An Extra Pair of Hands Whenever You Need Them

Is there anybody out there who couldn't use an extra pair of hands? Who needs help with getting the bills paid on time? Organising an electrician, plumber, decorator, etc to carry out work at home? Someone to answer the phone? Make your appointments? Type up your reports? Research holiday destinations and organise your travel - both home and abroad? Someone to manage your expenses and file your returns? Someone who can help you write your literature, blogs, flyers, who can help you with mailing campaigns or follow up calls. Sounds good?

Well, a virtual assistant service can place all this help at your fingertips. A perfect solution for anyone with too much to do and not enough time to do it in.

Think of it like hiring a temp from an employment agency - only you'll never have to do that again! A virtual assistant is self employed and bills only for actual hours worked - no paying for coffee breaks, holiday leave, sick leave or employment taxes. Because a virtual assistant works remotely (ie not in your office) the use of web based tools like instant messenger services, email, online calendars, task managers, online filing etc are used to help you work with your assistant. Schedule changes, project reports, customer service alerts can all be performed immediately. A virtual assistant can help bring the impression of size to your company.

Find out more about working within a virtual office.

The Away PA provides an "on demand" secretarial and business support service in conjunction with it's online office "Head Office". To find out more about how you can take advantage of a fully supported office, anywhere, any time, visit the Head Office website or The Away PA Website or email info.headoffice@theawaypa.eu or telephone 08450 527565.

Share your Diary and More

Sharing your weekly diary/calendar with a remote or virtual assistant/secretary can be a great asset to your business. There are various tools on the web which enable you to do this, for example Head Office and Google Calendar.

Keeping track of projects with one of these tools, or other similar available online systems, can go a long way towards helping you organise your business and keep things running smoothly - and you can utilise a virtual or remote assistant/secretary to help you.

These diary / calendar systems allow any number of people to see when events are happening within your business and to make notes on a project's status. You can also use these systems to assign tasks to your remote / virtual assistant and track progress.

In order to manage your projects effectively, you will need to ensure that each project is properly defined with accurate deadlines and milestones. It would be prudent to also allow contingency timings as a "cushion" in the event of unexpected delays. The online calendar systems will provide daily reminders, due dates and the current status of each project. As each stage of the project comes together, colleagues and teams will need to collaborate with each other to drive the project forward. These tools allow people to communicate effectively, with the ability to work away from the office location, on site, from home, etc.

These online "e-office" systems, eg Head Office, also allow you to share files easily. Technology is great, but when something goes wrong - for example lost emails, computer crashes, etc - the impact can be significant on your business. With these systems, files can be stored and shared online - if one person downloads a file and loses that copy, the last or latest version of the file can simply be downloaded again.

Being able to share your "e-office" (diary, files, email (if you require email monitoring by your secretary/assistant) ) makes it extremely easy to work together with someone if you are a home worker or travel a lot in your business. It also allows you to share information with business partners and clients.

The Away PA is a small business support specialist focussed on the needs of the individual entrepreneur and small business. Find out how a remote / virtual assistant/secretary can transform your business and save you time.


The Away PA provides an "on demand" secretarial and business support service in conjunction with it's online office "Head Office". To find out more about how you can take advantage of a fully supported office, anywhere, any time, visit the Head Office website or The Away PA Website or email info.headoffice@theawaypa.eu or telephone 08450 527565.

A Creme PA Service

Virtual Assistants are a crème service similar to that of the old fashioned personal secretary of years gone by. Today's online personal secretaries (Virtual Assistants or VAs) can help entrepreneurs and professionals expand their respective businesses in a very cost effective way.

In today's technologically developed world, Virtual Assistants are not limited to the old concept of simply completing routine administrative and secretarial tasks. Instead, the role of the VA today has become much more extensive. These online personal assistants are not only able to handle all your business administration processes but can also handle many other business requirements, such as creating dynamic and interactive Powerpoint presentations, developing complex Excel spreadsheets, writing and designing advertising, writing blogs, email marketing , debt recovery, designing company branding, building websites, as well as the more routine appointment scheduling, travel itinerary planning, email support etc.

With mobile working becoming more prevalent a VA service makes a perfect support system to this style of working.

The Away PA provides an "on demand" secretarial and business support service in conjunction with it's online office "Head Office". To find out more about how you can take advantage of a fully supported office, anywhere, any time, visit the Head Office website or The Away PA Website or email info.headoffice@theawaypa.eu or telephone 08450 527565.

Consider Social Media for effective Company Branding

Brand-building is very important when selling products and services. Effective brand building needs the concerted efforts of everyone involved in your company, irrespective of the efforts of brand managers and people responsible for really driving the brand and for establishing the image of the company. Anyone who represents the company must hold onto the business’ values and beliefs to maintain the business’ reputation and project a solid image of the company.

A Virtual Assistant can represent your business in a number of ways. Consider using social media for brand-building and take advantage of the services of a virtual assistant to deliver consistent branding messages through Twitter, Facebook, and other similar social media accounts.

Social media will let you send messages to your target market that will reinforce the kind of image you want to project to the public. Because social media are capable of reaching a wide audience, they can be used to help you establish and propagate your brand. The more people you are able to communicate with the more people will also understand what your business is about, what products and services you sell and what value you provide.

Twitter provides an effective tool for you to communicate with hundreds and thousands, millions even, of people from all around the globe. Other social media will also give you that opportunity. However, using social media for branding and other tasks is time consuming. Consider hiring a Virtual assistant who can dedicate the required time for your social media tasks to support your branding efforts on line.

To find out more about branding using social media and how a virtual assistant can help you achieve this, contact The Away PA.

The Away PA provides an "on demand" secretarial and business support service in conjunction with it's online office "Head Office". To find out more about how you can take advantage of a fully supported office, anywhere, any time, visit the Head Office website or The Away PA Website or email info.headoffice@theawaypa.eu or telephone 08450 527565.

Harness the Power of the Internet to Expand and Improve Your Business

In little more than a generation, the Internet has revolutionised the way that we conduct our lives and do business, and virtual offices and virtual office services have emerged to help us bridge the gap. In recent times this growing
trend has picked up momentum, and we now turn to the web through various modes
of communication to fulfil so many different tasks.

Methods of communication have made great progress and as postal services will testify, e-mail has now become the communications method of choice. Within many businesses, certain employees may be offered the choice to work from their homes. Costly travel and accommodation expenses are being reduced as organisations elect to utilise teleconferencing for necessary salesand client meetings. All these developments suggest the true strengthof the internet and its ability to make us communicate virtually and far more efficiently.

As technology is revolutionising the way we do business, the world of virtual assistant services has emerged to fulfil a clear need. In our evolving global markets, an online office and the services of a virtual assistant can make sense from a number of different perspectives, and we suggest below some reasons why you might consider their selection:

For either a start-up concern or an established business, the cost of expansion can dig a sizeable hole in a company's financial reserves. While it is hard to acquire new businessto begin with, it can be far more difficult trying to set aside

additional resources to bring in another capacity to service newly acquired clients and customers. If you have to deal with the hiring and training of staff, especially if it’s for short-term projects, you are likely
to encounter obstacles. At the least you will experience a ramp up period during which the employee will likely not be up to speed, and you may also run the risk of discovering that the person is truly not up to the job, or simply does not fit in. A virtual assistant can fulfil all your admin requirements instantly and free your resources to work on some other pressing problem.

The harried entrepreneur quickly finds that he or she cannot be amicro-manager and cannot assume responsibility for everything. There is only so much that one can do in a typical day and you may already have experienced that these days can extend to cover all daylight hours and more. Virtual assistant services are ideally placed to free management from non-essential activities. Imagine a scenario where all routine admin tasks are covered by an efficient, readily available and reactive virtual assistant. By focusing on core values, direct customer satisfaction and new business development, the entrepreneur can concentrate on bringing more money to the table.

As expenditure has taken on a whole new meaning during our recent economic difficulties, it makes sense to trim all overhead costs as much as possible. With competition very much in mind, the organisation that is able to reduce overheads while taking advantage of an online office and/or virtual assistant services will be much leaner, fitter and able to trade more efficiently, as we emerge into more profitable times.

The Away PA provides an "on demand" secretarial and business support service in conjunction with it's online office "Head Office". To find out more about how you can take advantage of a fully supported office, anywhere, any time, visit the Head Office website or The Away PA Website or email info.headoffice@theawaypa.eu or telephone 08450 527565.

Reports Hail the End of the Recession

In the last two years, millions of people have lost their jobs due to the slowdown in the UK and global economies. Many companies were left with no choice but to lay-off employees after the economy suffered a major downturn at the beginning the last quarter of 2007. Many companies who had to borrow money to expand had to close some of their office and branches. There were also companies that could no longer afford to keep many of their employees. The recession has proved a cruel reality for the business world in the last two years.

Reports recently published are hailing the end of the recession, and it is expected that there will be new businesses opening and many existing businesses will start to bounce back in the next few years. Companies that are running on low manpower or have had to let go of employees in the last few years can choose to temporarily hire virtual assistants to manage and deal with administrative tasks and general business processes.

Virtual assistants provide various administrative and other specialised services for clients. They can be very effective support teams for businesses that have had to lay-off employees during the tough economic times. With the help of virtual assistants, a company can continue to run its business operations smoothly, despite only a skeleton number of permanent employees.

Virtual assistants can be the perfect solution for transition periods within the company, as companies slowly recover from an ailing economy. Instead of immediately hiring permanent employees, companies can simply hire virtual assistants on a temporary or short term basis to work within the business.

Even the strongest companies who have not necessarily suffered from low manpower can still benefit from the services of virtual assistants. Many virtual assistants offer specialised services such as SEO, web design, debt recovery, database management, etc. Virtual assistants are incredibly flexible and are in a good position to help businesses, whether they just need simple administrative services or more specialised services, or whether they just need additional manpower during peak seasons and tough economic times. Companies should not overlook the valuable resource that virtual assistants can provide.

The Away PA provides an "on demand" secretarial and business support service in conjunction with it's online office "Head Office". To find out more about how you can take advantage of a fully supported office, anywhere, any time, visit the Head Office website or The Away PA Website or email info.headoffice@theawaypa.eu or telephone 08450 527565.

What is a Virtual Office?

A virtual office network is an office environment that is accessed by way of the web at any time and from any place. A virtual office network provider utilises the power of the internet and technical expertise to offer the user a simulated work environment where the user can access facilities similar to that provided by a more expensive exchange server, such as intranet, company email, shared calendars, shared files and work processes by way of a PC or laptop/netbook and web connection.

So, for example, an employee or work colleague could be out of the office due to business, or may even work from home, but yet is still be able to communicate or transfer data to colleagues and others at the workplace within the office environment. This makes a virtual office an effective tool to add value to your business and make it more systematic and effective.

What makes the virtual office so attractive is that all this is achievable with minimum to zero investment in infrastructure, with the service provider managing the design and development of the virtual office network and taking care of the maintenance and support.

The Benefits of Virtual Office

• The client does not have to bother with costly and time consuming upgrades since the client hires the virtual office service from the provider and the maintenance of which is the responsibility of the service provider.

• The flexibility that a virtual office network provides is unparalleled, as employees only need a laptop/netbook and network connectivity to get in touch with the main office. This functionality is important for mobile businesses and where business activity is conducted from various locations or from home.

• Often security is seen as a constraint in the domain of virtual office networks as corporate data is confidential. However with development in technologies, service providers today utilise highly sophisticated tools, password login systems and authentication management which makes the system more secure than accessing it from your workplace.

• The package that a virtual office network provider can offer includes the deployment, along with support for planning, designing and maintenance. Subscription is on a "pay as you go" basis in the form of a monthly fee.

To find out more about the virtual office service provided by The Away PA, visit: Head Office.

The Away PA provides an "on demand" secretarial and business support service in conjunction with it's online office "Head Office". To find out more about how you can take advantage of a fully supported office, anywhere, any time, visit the Head Office website or The Away PA Website or email info.headoffice@theawaypa.eu or telephone 08450 527565.