What is a Remote Office? [What to know]

A remote office can be any part of your business that is separate from the main office. A remote office could then be a home office, a virtual office in a building across the street from your HQ, a separate office in the same building as your HQ, or an office that is located in a different city, country, or even continent.

Remote offices are most commonly used to test out an expansion into a new market. Traditionally this test would require relocating an executive to the prospective location and have them work at an office there for the minimum lease term you could get. This was very expensive, and success was of course not guaranteed. 

A less expensive option is relocating an executive and have them set up a home office they can work out of. Although this saves the company a lot of money, it also means that they aren’t really setting up a proper presence in that new market. Working from home is less than ideal, and doesn’t convey a professional image to potential clients and partners. 

To get all the benefits from both approaches, and with the added bonus of not having to get into a long term commitment, the best remote office solution is to start with a virtual office.

A virtual office provides companies with a business address at a well known office building anywhere in the world. This means that companies can easily establish a robust presence in their target market almost immediately and for a fraction of the cost of setting up a traditional office. 

Once your virtual office is set up, you can start to work on your business objectives from your current office. Then, once you start getting some traction at the new location you can book a private day office or a meeting room whenever you need to physically work at the new place.  

Another benefit is having a complete team to support you on your expansion efforts. This means being able to have your current marketing department, accounting, sales, human resources, basically your whole organization, working on the new location without having to relocate everybody. 

And if your company decides to make this remote office a more permanent commitment, with a virtual office it is very easy to scale at whatever pace makes sense for you. And if the operation doesn’t go as planned, it is also easy to downscale without having to incur in big penalties or having to sell office equipment at a loss. 

About Andrés Sanjose

Andrés Sanjose is a writer and editor based in Guatemala. He previously lived in Berlin for 10 years where he witnessed the birth and amazing evolution of the Virtual Office phenomenon, while working as a freelancer in the german capital. He is very interested in what the future holds for this exciting industry and loves to write about it.