Three tasks you can outsource to a virtual assistant

Business owners and managers are often guilty of taking on too many tasks at once in order to keep their operations running smoothly. It can be daunting to give up control, but passing simple duties to a virtual assistant (VA) can allow you to dedicate more time to growing your business. Here are three tasks you could outsource to a VA.

1. Email management

Around 28% of our working day is spent managing our inboxes. It's not just reading and replying to emails that's time consuming; we also lose lots of time refocusing after our workflow is interrupted by email notifications. While it's tempting to turn those pesky notifications off, doing so runs the risk of missing important correspondence that needs a timely response.

A great solution is to outsource your emails to a virtual assistant. They can read, organise and prioritise incoming emails and highlight those that need an urgent response from you. In many instances, your assistant will be able to write responses themselves to save you as much time as possible. This lets you concentrate on the work that matters without fear that you'll miss important communications.

2. Out-of-hours phone calls

A virtual assistant could take calls from your clients beyond your usual office hours, Virtual Reception Service if you use multiple assistants or a virtual reception service. This could be particularly helpful if you conduct business internationally and have clients in different time zones.

If a potential customer can't reach you at a time that's convenient to them, they might be dissuaded from doing business with you. When your virtual assistant picks up out-of-hours calls, prospective clients are reassured that your business is accessible and capable of providing support whenever they need it. If you've already been putting in long office hours by answering every call yourself no matter what time of day it arrives, you can look forward to some well-deserved time off when you outsource to a virtual assistant.

3. Calendar management

Managing your schedule can be both time consuming and stressful, particularly if organisation and time management aren't your strongest skills. By outsourcing your calendar management to a VA, you can pass off any requests for meetings to them and rest assured they'll keep a careful eye on your schedule to avoid double bookings. If you ever have to rearrange commitments, your virtual assistant can save you time by calling relevant parties to reschedule.

Using a VA to manage your calendar can also help you protect your free time if you have difficulty declining requests for unimportant meetings. This is particularly helpful when you have your assistant set agendas for meetings ahead of time. If they struggle to define an agenda for a requested meeting, your VA can identify it as a potential drain on your time and decline to book it into your schedule.

Streamline your workday with a virtual assistant

A virtual assistant can help you save time and become more efficient during your working hours. Consider outsourcing these three tasks to an assistant and see how much more streamlined your workday becomes.