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As a Virtual Assistant, one of the services you may want to consider offering to your clients is transcription. While it sounds easy enough (you listen to an audio tape and just type what you hear), it's much more involved than that.

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There are advantages and disadvantages you should consider before making your decision to offer transcribing services.

According to the Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, the official definition of transcribe is "to make a written copy of" or "to make a copy of (dictated or recorded matter) in longhand or on a machine (as a typewriter)." Now before you drag out your trusty old typewriter, you will need to make sure you have a few things first. Most importantly, you will need a good computer with a high speed internet connection and both transcription and word processing software installed on it because that old typewriter just isn't going to do the trick anymore. Some other equipment you will need is a quality headset, a comfortable chair in a quiet room, and if you're serious about doing transcription, a foot pedal (preferably the USB kind). Depending on the format used (DVD, mp3, cassette, micro-cassette, etc), you may need additional equipment for audio playback. Of course, to virtual assistant services uk be an efficient transcriptionist, you must also have a pretty decent typing speed, good listening, spelling and grammar skills.

Here are some of the points you will want to take into consideration before you decide to offer transcription services:

Advantages:

Pricing is pretty straightforward (by the word, page or audio minute/hour)

Sharpens your listening and typing skills

Opportunity to learn about new and interesting topics

Can turn into a long-term client as transcription can easily lead to other projects (editing, proofreading, article writing or creating an ebook)

Pre-recorded audio gives you the flexibility to transcribe anytime (excellent for those who are trying to juggle a 9-5 job too)

With some additional education, you have the ability to specialize (i.e. medical or legal transcription) and charge a higher specialized rate

Disadvantages:

Some equipment and/or software may need to be purchased (headset, foot pedal, etc.)

You must have a decent typing speed or you are not going to make much of a living doing transcription

Sound quality, multiple speakers, accents, people talking over each other, and audience interaction can significantly slow down the transcription process causing frustration and reducing productivity

Templates provided by client may be difficult to work with

Transcription is not multi-tasking friendly; you will need to concentrate so no telephone calls or tweets

Real-time transcription requires that you and the client are available at the same time. This does not allow time for editing, or breaks

As with any task you perform for your client, you will need to ask some important questions before you get started.

You should be ready with a checklist of some kind, because finding out certain information ahead of time will save you time and aggravation. Some questions you should ask your client before transcribing:

What will the client ultimately do with the transcription (i.e. create an article or ebook)?

What form is the audio in (DVD, mp3, cassette, micro-cassette, etc)?

How will you receive the audio (mail, email, etc)?

Does the client want a hard copy or just the electronic file?

What form do they want the final product in (Word, PDF, etc)?

Do they want verbatim or do they want umms and other unfinished thoughts edited out?

How many speakers are there?

Do any of the speakers have accents?

Are they just looking to have the words put on the paper or are they looking for something that is proofread, edited, and in the final draft stage?

Does the audio include any confidential information?

o Will the client require a Non-disclosure Agreement in addition to the Virtual Assistance Agreement?

o If it is medical transcription, will there be HIPPA compliance issues involved?

If you do decide to venture into the realm of transcription, make sure you have all the necessary tools in place to make your journey a positive experience. Take your time when creating your proposals and make sure you understand all the details of each transcription project. If you are not sure of the terms of the project, contact the client for clarification.

You don't want to get in over your head and disappoint your client and yourself.

Consider taking on a couple small "trial" project before officially offering transcription services on your website.

Volunteer to transcribe a meeting or two for a church or civic group to gain some experience. You might even suggest a trade and get a client testimonial for your business! Either way it is an excellent opportunity to try out transcription, and see if it is worth adding to your business.

If you have the typing, spelling, and grammar skills that transcribing requires and you are willing to invest in some equipment to get started, then transcribing may be for you. Transcribing can be frustrating and tedious at times, but it can also be a rewarding, interesting, and flexible service that you can offer to your clients. While it has advantages and disadvantages, always keep in mind transcribing is a perfect springboard to additional services you may want to market to your clients to keep your business flourishing.

How much time do you spend returning emails, following up appointments, making calls, fixing your schedule, booking flights, and researching on the most ideal hotel to stay at on a business trip? These small tasks aren't jobs for busy people. An assistant who can be your right hand and set some order into your life can make you more efficient in whatever you do.

To save up on costs, you can hire a virtual assistant who will perform the said tasks and help you out in managing your life from an offshore location. If you're a little unsure about this setup, read through the basic tasks of a virtual assistant and you will realize that these services could be performed for you from millions of miles away.

• VA's typically work on your calendar, confirms your meetings, prepares travel arrangements, and complete other admin tasks, like following up clients, distributing email advertisements to your customers, mailing out newsletters, and taking care of your bills.

• VA's with higher qualifications are assigned more specialized tasks, like transcription, research, data gathering, and market studies. You will even be able to find a virtual assistant with skills in web development, marketing, and programming. If these profiles are important in your job, it will be useful to pay extra and hire a professional virtual assistant.

Virtual assistant outsourcing enables you to hire a VA with better skills and qualifications at a lower cost. Outsourcing destinations like the Philippines have a large manpower pool that can be tapped into for this job profile. Furthermore, virtual assistants in the Philippines have exceptional English communication skills and pleasing personalities that will make a perfect and flexible associate.

The advantages of outsourcing virtual assistant services can be very convincing. You will become more efficient at your job, you will be able to focus on your personal core competencies, and you will have more time in your hands to spend with family and friends.

Virtual assistants offer business support remotely using their own equipment. This means that they can work from for clients who are miles and miles away from them. The best thing about virtual assistance is that it does not come with costs for additional overheads. Whether you are a small business or not, you stand to gain a lot when you hire a reliable and professional assistant. The virtual assistants can handle different kinds of business tasks including:

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Variety – When looking you do not even need to place an ad that you are looking for an assistant. There are so many work related platforms where job seekers post profiles under relevant categories hence all you have to do is go through a few and virtual assistant services uk make a selection. The huge variety means that you can easily pick out an assistant you feel you will get along with and one that you can also afford.

Affordability – The best thing about virtual workers is that they are paid for the hours they work. This is really nothing compared to a salary since there will be days you only need them for an hour or a couple of hours and the day is done. At the end of the day they are more affordable than getting a physical salaried assistant.

Flexibility – Unlike physical assistants who work from a given period of time during the day, virtual assistants are flexible enough to come to your aid when you need them. It means you can access them even during odd time of the day when there is reason to. This way you easily keep up with deadlines and have urgent work done on time.

As your small business grows and you to start to outsource parts of your operations, you may consider taking on a Virtual Assistant (VA) to assist with the ticking over of your social media activity. At such a time, rather than dish out your personal passwords willy-nilly, you can instead give and remove administrative access to your business accounts on Facebook and LinkedIn to your assistant at your pleasure.

While this is a very quick and easy process once you know how to do it, the links to do so are not always in the most logical places. This article will therefore help you add another administrator to your Facebook page; your Facebook group; your LinkedIn group; and your LinkedIn company profile.

Before we begin though, in order to be able to do any of these, you need to already be an administrator for the page or group in question. If you were the one to create the page or group, you will be an administrator by default; if you did not, you will need to added as an administrator to the page or group by someone who is.

I. Adding administrators to your Facebook page

II. Adding administrators to your Facebook group

III. Adding managers to your LinkedIn group

IV. Adding administrators to your LinkedIn company profile

Easy peasy!

Virtual assistants, as the name suggests, assist people from the different strata of the society but virtually. The virtual assistants normally known as the VA are basically entrepreneurs providing professional assistance to people in the administrative sphere, technical world and the creative field. They provide this assistance to the clients from their home office. There are several virtual assistants working from home to help the business people. The best part of hiring such assistants is that they are involved in a wide variety of works and are able to provide service accurately.

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However, these Virtual Assistants normally work for small scale organizations and consultancy groups. A worldwide survey has revealed that there are about thirty five thousand virtual assistants serving various small scale companies. Even the consultancy groups hire them for their services. Especially in the centralized economies virtual assistants are being hired often due to the short span of job. In these kinds of firms, assistants are hired for a small span of time where they are laid off after the completion of a project. This practice is often known as the FIFO method of staffing.

Normally the data transfer between the firms and the virtual assistants take place through e mail, telephonic conferences and fax machines. Sometimes it also takes place through instant messages sent online. The virtual assistants are hired on the basis of contracts for a stipulated time period. However, most of these relationships transform themselves into long lasting ones fetching more work for the virtual assistants. If you wish to work as a virtual assistant then you must have at least five years of experience at an administrative post in the previous office. Normally they work as executive assistant, secretary, legal assistant, manager or supervisor, paralegal, real estate assistant and legal secretary.

However, one must remember that he/she is not an employee of the company that has hired its services. He is considered to be an independent business contract owner. They come under the purview of tax paying workers. In fact, they pay their own self employment taxes to the government. They decide on the terms and conditions on which they will work and also the payment pertaining to their service. Hiring virtual assistant services uk them are profitable for the company since they do not come under the direct payroll of the company. Hence, they are only paid when they work for the firm based on the volume of work they have done. In fact, they are capable of expanding the small scale companies by generating more sales.

Since the VA is not a direct employee of the company, the company does not have to bear the expenses like training the employee, casual leaves, paid time off, sick leave, retirement plans and insurance of the employee. Hence, the burden on the house is much less. If you can free yourself from the little office chores then you will be able to attend more and more trade shows and establish contacts with other firms. They happen to be the obvious choice for replacing a full time secretary when he or she is on leave. Hence, working with a them has many advantages.

There are a heap of reasons a Virtual Assistant can be a valuable asset to your business. I have noted five of the most common ones.

1. BUSINESS HOURS CAN BE WORKED AROUND

A Virtual Assistant is just like a Personal or Executive Assistant, yet they don't usually work from your office. They freelance or contract their work out to businesses and even individuals remotely from their own space. So an email at anytime of the day is no problem. Just ensure you don't step outside their boundaries. They do need personal time too.

2. THEY TAKE CARE OF YOUR BUSINESS

You are busy at work, have a heap of documents to write, keep up with all your emails and social media messages and be present to actually run your business. A VA can free up your time by doing these tasks for you!

3. SAVE MONEY ON EMPLOYMENT COSTS

If you employ someone to do your work, you would usually need to pay your employee an hourly rate. On top of that, there may be penalty rates, Superannuation, annual leave, personal leave and possibly other bonuses. You also need to ensure you have adequate insurance and pay their tax.

Yes its still good to have an employee to do the tasks you want done and you most likely still will, however; hiring a VA cuts all these extra expenses out. You can get the same work done for less.

4. ONLY PAY FOR WHAT YOU ASK FOR

A Virtual assistant will consult with you to discuss your requirements.

Whether you need someone to help you for only a few hours a day, do specific tasks on a continual basis, or just one project, a Virtual Assistant can help you meet your needs.

A Virtual Assistant will manage your requirements with set fees and invoice you accordingly. The best bit is you only pay for what you ask for.

5. COMMUNICATION IS EASY

You don't have to manage a Virtual Assistant. Help is just an email or phone call away. There are no monthly check ins, writing reports, probation periods. If you have a question or need something done, you just contact them. If you feel your work is not completed to standard or as requested, they are obliged to make it right. They work with you to ensure your needs are met to the highest standard.

I can go on about the benefits of hiring a Virtual Assistant – I will just leave it here.

Nowadays, this generation is a fast-paced development in the field of internet computer technology. Wherever we go traveling around the world, most people engaged in technology like using gadgets such laptops and cellphones because it gives benefits to them and makes them do something comfortable, convenient and no hassle at all. We can overview that the world is revolving through the use of computer technology and it's very demanding today. We have also to adopt the virtual assistant services uk changes, learn more new things and new ideas related to technology. And we have to upgrade ourselves as technology do.

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Many University schools offer a course related to Computers such as Information Technology (IT), Computer Programming, Computer Science, Computer Engineering and a lot more. Some of us will choose in any of these courses because it has many advantages and benefits we can gain as we apply to big companies and for abroad also with highly paid salaries. But these days, many of us prefer to work at home for convenience, have spare time with family, efficient money-saving and no struggling to commute to go for work. Fortunately, everybody can avail the opportunity to work on the internet even though without any degree holder as long as we have the profound skills and knowledge about computer.

Virtual Assistant Work is very highly in demand today because we are interconnected throughout the world through this computer age. Especially if we have a variety of skills to showcase or provide to the clients. Most clients are seeking a multi-skills virtual assistant to help conveniently build their online businesses grow.

Here are the Benefits of Virtual Assistant Work:

Personal virtual assistants have received a lot of attention during the past few years. Much of this attention has come from the success of Timothy Ferriss' book The Four Hour Work Week. In the book, Ferris outlines strategies to eliminate one's daily busy work by outsourcing tasks to a low-cost virtual assistant, or VA. Business executives can use personal virtual assistants to handle tasks such as, web design, web edits, blog installations, posting, and maintenance, accounting and bookkeeping, telemarketing and appointment setting.

While much of the book's ideas have merit, there many areas that just aren't realistic. Here are some basic guidelines to follow to ensure your virtual assistant outsourcing project will be successful.

1. Define the duties you feel would better be completed by a Virtual Assistant (VA). Ideal services would be repetitive, time consuming, tasks that don't require your personal expertise. Ideal projects to outsource to a virtual assistant can include things like data entry, telemarketing, and appointment setting. Things to avoid would be one-time tasks that would take less time to do yourself than it would to explain to a third party.

2. Compose a detailed description of the tasks at hand, and a step by step guide your virtual assistant can follow to properly execute them. Specifically outline:

* Exactly what it is you are looking for. Do your tasks require voice related skills, writing skills, or both? * What schedule you need your VA to work. This is particularly important if you are outsourcing to a different country. * Communication. Would you rather correspond with your assistant via phone or email?

3. Browse the web to find the personal assistant that would be best for you. Ask around to see if anyone in your network has employed a virtual assistant and solicit their input. If nobody you know has used a VA, try the following:

* Google* freelancer websites such as elance or guru* Craigslist

4. Request price and service quotes. Learn about the management of the company that employs your assistant – after all, the management will be responsible for ensuring your VA's attendance and effectiveness. Look for professionalism and quick response time.

5. Choose a virtual assistant services provider. Once you've narrowed down your search to a handful of sources, set appointments to speak with the virtual assistants and their managers. Many call centers will allow you to do a paid trial in order to get to know how you will work together. This is an important period in the relationship and will lead to a better understanding of whether your styles mesh or not.

6. Lock them up! Agree to terms and conditions with your outsourcing services provider that will define:

* Confidentiality – This can be important, as you don't want confidential information to be used for unintended purposes.* Virtual Assistant Status – Be sure to clarify that your VA is not an employee. This will help you save money on taxes and other requirements.* Payment terms – Define the frequency and method of payment.

7. Keep in touch. Check in with your personal assistant at predefined intervals to monitor her progress. If applicable, request reports from your service provider listing daily phone calls, or any other metrics you find important. Now that you have followed these steps, you should begin to experience the benefits of a more productive work week!

Computers are very detailed machines that function by set rules, codes and languages. Everything follows a pattern and schedule in order to operate efficiently. Computer viruses can affect the cosmetics of a computer such as the screen and display appearances or the simple functions such as the way the keyboard operates or the functionality of the drives. Some of these symptoms may seem to be only a minor inconvenience, but when you see these signs you should wonder what may have caused the change and what else may be going on that you can't see. Other symptoms can include loss of files, decrease in memory space, slow operation and damaged programs.

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The writer of the virus determines how they will infect the system as well as what they want the virus to do. In most cases, a virus will perform damage to the host system, and may do this while performing another function such as retrieving information, and then spread to the remainder of the network.

A computer virus is similar to a medical virus in that it often occurs even when precautions were taken to prevent virtual assistant services uk it. Particularly malicious viruses steal information and data, which may be confidential. This may be customer or client information of a personal nature whether medical, financial or some other form. It may be company information specific to employee's records, user names and passwords or other functions of the business. Information may simultaneously be erased. It can pick up information from any other computer in the network. It can locate other users and obtain their information.

There are many programs available and they are a must-have for an individual's personal computer and certainly for that of a business. Strong measures must be taken to prevent viruses within a company, as one infected computer is opening the door to the entire network, putting clients, customers and even employees at risk. Businesses should understand that the condition of their system is susceptible to change with every employee that signs into the network.

Training should be instituted to prevent damage by teaching employees how to determine what is safe use of the system, how to update their protection programs and how to know if something is questionable and when to bring it to the attention of the IT department. It is always helpful to set up the virus protection programs to run automatically and the individual systems or the network as a whole can be set to automatically update the programs that are install along with fixes and patches as needed. In addition to anti-virus programs a filter may also help to block viruses.

While the anti-virus is placed inside the firewall, a filter is placed on the outside and closer to the server. Users may be limited as far as what can be received and may not be able to open attachments. This will undoubtedly create an inconvenience, though it is in the best interest of the company and will save money by eliminating loss of business if a shutdown is needed to correct a problem. A virus usually spreads very quickly and for a large company this can be costly. Prevention is always the least costly way to reduce the risk of virus.

The first time I became interested in hiring a virtual assistant (VA) was after I read the book the 4- Hour Workweek. In that book it spoke of how to cut your work hours down to just 4 hours by engaging virtual assistants to assist you. It specifically extolled the benefits of hiring a virtual assistant overseas in order to benefit from strong exchange rates. So, I conducted an online search for a VA overseas but quickly became overwhelmed. The number of websites where I could hire virtual assistants was too numerous to count. Being new to the whole world of working with a VA, I wanted it to be easy, quick and secure.

Where I Hired my Virtual Assistants – I hired my first virtual administrative assistant from oDesk – a company located in California that has VAs, of all kinds, around the globe. If you've previously tried to find a VA online, you know it can be frustrating. However, once you get to the oDesk website, you're going to breathe a sigh of relief, because they have amazing tools on their website to help you choose the perfect VA.

Even though I praise oDesk, realize they don't do All of the work for you. You'll have to do some footwork before finding your perfect VA, virtual receptionist, etc. "There's someone for everyone" – the saying goes. So what will you have to do? First, after you post your job, you'll probably get over 100 applicants within the 1st 24 hours. You can hire from this pool or, you can do a search of your own and invite qualified candidates to interview for your position. This will dramatically reduce the number of candidates you have to filter through. What criteria you search for, in either scenario, will depend on what work you want the VA to do. I'll share with you what I did below.

What to Look for in a Virtual Assistant – The first time I hired a virtual office assistant, I was looking for someone to do Internet research. It was important to me that they speak perfect English, so, rather than waiting for applicants to reply to my job listing, I took the proactive approach. I used oDesk's search criteria to search for a virtual administrative assistant who had "call center" experience and then I invited them to interview for my position. I entered "call center" in the search box on oDesk. I figured that if a VA has worked in a call center where they have to communicate with English speaking customers (you know, like those Dell call centers they have in Asia), that they spoke good English. This brought up many candidates. Then I filtered that list for other criteria like feedback scores from other jobs, I looked for test results on English tests, Microsoft office applications like excel and also, what their hourly fee was for certain jobs they have done. (All VAs post their desired rate as well as all previously charged virtual assistant rates.) It's a good indicator of what you might charge.

After I came up with my list, I then contacted a few of them and invited them to interview for the position. After conducting the interviews, I hired 3 for a test run. I gave each a short assignment which lasted no more than one hour. I also paid them for the 1 hour test. The one who performed the task the best, I hired for a much longer assignment.

I got 12 months of work done in just 3 months by hiring virtual assistants. It's by far the one of the best business decisions I have made.

Virtual assistants have more to offer than the average secretary or administrative assistant. When a new entrepreneur comes to the VA world they come with the skills they have garnered over several years virtual assistant services uk or sometimes decades in their perspective specialty. This is from the kind of work they did prior to becoming a VA. You will find some VAs come to this industry with Associate Degrees, Bachelor Degrees, Master Degrees as well as PhD's.

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A VA specialty is; a VA who specializes in a particular field for a particular industry. The industry could be real estate brokers, real estate agents, writers, speakers, coaches, physicians, dentist, lawyers, professors, students, entrepreneurs, engineers, mortgage brokers and just about any field you can think of.

This is a small list of the different specialties that VAs have experience in;

Advertising

Accounting

Bookkeeper

Bankruptcy Petition Preparation

Customer Service

Digital Documentation

Event Coordinator

Ghost Writer

Graphic Designer

Logo Designer

Marketing

Paralegal

Program Coordinator

Project Manager

Real Estate

Sales

Social Media

Telemarketer

Transcriptionist

Travel Agent

Type Setter

Website Designer

When deciding on hiring a VA, check out their websites for their specific specialty.

Below are some words that can be used to find a VA that offers a specialty you may be looking for.

If you are an attorney you can use keywords such as Virtual Paralegal Assistant or Virtual Bankruptcy Assistant.

If you are a writer or you need copy for a blog or newsletter, you can use words such as Ghost Writer along with the common VA.

If you are a writer, you can use words such as Ghost Writer, Editor, or Proofreader with the common VA.

If you are a physician, you can use words such as Medical Transcription and Medical Billing along with the common VA.

If you are a CPA firm, you can use words such as Bookkeeper or Accountant along with the common VA.

Using these words to search for your specific specialty area along with the common "Virtual Assistant" will help you find the VA you need.

There are many more specialty VAs. It would take pages and pages to go through them all. This article is to give you an idea on what types of specialty VAs there are and the many years of experience they bring to your business.

With increasing opportunities on the internet, more and more people have full time jobs on the internet; there is nothing that cannot be done through internet. If you are tired of having unreliable secretaries or they simply can't do enough for you, you can simply hire a virtual office assistant on whom you will not spend a dime in the name of insurance and they will be able to do more than the live in secretary will ever do. An in-house secretary occupies a lot of space; something that lacks in small businesses or medium sized companies.

From a virtual office assistant you will be able to benefit from personalized services, without feeling that you are letting them know too much about you. Hiring a virtual office assistant is hiring a personal assistant who will not take bathroom or coffee break when you are not around to supervise them. He will be on call anytime to do whatever you require of him anytime. The virtual office assistant will remind you of the appointment you need to make with your dentist and maybe make a hotel reservation for your annual retreat.

He may even go to the extent of designing the new web page for your business website, something that you would have had to outsource if you had a live-in secretary. Whether your virtual secretary does some outsourcing for his services really isn't a bother to you.

If you have an in-house assistant, he/she may not have the skills or the experience needed by the firm from time to time. On top of that, you will have to make room for the person and the myriad of machinery that he/she will come with. A virtual office assistant works far from you. You will not be able to see eye to eye but they will always be at your beck and call.

The in-house assistant stays idle at some point in their working day, depending on the amount of work that is handled by the firm on a day to day basis. No matter how much time he/spends on the work that is assigned to him/her a live-in assistant will not do more than is required by the boss unless you plan to hike the pay. They may go on a go slow or decide to quit without a notifying you. A virtual office assistant on the other hand is only paid for the actual hours that he does the job and nothing extra. He will not become a headache since he has other clients whose needs he needs to cater for. All you do is give an assignment and a due date; and the work will be delivered. It is cheaper to maintain a virtual office assistant since you will not have to pay some fees that come with having an in-house assistant.

A virtual office assistant is most of the time an assistant to many other people and since he/she has specialized on the work that he/she is doing, they are more likely to be more proficient and faster and have the latest tools to do their jobs. They have the latest software and they have a good support system. They pool their resources and help each other out when they are stuck.

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