Amazon virtual assistants can make your life much easier. A valuable addition to your business, they can help boost performance and save your time and effort to focus on tasks that need your attention.
Infact, an Amazon virtual assistant can help reduce your operating costs upto 60%
That said - Hiring an Amazon virtual assistant will add no value until you know how to make the best out of working with them. While proper communication is the key, let's step further to understand how to build a successful business relationship with your virtual assistants.
Tips to Manage Amazon Virtual Assistants
Define the Role:
Imagine a situation when you want to hire two dedicated VAs. One for data entry and another for product listing optimization. The similarities between the jobs may lead to a communication gap between the employees.
That's why it's essential to define the role clearly upon hiring. Make it a point to delegate the specific tasks to the suitable Amazon virtual assistant based on their skills and experience. And invest some extra time to outline the tasks concisely to your VA. Assigning your employees to their zone of excellence will improve their productivity and help them learn and excel in their expertise.
Communicate:
Make communication a priority. Consistent communication with your VA is a must to find the areas that need the most attention. Make sure the mode of communication is quick and effective. You can use online communication platforms like Skype, Zoom, Slack, and Loom to consistently contact your virtual assistants.
Slack is an excellent tool for instant messaging. It is customizable, and you can create channels in slack specific to your business. For Instance, you can create separate channels for Amazon store management and product content creation and listing and direct messages distinct to your Amazon virtual assistant based on the task.
And, Loom is an easy-to-use tool that can record your computer screen, voice and face and instantly share your video with your team. Instead of hopping on a skype call or typing a brief for your virtual assistants over email, It is easy to send them a loom.
Set Targets:
Establish performance goals and break them into meaningful metrics to understand your VAs performance. It's easier for you and your virtual team to sort out these critical metrics at the beginning. Set the KPIs based on the tasks they need to accomplish.
For Instance, the metrics for customer support virtual assistant will be the number of sales and resolved customer issues addressed in a month. In contrast, for a product sourcing virtual assistant for Amazon will be the number of profitable products and the winning deals at the same time.
According to a study by psychologist Gail Matthew, when people have written goals, they were 33% more successful in achieving them.
Once you establish your KPI's, it's best to put them in writing. The document that spells out your expectations can be used to evaluate your VA's performance. Moreover, having this document in view will motivate your virtual assistants to work towards achieving them.
Track Progress:
Make a point to track their progress. Tools such as Asana and Trello are excellent task management boards that allow your team to log every step of the process. This will keep you and your VA to be on the same page with the daily, weekly and monthly expectations. And help check the progress quickly rather than constant emails and message check-ins.
But, How to monitor and manage your Amazon virtual assistant without micromanaging them?
The key is to use the right set of tools and technology to connect with your VA.
There are several online management tools that are not intrusive with your Amazon virtual assistant's everyday activities yet are compelling enough to make sure the project runs at the needed pace.
Create a Shared System:
Save yourself from the trouble of continually emailing deadlines, project lists and updates, by creating a shared system giving access to your Amazon virtual assistants. Besides, you can also plan and track the tasks using the shared network for easy access.
The simple setup and generous amount of free storage make Dropbox a suitable choice for many businesses. The free version includes 2GB of storage space. However, Google Drive offers more open space than dropbox does, starting with 5GB, and is cost-effective compared to other shared file systems.
There might be situations where you want to share credit card numbers and confidential information. And in turn, your VA can store new passwords in the same documents when they open new accounts. A password manager tool like Lastpass can help create solid account information and passwords and share them across your team securely in such situations.
Motivate:
Did you know, disengaged employees cost companies a total of $300 billion in lost productivity each year?
Employee motivation is a critical aspect of effective management, and it's even more critical when handling remote assistants. Appreciate their success, completed timelines and reward skills in review meetings. Moreover, having regular reviews will allow you to discuss any concerns. And be clear about the changes that need to be made.
Besides positive feedback, a word of kindness can keep their motivation afloat. Give your Amazon virtual assistant a review on how their results positively impacted your sales and performance. For Instance, it will be a good idea to give your Amazon virtual assistant a quick peek at how their product content or the SEO efforts have increased the site clicks and sales.
Provide Training:
Train them on every aspect of your business. An Amazon virtual assistant will have strong technical knowledge and skill sets but will need a bit of understanding of your business's particulars. If you own a brand or sell a unique product, it's better to train your Amazon virtual assistant on the product and the niche industry.
Use software like droplr.com to quickly create video walkthroughs of the tasks to handle or the software used to manage and upload data. It is also good to maintain a central repository of know-how and information related to the Amazon business to save your time on training.
Do you still think you need hands-on helping with managing an Amazon virtual assistant?
We can Help -
Vserve is a one-stop solution for all your Amazon virtual assistant needs. Manage your Amazon marketplace accounts right from setting up your store to account management and promotional activities. We have experts to get it all done while you sit back and relax. Additionally, trust Vserve virtual assistant services to deliver the needed assistance to manage your virtual assistants for Amazon with a dedicated program manager and 24*7 support.
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