How to Start a Secretarial Services Business

Home Secretarial Services refers to a home-based secretary, also known as Virtual Assistants, Personal Assistants and Administrative Assistants who works as an independent contractor from their own home.

Secretaries help keep offices organized and running smoothly. Secretarial careers exist in settings like corporate offices, government agencies and schools, either on site or remotely in the role of virtual assistant.

In these positions, you perform basic clerical duties, such as running office equipment, organizing files and filing systems, creating and maintaining correspondence, answering telephones and performing other duties delegated by your boss.

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Tips to starting Secretarial Services

The secretaries’ job responsibilities may also include reconciling financial accounts and statements, general human resources functions and troubleshooting office equipment.

There are several types of secretaries namely, Legal Secretaries, Medical Secretaries, Executive Secretaries etc.

Hiring a full-time secretary is a luxury many small business owners can’t afford, so instead, they outsource their administrative tasks to home secretarial businesses. Secretaries are expected to handle a wide range of tasks from filing, accounts receivable and accounts payable, managing schedules, making travel arrangements, answering customer phone calls and emails, blogging and they may even be tasked with running errands and assisting with event planning.

Home secretarial businesses are a low-cost startup for individuals who are organized and ready to assist busy entrepreneurs and executives.

Thinking about opening a secretarial services business?

Perhaps you’re already familiar with the many work from home opportunities. With the aid of the internet, you can now provide secretarial services from the comfort of your own home. With knowledge, skills, and experience, you can now expand it and start a secretarial services business.

You need to be aware that with this type of business, you can offer a wide range of services like business writing, editing or proofreading, preparing spreadsheets, word processing, billing, bookkeeping, contact management, database, graphic design, office management, and organizing consultation.

If there are professional organizations in your area, you can join them. This is called networking because there is a great chance to meet potential clients or get referrals. Local publications can also be used for advertising purposes.

Choose the location of the ad carefully to ensure visibility. Business owners usually travel and perhaps some have checked-in in the local hotels. You can request the hotel to refer businesspersons to your secretarial service when needed. More people are working from home or operating a business from home than ever before.

This fact creates an outstanding opportunity to capitalize on the ever-increasing demand for secretarial services by starting a secretarial service that specializes in assisting clients online. An online secretarial service provides the same services that a regular secretarial service provides with one main difference: the services are provided online.

Clients seeking typing, editing or electronic filing services would simply e-mail the work or the outline of the work required. Once the work has been completed, it would be e-mailed back to the client. The business will take some time to establish in terms of securing regular clients and building templates and an operating format.

However, for anyone with secretarial experience, starting this business is a great way to work from home, benefit from your skills, and earn an handsome amount of money.

A secretarial business can also be called a virtual assistant business, where you offer various secretarial services online and remotely. Nowadays, an increasing number of clients need help in managing and answering their emails. There are also a number of clients who need help in building and developing their social media presence.

Your first step should be to determine what kind of services you will focus on for your secretarial business.

The possible markets you can tap for this business include the following:

Brand new businesses with no support staff. Most of these will also be small businesses and self-employed individuals that may need some help on as-needed business.
Other small business entrepreneurs have little time or desire to do their own administrative work, and your service will be of great help to them.
Small and medium businesses experiencing difficulty in hiring full-time staff. Despite the good economy, attracting good employees is a major problem of most small businesses. Labor market is still tight nowadays, that even established firms are continuously looking for temporary help to do administrative tasks.
Students, either college or graduate students, oftentimes need help for their research. Your organizing and research skills can come in handy for this segment.

Determine the types of services you plan to offer. Make a list and attribute a cost to each service you plan to provide. You may opt to get paid by the hour, per project or you may offer clients a monthly retainer for ongoing services.

There are some ideas for you which you could take up as your niche for a home-based secretarial business:

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Resume writing and career consultation
Word processing
Editing an proofreading
Business writing
Preparing spreadsheets and presentation materials
Bookkeeping an billing
Database and contact management

Identify which industries you’re comfortable performing service for. If your background experience is in education, you may plan to contact day care owners and directors, or tutoring companies, while if you have experience in the pharmaceutical fields, you may approach a health care copywriter or doctor’s office with your services.

Once you are done deciding, you can set up a home office in an area of your home that’s free from distractions, such as your spouse, children, pets and the television.

Equip your office area with a desk, printer, fax machine, telephone, printer, book case, wall calendar, common office supplies, such as pens and pencils.

At Last

Come up with a name for your home secretarial business that describes the services you provide, industries you serve or your work ethic. Your business name should immediately tell potential clients that you can help them reduce their administrative workload, so they can focus on tasks essential to growing their businesses.

Freelancers are increasingly in demand, as companies value the flexibility and cost effectiveness of their services. Even personal assistants (PAs), traditionally the heart-and-soul of an office, are working out of the office.