Could a Virtual Assistant Help Double Your Sales Meetings?

Scheduling sales appointments is a crucial part of any business's sales process. However, the administrative work involved with booking calls and meetings can be highly time-consuming for business owners and sales teams. This is where partnering with a dedicated virtual assistant appointment setter can help maximize your sales productivity.

This comprehensive guide will explore how a virtual assistant focused on appointment setting can transform your sales pipeline.

What is a Virtual Assistant Appointment Setter?

A virtual assistant appointment setter is a remote assistant whose primary responsibility is booking sales meetings and calls between your business and qualified prospects.

Rather than your salespeople spending hours emailing and cold calling to schedule appointments, this critical but time-intensive task is outsourced to a dedicated virtual assistant. 

A skilled virtual assistant appointment setter will take over all the administrative work involved in booking meetings, including:

• Researching and compiling prospect contact information
• Conducting cold calls and emails to qualify and schedule leads
• Following up persistently via phone and email to lock in appointments
• Confirming appointments in your calendar or CRM platform
• Providing reminders and details for scheduled meetings
• Recording all communications and appointment details for your records

This allows your sales team to focus purely on having strategic sales conversations and closing deals rather than getting caught up in the weeds of appointment-setting logistics.

Why Your Business Needs a Virtual Assistant Appointment Setter

There are many impactful reasons why leveraging a virtual assistant focused on scheduling appointments can be a game changer for your sales pipeline.

• Save Hours Each Week

Booking sales meetings requires a tremendous amount of coordination and persistence. A reliable virtual assistant appointment setter will take this hugely time-consuming task off your plate. 

This can free up 5, 10, or even 20+ hours in your salespeople's week that can be reallocated to more valuable selling activities.

• Increase Overall Efficiency

Carefully hiring and training an offshore virtual assistant appointment setter allows you to implement standardized processes for scheduling calls. This structured approach executed by a dedicated resource leads to more booked appointments than your sales team could manage themselves.

With more meetings scheduled, your sales team can focus purely on an increased number of sales conversations with interested prospects.

• Improve Prospect Experience 

When a virtual assistant appointment setter handles the scheduling logistics, your sales team can devote their time and energy entirely to sales conversations and nurturing prospects. 

This leads to a smoother experience for potential customers engaging with your business.

• Significant Cost Savings

Employing a US-based appointment setter on your team requires paying a full salary, benefits, payroll taxes, and more. But virtual assistant appointment setters allow you to only pay for actual time worked at much lower hourly rates.

You get the same results and quality of appointment setting but at a fraction of the cost of an in-house resource.

What Tasks Can a Virtual Assistant Appointment Setter Handle?

A dedicated virtual assistant focusing on appointment setting can take on a wide range of scheduling and administrative responsibilities for your sales team.

Here are some of the most common tasks a skilled virtual assistant appointment setter can reliably execute:

• Research prospects from lead lists and identify correct contact info
• Conduct outbound cold calls to qualify leads
• Send initial emails to introduce your business
• Schedule appointments that work for both parties
• Set calendar invitations and meeting details in CRM platforms 
• Provide prep materials like sales decks before calls
• Send appointment confirmation and reminder emails
• Log all communications with prospects in your CRM
• Follow up with options when needed to reschedule
• Update sales team on confirmed appointments   
• Handle inbound leads and convert them into booked meetings

By fully taking over these administrative tasks, a virtual assistant appointment setter allows your sales reps to focus their limited time entirely on having productive sales conversations.

Critical Skills to Look For in a Virtual Assistant Appointment Setter

Not all virtual assistants have the experience and skills to succeed in an appointment-setting role. 

When vetting candidates, be sure to look for these critical abilities:

• Excellent Verbal and Written Communication

A virtual assistant representing your brand must have an outstanding phone and video call presence. They should be able to have friendly, professional conversations and answer prospect questions. Strong writing skills are essential for emails, too.

• Sales Experience

Look for candidates with proven experience making outbound cold calls and setting up meetings. They should understand sales psychology and overcome common objections. Knowledge of your industry is ideal.

• Persistence and Consistency

Appointment setting takes persistence through many "No's" before getting a "Yes." The virtual assistant must be tenacious in following up while also balancing professionalism.

• Time Management Abilities

They'll need to juggle prospect communications across time zones and calendars. Being highly organized is crucial for executing scheduling campaigns efficiently.

• Tech-Savvy 

Proficiency with CRM platforms like Salesforce to log interactions is vital. Bonus points if they are skilled with automated scheduling tools like Calendly.

• Reporting Skills

You'll want regular progress updates and reports on outreach campaigns. They should be able to track and share metrics on appointments scheduled, call completion rates, and more.

Where to Hire a Virtual Assistant Appointment Setter

Once you're ready to add a virtual assistant appointment setter to your team, you have two good options:

Virtual Assistant Agencies

Reputable virtual assistant agencies like ours have large pools of VAs. We can match you with an assistant with proven appointment-setting experience.

Independent Virtual Assistants 

You can search freelancing sites like Upwork, Fiverr, or Online Job Ph to find independent VAs interested in appointment-setting work.

I recommend leveraging a trusted virtual assistant staffing agency like ours to make the hiring process easy and successful. 

We have an extensive roster of highly qualified virtual assistants with proven experience excelling in dedicated appointment-setting roles.

Our full-service approach includes pre-screening candidates and matching you with VAs with the required skills.

Ready to scale your sales pipeline? With a dedicated virtual assistant appointment setter? Reach out today to learn how we can help your business book more meetings!