How to Hire a Virtual Assistant to Manage Your Blog

Many professionals have a hard time keeping up with the tasks that come with managing their businesses. And while in today’s world quality content is more important than ever, creating that content can feel like just one more thing demanding your attention that needs to get done quickly. However, you can’t and shouldn’t rush to create your content, as poorly written work can be a death sentence to your business.

Your website blog is a key part of your marketing strategy, so it needs to be articulately written, engaging and relevant. The content you publish should be regular and fresh, and structured appropriately with strong keywords to help keep you high on Google's search results.

Beyond developing great content, there are many technical tasks that accompany your blog, such formatting, uploading, and finding good images. If people start to interact with your posts, you’ll need to respond in a timely fashion. You'll also have to study the analytics and market your blog strategically to get it in front of the right people. All considered, blogging is time consuming; there’s no doubt about it.

How are you going to find the time to do all this, in addition to running your business? If you’re having to ask this question, the answer could be this: hire a virtual assistant.

Do You Need a Virtual Assistant to Manage Your Blog?

You could definitely use a virtual assistant (VA) if any of the below pain points sound familiar:

• Your writing skills are not polished.
• Your schedule is already hectic.
• You struggle to come up with fresh content ideas.
• You don’t understand SEO.
• You find analytics confusing.
• You’re not particularly technical.
• You don’t have a strong understanding of marketing best practices.

Virtual assistants are trained professionals who provide services to those who wish to outsource aspects of their business. VAs come in all shapes and sizes, so to speak; most specialize in particular areas of business.

When hiring your VA, you’ll need to make sure that he or she is experienced in content creation and marketing. They should also be conversant with SEO and the web software you use. It goes without saying that your VA should be highly organized and able to stick to a regular schedule.

Let’s take a look at the duties your VA will need to perform:

Content Creation

You might have ideas about the content you wish to create. That’s fine; you can pass this guidance onto your VA. However, since they are the ones with the core skills, it can be prudent to let them run with their own ideas.

Your VA should have proven experience and an articulate writing style. They should fully understand SEO (search engine optimization) and be able to write each post with this in mind. They’ll be adept at finding the most appropriate keywords; they should understand the consequences of keyword stuffing and be familiar with link building.

Assuming you’re using WordPress, they will ensure that the correct SEO plugins are installed in order to manage the optimization. Lastly, your VA should be able to select compelling, relevant images to help highlight your post. Formatting posts should be done in accordance with SEO best practices, too.

Organisation

Your VA must be highly organized. It helps if they have some kind of system to help them regulate your posts and plan in advance. An editorial calendar is a useful tool – you can even get a plugin for one on Wordpress. The VA then has a schedule to refer to and can come up with relevant content ideas well in advance.

Your VA will need to be on the ball when it comes to responding to and engaging followers. If your blog is good (and marketing is done correctly, you’ll attract followers to it. Some of those followers will have something to say about your content.

One of the worst things you can do is ignore comments and feedback on your blog; you should have your VA respond to notifications as quickly as possible after they come in. He or she should also filter out any spam your blog attracts – this is annoying, but common!

Your VA must also organise the technical aspects. Again, assuming you’re running your blog on WordPress, then you must be sure to have the latest version operating at all times to avoid glitches and security issues. Your VA should also ensure your blog has up-to-date plugins.

Lastly, it’s crucial for your VA to back all work up regularly. We don’t need to tell you that losing your posts can be a total disaster!

Marketing

Marketing your blog is crucial. Clever content alone just won’t cut it – you have to make an effort to spread your blog far and wide. Every post you put up will need to be promoted. There are several ways your VA can do this. He or she should post it on your social media channels, even paying to have it channeled to carefully chosen audiences. This also means you’ll need a moderate marketing budget to boost your posts.

Your VA can also connect with influencers to spread your content as far as possible. They can locate other blogs related to your type of content and comment on them, with links back to your blog, so that you’re reaching people who are already interested in your niche. Guest blogging is also a great way to promote yourself. Other bloggers will be happy to host your content as it will bring more traffic to their sites; it’s a win-win situation for all.

A content aggregator is a person or organization that gathers online content from different online sources for resale or reuse. Content aggregators can be a great way to make a side income and generate traffic, so get your VA to find out who are the best aggregators are for your niche, then submit your feeds.

Your VA should submit your blogs to RSS directories, too. An RSS feed directory is a site that hosts RSS feeds. These are searchable through RSS keywords, topics, or categories. RSS feeds increase exposure and brings more traffic to your site.

Your Time Is Precious… So Spend It Wisely.

Hopefully it’s now clear just how much time a virtual assistant can save you by managing your blogs. Virtual assistants can take care of content creation, marketing, the technical aspects and all of the related organization. By using a VA to manage your content, you'll free up precious time so you can focus on other aspects of your business.

With your blogs taken care of and your own time dedicated to other operations, who knows… you may even have a life outside of your business! That’s practically unheard of for most startups and entrepreneurs. Good luck hiring your life-saving VA!