Guide to Hire Trustworthy Virtual Assistant on Online Platforms

First published: July 21, 2021 @ 6:00 pm

For business owners, virtual assistants can be the best tool to help them in their business. Hiring a VA is not as easy as hiring a person.

This is because you are not hiring an employee, but rather, you are hiring a freelancer who will work on your projects. It’s important that you are able to hire someone that can do your job effectively and efficiently.

It’s also important that you hire someone who is honest and trustworthy enough to handle sensitive information. You don’t want someone who would sell the information for money or misuse it for their own personal gain.

From my own personal experience, I have come across several “virtual assistants”, that is, individuals who call themselves virtual assistants but are not. A virtual assistant is a person who is hired to do various tasks for your business.

This includes writing content, sending emails, taking care of your social media accounts, and many more. One of the main things that you need to consider when hiring a virtual assistant is if they are trustworthy enough to handle sensitive information.

In this article, I will share with you how you can easily spot if a virtual assistant is a scam or not. This way, you can hire someone who can help you in your business effectively and efficiently.

Why Should You Hire A Virtual Assistant?

Before we go into how to hire a trustworthy VA, let’s talk about why should you hire one in the first place. Virtual assistants can be really useful especially if you have multiple businesses or are into affiliate marketing and online marketing.

For example, if you have several websites that require content writing, having a VA will help you save time and effort because they will be able to write all the content for your websites.

They will also help in updating the website’s blog section regularly with fresh content from your sites or even write guest posts for other sites. Virtual assistants can also be really useful in your online marketing business.

If you are into affiliate marketing, you will need someone to handle your social media accounts, such as Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and others. You can also hire a VA to do your email marketing for you.

In short, virtual assistants can be very useful in running your business because they can help you save time and effort.

How To Hire A Virtual Assistant?

Now that we have talked about why should you hire a virtual assistant in the first place, let’s talk about how to hire one. I’m sure there are several online platforms where you can find a virtual assistant to work for you.

But the question is how do you know if the person that you are hiring is trustworthy or not? Here are some tips on how to spot if a virtual assistant is scam or not:

1. Check their reviews

You need to check their reviews first before hiring them so that you will know if they are trustworthy or not. Here’s what I recommend:

a) Go to their website/profile page on the platform where they sell their services and check out their reviews and ratings. See if there are any red flags for potential clients in their reviews such as bad ratings from past clients or if there are any negative comments.

b) You can also check their ratings on review sites such as Yelp, Facebook, and many more. If they have bad ratings or negative reviews on these sites, then you should stay away from them.

c) You can also do a Google search for their name and see if there are any reviews about them online.

2. Do a background check

After checking their reviews, you need to do a background check on them so that you will know if they are scam or not. Here’s what I recommend:

a) Check if they have any criminal records in the search engine of your choice (i.e. Google). This way, you will know if they have a criminal record or not and this can be used as one of the factors in deciding whether to hire them or not.

b) Check if they have any complaints filed against them in your local government office such as your city hall or the department of consumer affairs office (in the US). This way, you will know if they have any complaints filed against them and this can be used as one of the factors in deciding whether to hire them or not.

c) Ask for references from other clients that they worked for. This way, you will know if they are scam or not because if the past clients are happy with their services, then it’s a good sign that they are trustworthy.

3. Take their test project

You can also take their test project so that you will know if they are scam or not because if they fail to deliver your project on time and to your satisfaction, then it’s a good sign that they are scam and you should stay away from them.

If you are hiring a VA for writing content, ask them to write an article about your niche topic. Make sure that it is unique and free of grammatical errors and spelling mistakes.

Or if you are hiring a VA for content editing or content creation, you can ask them to attach their portfolio or ask them to create several contents for your company social media or for company profile.

If their contents enhance customer experience and increase customer satisfaction or digital customer engagement throughout the whole customer journey, it means that they are skilled and capable to create content strategy and will be able to complete the tasks on content marketing, content editing, or content creation well.

After you found out which VA is scam and which one is not, you can hire the one that you think is trustworthy enough to handle your sensitive information. Here are some tips on how to hire a virtual assistant that you can trust:

1. Hire from Trusted Platforms

The first thing that you need to do is to hire a virtual assistant from a trusted platform. There are several online platforms where you can find a VA to work for you.

Make sure that the virtual assistant that you hire is trustworthy enough to handle your sensitive information and it’s best if you hire from one of the trusted platforms above because these platforms will vet the VA first before allowing them to sell their services on their sites.

2. Ask for references from other clients that they worked for in the past

It’s important that you ask for references from other clients that they worked for in the past so that you will know if they are scam or not because if the past clients are happy with their services, then it’s a good sign that they are trustworthy and can be hired again in the future when needed.

3. Check their reviews and ratings on review sites.

It’s important that you check their reviews and ratings on review sites so that you will know if they are scam or not because if they have bad ratings or negative reviews on these sites, then potential clients should stay away from them.

I hope that this article will help you to spot if a virtual assistant is scam or not and to hire a virtual assistant that you can trust to help you in your business.

Hiring a virtual assistant can be very useful in running your business because they can help you save time and effort. It’s important that you hire someone who is trustworthy enough to handle sensitive information and not someone who will misuse it for their own personal gain.

If you’re looking for tips on choosing virtual assistants or any recommended virtual assistant software, WorkDeputy is the place for you. Our platform has a huge database of software that could help you maximize your business growth.