Along the incredible journey of developing a virtual assistant career, one of the first hurdles many struggles with is figuring out which virtual assistant services to offer. The reality is that just as with the infinite potential for business expansion, the possibilities with a virtual assistant career are just as limitless. 

Most of the administrative needs a business might have can be a potential service area for a virtual assistant, and the opportunities are incredibly diverse. 

How to determine which services to offer as a virtual assistant 

Many desire to start a virtual assistant business but have no idea what skills to provide. This shouldn’t be the case because one way is to look at your existing skills and uniquely package them to make you a much sought-after virtual assistant. 

To begin, a bit of brainstorming will help distinguish the skills you can start with. With a notebook and pen at hand, note down activities you are passionate about and deeds that come naturally to you. These pointers below can act as a guide to help you in this process. 

1. What do you enjoy doing? It could be anything like painting, cooking, travelling, reading, or swimming.
2. What are you gifted at? List all your skills and talents, even those that don’t seem to relate to virtual assistant services. 
3. What’s your passion? What is that activity you can do, even without payment? What do you desire to do but lack the skills or financing to do it? 

So, how do you turn a skill or a passion into a service? 

Suppose you have a skill or a passion on your list but have no clue how to turn it into profit. Let’s assume you love cooking and experimenting with new recipes. You could become a content writer in the hospitality industry and write blog posts for hotels, fitness websites, create e-books recipes for sale or start cooking lessons and market them online.

And if you love traveling, you could become a travel agent and offer services that include hotel and airline bookings, selling holiday insurance, proposing suggestions on holiday destinations, or creating blog content to market hotels and diverse luxury destinations. 

If you have a passion for working with numbers, you could approach businesses and offer to streamline their accounts department, maintain records, pay taxes, investigate fraud, and audit books of accounts.

You could also research to get ideas online. There could be a virtual assistant who’s engaging in a similar service. Please don’t copy them, but learn from them. Get ideas to create a unique service that you can offer. 

Love spending time with kids? You may focus on clients in the education sector, children’s fashion houses, write for blogs highlighting parenting challenges or pregnancy and birth, market kids recreation sites, and so on. 

But what if you don’t have any skills? 

There are numerous free online courses to help you start. Having a wide range of skills will create many opportunities and financial freedom. 

If you’re a Facebook enthusiast, consider offering social media management services. Nonetheless, if you lack the skills, enrol for an online course that can get you certification within one month. You could create and start by managing your own Facebook business page. After gaining experience, approach business owners and market your social media management services. 

Also, you could learn digital marketing and implement this skill to grow your business. Later, package online marketing as a service and request companies to manage their marketing strategies for a fee. 

What Services Do Virtual Assistants Offer?

Knowing who to work for is essential in your success as a virtual assistant. Identifying a specific target and services to offer will give you focus and you’ll polish your skills in particular areas. Some benefits you may want to provide include: 

Content writing 

Nowadays, almost every business has an online presence and needs experts to create content for company blogs, websites, social media, courses, e-books, or ghostwriting. 

Some of the duties and responsibilities of a content writer include: 

• Editing and proofreading articles, books, newsletters, product reviews, recipes, and so on. 
• Copywriting content for sales pages including email marketing
• Ghostwriting or creating e-books 
• Transcribing videos or audios and formatting the content
• Creating content for social media business pages. 
• Product descriptions for e-commerce websites 
• Grant proposals and business plans
• Letter writing, testimonials, or resumes
• Podcast or YouTube scripting

Administration support 

Admin management is vast and accommodates a varied range of skillset that virtual assistants can offer organizations and entrepreneurs. They include:-

• Calendar management – appointment booking, travel arrangements, setting up meetings via Zoom, Google Meet, Skype, or Teams, and managing blog editorial calendars. 
• Email management – responding to emails or organizing email boxes.
• Customer service – managing blog or social media comments, handling customer interactions through phone, live chat, email, customer follow-up, or responding to phone calls. 
• Staff recruitment, writing job listings, organizing interviews, creating resumes, hiring, and training new staff. 
• Social media tasks – managing engagement, responding to comments, uploading and monitoring YouTube videos and managing online communities. 
• Data entry tasks
• Content management, including typesetting, creating PowerPoint presentations, and re-purposing content.
• Order fulfilment, ordering supplies or handling onboarding tasks 
• Event planning and management
• Translation 

Graphic design 

If you lack design skills or want to polish existing skills. There are many short online courses or tools to help you along the way. Canva’s free version offers tons of templates to customize and create professional-looking images. However, you have to upgrade to the pro version to access additional features like image resizing, background removal, or varied stock photos. 

Some graphic design tasks include:

• Creating social media posts 
• Photo editing 
• Designing business cards, flyers, logos, signage, e-book covers, and adverts
• Photo and video editing 
• Photography 
• Designing websites.

Website and software development 

Another service that virtual assistants can offer is web development. Learning how to create and manage websites requires some advanced and specialized training. Some web development tasks include: 

• Know HTML, JavaScript, PHP, and other coding languages 
• Troubleshoot website problems 
• Maintain and update websites 
• Web development and maintenance 
• Offer IT support 
• Creating a website layout
• Develop and maintain applications 
• Creating software 
• Web coding
• Web customization – shopping cart installation on e-commerce websites, setting up opt-in forms, membership sites, or upgrading a website’s design
• System automation
• Managing databases
• Website security 

Social media 

Technology continues to revolutionize business processes, and marketing is one of them. Having an online presence is no longer a luxury but a necessity in the current market. Demand for social media managers is rising as more companies need someone to manage their business pages to increase visibility. Some on-demand tasks include:-

• Creating and managing social media accounts 
• Designing images and posts 
• Creating and scheduling posts 
• Creating polls 
• Analytics 
• Creating and managing ads 
• Developing social media marketing strategies 
• Managing engagement by responding to requests, concerns, and criticism 
• Social media influencer 

Digital marketing 

If you desire to offer digital marketing to companies as a service, there are many tasks you can provide since it is pretty broad. Some terms you need to research and learn more about are:-

• Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
• Ad management 
• Search Engine Marketing (SEM) 
• Social media marketing 
• Affiliate marketing
• Email marketing 
• Re-targeting 
• Content generation and optimization 
• Pay Per Click (PPC)
• Analytics 
• Mobile marketing 
• Developing a marketing strategy 
• Tracking and fixing broken links 
• Monitoring and managing website traffic 

Research 

Most business owners know that market research provides vital information about your target audience, competition, and industry. The comprehensive study can give insights on demand, client perception of your brand, and growth. It may help a business spend less on purchases or discover new opportunities.

Also, conducting market research can influence decision-making, secure investment, and avoid pitfalls, making research a highly sought-after service you can provide as a VA. Some tasks may include:-

• Travel research 
• Keyword and key phrase research 
• Product and market research 
• Hashtag research 
• Funding or sponsorship research 
• Empathy map research and create avatars for inbound marketing strategies
• Software research 
• Education research 
• Licensing, patenting, and company policies
• Competition research 
• SWOT analysis 
• Event research 
• Social media research 
• Product monitoring
• Product comparison

Accounting 

For businesses to thrive, they must have organized and well-streamlined bookkeeping departments, failure to which may lead to losses and business closures. If you love numbers, you may approach small businesses or startups and offer freelance bookkeeping services. Some tasks you can offer are: 

• Invoicing and billing
• Auditing 
• Taxes 
• Managing payments and petty cash
• Budgeting 
• Financial consultation 
• Stocktaking 

How to Promote Your Virtual Assistant Services

Depending on your skillset and the services you’re interested in, you can combine related ones and sell them as a package. You may choose to offer hourly rates, charge per project or on a contract basis, or create long-term alternatives at discounted rates. 

If you find something that draws your interest, investigate more. If, after exploration, you discover that that skill will improve your marketability, enrol in an online course and learn more. 

One benefit of launching a virtual assistant career is that you can vary the services you offer. You don’t have to stagnate with one service. You have the freedom and flexibility to alter your skillsets depending on market demand. 

Final thoughts 

If you are tired of having an 8 to 5 job and desire more flexibility in your routine, starting a virtual assistant career can be a good solution. In these challenging economic times, businesses tend to centre on reducing costs while boosting profits and efficiency. One way to solve this challenge is that business owners prefer outsourcing tasks to virtual assistants instead of hiring additional staff. 

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