

Virtual assistant has lower chance to lose his job because he is an entrepreneur and works for many customers – employers. Last but not least, the Virtual assistant is dependent upon himself in order to achieve professional development and career growth.

Which position you would love to get more? It depends on your individuality and personal character. Knowing all of the differences between the Personal assistant and the Virtual assistant would help you make an easier and more effective decision.

Imagine that you have solution to all of your problems at once! That is our Virtual Package in fact! It is similar to a virtual magic Lamp of Aladdin! When you rub it, our Virtual Assistants Team appears and makes all your wishes come true!

The story of the Virtual Package

Once upon a time… there were people who lived in the world of the virtual reality, they played virtual games, communicated using virtual social networks, joined in interesting virtual groups, loved to participate in virtual meetings, and also worked on virtual business projects and … may be You are one of those virtual people?!

One day, something amazing happened and life of those virtual citizens would never be the same again. The very first Virtual Package in the Virtual History was born and appeared on this virtual world!

What is a Virtual Package and how it works for you?

It works in the same way as the Aladdin’s Lamp Spirit. Our Virtual Package of services is flexible and designed to satisfy all your needs.

Imagine that you and your beloved ones want to go the newest luxury restaurant at the city but you are too busy to find out where it is located, what food they offer and to make a reservation would be mission impossible to you. May be You want to go to theatre or movie and watch the funniest comedy but still can not take your time for research and reservation. What if you had your own Personal Virtual Assistant who would always support you with administrative services at acceptable prices?

Sometimes it is normal to face conflicts with your girlfriend or boyfriend and it feels like nobody can help you. Advice from family or friends could not be the best options to choose from. May be you would need some objective advice and resolution from a trustworthy third party – how about having your Personal Virtual Coacher, Mentor who is a professional in psycho-social counseling?

Let’s not forget that the more work you have to do at the office and the more technical problems with your computer arise, the less time you would have to take care of your private life and show your love to your family and folks. It would be really great if you had a Genius IT specialist at your disposal who would provide you with fast and effective IT remote support and solution to fix every bug, virus, error etc. at anytime you need it.

You will feel surprised how useful it is to have your Personal Virtual Assistant – Administrative Secretary, as well as a personal Coach who is always by your side together with an IT specialist who would support you in all your daily challenges – all of them combined in one Virtual Package!

Try it! Because you will save time, nerves and money!