Using support services such as outsourcing work to other businesses as a virtual assistant is becoming one of the best practices small business owners are enjoying today. When you are the owner of a small business, you may not have the funds to hire a full time employee and have to not only pay a wage but unemployment, and benefits. These are all expenses that can add up and eat your already meager profit margin. The birth of service providers such as virtual assistants has made running a small business online an easier undertaking.

There are many terms used when looking for a service provider who can help you get certain jobs done. The following list is a short glossary of terms used to help you better understand the type of service providers there are to be found for hire online today.

Virtual Assistant

A virtual assistant (VA) is much like an executive assistant or an administrative assistant in the offline world. They are the ones who usually take care of your scheduling, talk to your business contacts, make flight arrangements, answer your mail/email, process orders, or help with any other daily task that needs to be done in the general scope of things. These people are your right hand man or woman and know just as much as they need to know about your business. So if they were needed, they could take things over and you could go on vacation or whatever. These contractors usually are hired on a monthly basis for a set fee and work for you as many hours as set out per week for as long as you need them to.

Secretarial Services

These are services that you usually end up hiring for odd jobs that need being done but they do not work closely with you such as your virtual assistant would. If you need something done such as a podcasting submission or a press release submission to media sites or something that your VA doesn’t specialize in, you would send the job out to these professionals on a fee-by-project basis or via a possibly hourly rate.

Virtual Staffing Service

Much like a temp agency, these services work with many casual workers and several clients who are looking for certain jobs completed. The worker gets paid a set amount per hour as a subcontractor and the company itself takes a cut of the fee charged for placing the worker and client together to get the job done. The client will often receive different workers throughout the time that they are looking for workers with the virtual staffing service. Often times, the workers themselves only want part time work to pay some bills or make some vacation money. These workers often have no interest in either their own business or a full time position.

While there are still other service providers such as personal assistants, virtual professionals and freelancers, they are all proficient in specific skill sets such as graphic design, bookkeeping, web design and more. These are usually all individuals who are hired on a per project base for a certain fee and then when the work is complete, you may never deal with them again unless you specifically ask if they would be interested in more ongoing work.

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