Virtual assistants can be called on to do all kinds of duties for their clients. Some Virtual Assistants perform a few specific tasks just for an owner or manager. In other cases, they might play a vital role in primary business functions and feel like part of the team. Being a virtual assistant allows you to be flexible and experience many kinds of environments, then focus on the ones you like best.
Here are some of the most common specialties that the VA role includes:
General admin work
Administrative tasks such as managing a calendar, sorting emails, answering phone calls, making appointments, and other tasks that on-site assistants do.
Project management
Some Virtual Assistants run projects for business owners. This means you will hold meetings, ask for updates from team members, and create reports on the progress of a project. You may also have some responsibility for projects staying on time or on-budget.
Bookkeeping
Financial support is vital to every business. Smaller companies and those using VAs often need to help with processing payments, checking expenses verifying payroll, and creating regular budget statements. If you’re good with numbers and business, this can be a suitable place to start.
Billing and invoicing
Companies often need help invoicing their clients. In these roles, a VA will create the invoices using the company’s software platform, verify each invoice, send them out, and help to process payments and record them when a payment is completed.
Content research
Here you’ll learn about the company, its products, and its customers. Then, your job is to generate ideas and research assigned topics to provide relevant information.
Blogging and writing
Sometimes, you’ll also write the content of your research. This is commonly in the form of blog posts, but VAs can also be tapped to write web pages and other content.
Customer research
Growing businesses often need to understand who their customers are. In this case, VAs will be given tasks related to tracking and analyzing the data provided by a company’s research tools.
Customer support
Answering frequent questions, looking up customer details, taking messages, and generally helping are tasks that most freelance virtual assistants handle regularly.
Data entry
Data entry generally is clerical work where you organize and type information. Sometimes it can be general recording or typing of information and in other cases, you might have more detailed tasks where you need to analyze the information you’re reading.
E-commerce order management
Generally, as a specialized form of customer support, many e-commerce companies use virtual assistants to help them understand current orders, find tracking numbers for customers and even restock products.
Email marketing
You may need to send emails to customers or manage email sequences in email marketing programs. Sometimes, a virtual assistant will write the email or respond to it, especially if customer responses include things like setting up a meeting.
Social media management
Posting on social, answering questions, and ensuring that a brand looks good online are all part of social media management.
Social media marketing
Virtual Assistants can specialize in the marketing that happens on social media, too. Here you may create campaigns and set spending, define ad targets, or take ad campaign reports and pull the pertinent details together for your boss.
Website management
Virtual assistants are often tasked with making basic updates to websites, posting content, proofreading, and more. You might need WordPress or other skills to shine here.
Transcription
A final task that is common for VAs is to listen to meetings or recordings and transcribe what’s been said. Some jobs may also ask you to take notes and create reports on what was discussed.
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