6 Creative Ways to
Use Overseas Virtual Assistants
James Parsons
Outsourcing work to overseas contractors has a bad
reputation.
Decades of U.S. businesses trying to find the cheapest
possible labor in foreign markets
led to a backlash, especially when the home economy
was faltering.
Everyone seems to have a horror story how of a low-paid
contractor mismanaged a website,
created valueless content or simply took the money and
disappeared.
But the problem can sometimes result from the pay.
When an entrepreneur pays pennies
on the dollar compared with what it would
cost domestically,
the results can sometimes end up being worth only a
fraction of the cost as well.
No matter what market is selected, keep the language
barrier in mind.
Hiring overseas contractors to write fluent English
content can be an exercise in frustration –
not to mention
the minefield of copyright flags. Instead, hire overseas virtual
assistants
to perform the following tasks that can often be done
independent of language fluency:
1. Raw coding.
Javascript, HTML, cascading style sheets (CSS) --
coding languages are the same
whether a person's native language is English,
Spanish, Japanese or anything else.
There's no need to worry about virtual assistants'
English fluency
when they are producing code for website modifications, plug-ins or landing pages.
Do worry about the quality of their code. But that’s easy
to check. Does it work? Is it secure?
An overseas coder is just as likely to produce a quality
website as a domestic one –
- and can do it at a fraction of the cost.
2. Scripted live
chat.
OK, so scripted live-chat agents are going to sound a
little stilted and unnatural when English
is their second language. Then again, if anyone
is required to stick to a script,
he or she will suffer just as much with even if
fluent in English and residing in the States.
Live-chat agents are paid to sit around and be available
when a user needs a question answered on a website.
They generally don’t need an intimate
understanding of the business.
A handful of scripts and some basic information will
enable them to answer most questions
that a user might pose through live chat. Plus, overseas
agents are available
and alert late at night after business hours, ensuring
quality service around the clock.
3. Lead
generation.
Web site contact forms can be powerful sources of leads.
But it’s a time-consuming manual task to sort through the
contact messages,
determine which can be pursued as customer leads,
find the ones requiring other attention and then pursue the leads.
Why bother doing it manually? A virtual assistant can
just as easily sort through the contact forms and send a follow-up note to the
most promising leads. If the virtual assistant proves effective, expand his or
her role to include other forms of lead discovery.
4. Graphic design.
Like coding, imagery is somewhat of a universal language.
There are just as many talented graphic designers overseas as there are
domestically, and their services cost less.
Need a new logo designed, a brochure put together or a
mockup for a website layout?
Any task that requires a graphic designer can be
handled by an overseas virtual assistant.
Another great idea is to outsource the creation of the
company's infographics.
A staffer in the States can handle the initial
legwork of gathering the data;
the virtual assistant does the manual task of
putting it together in a graphically compelling way.
Determine whether to hire a general virtual
assistant or a specialty graphic designer.
It all comes down to how much graphic work is
needed.
A specialist may be perfect for large projects, but a
generalist can cover other tasks as well.
5. Social media
management.
SproutSocial is an incredibly powerful tool for managing
a company's social-media accounts,
but it takes hours to reply to mundane
comments and gather basic analytics data.
Instead of doing it alone, make use of the integrated
team management
to hire a virtual assistant to run the company's
social-media accounts.
It's possible to easily limit what the virtual
assistant can access for security reasons.
Arrange for the virtual assistant to run the company's
feeds and respond to comments
as they arrive. Then it's possible for the U.S. team to
focus on creating the content
and making use of the analytics data to develop new
plans.
6. Blogging.
Blogging involves a lot more than just writing content
and publishing text.
There are a whole host of menial tasks that need doing --
and they could be done by anyone,
like backing up the blog and keeping the software
up-to-date.
Rather than worry about all these tasks, hire an
overseas virtual assistant as a blog manager.
Those willing to take the time to experiment with various
virtual assistants
may be able to find one with the skills to develop ideas
for posts, draft outlines for them,
hunt down images and reference links and more.
At the end of the day, the entrepreneur will have more
time to run the business
and create content, with all the manual work
handled overseas.
https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/236399
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