About Virtual Assistance

We believe the Virtual Assistance Industry is the future of administration for business of all sizes across the globe

Here we help you get your head around our Industry & how it works. All VA Businesses run differently, but we have general information below for your assistance.

What is Virtual Assistance?

The world of Virtual Assistance has been around since the 90's, when technology started to increase in popularity. There is now thousands of VAs around the world, specialising in general administration or different niches/ industries.

A Virtual Assistant (typically abbreviated to VA) is often self-employed (or works with an agency) and provides a wide range of administrative services to the clients they work for.

Packages with monthly hours, are often a normal agreement, although every VA and client has their own arrangement.

VA's can provide an excellent alternative to an employee in a business of any size, as they are independent contractors who generally works from their home, saving business owners a lot of employee costs (ie. tax, insurance, holiday pay) along with other benefits like no office space costs.

With the development of technology, VAs have become a popular option for business owners as they mainly communication with their VA via the internet including email, social media or conferencing software such as Zoom.

The VA profession is ideal for wide range of people who are after flexibility in their job as well as earning decent money.

VAs come from a variety of business backgrounds and will include stay at home mums or previous secretaries, who want to start their own business with the flexibility of working their own hours.

The VA world continues to adapt and develop to suit the increasingly wide range of industries it serves.

To find out more about VAs and/or tips, go to some of the below links from external sources.

How much will a Virtual Assistant cost?

It's a common misconception that Virtual Assistants are expensive.

Depending on where a VA is based, their experience and/or their skills, they can charge anywhere between $1 to $100+ per hour.

A lot of Virtual Assistants these days offer packages to clients (either pre-made or custom). These can vary from weekly to monthly hours for a certain amount. For example $500 for 10 hours a week.

In general with packages, the more hours you sign up for, the lower the hourly rate.

As mentioned above, where a VA is in the world, can have affect on their rate. VAs in the same country usually have similar rates, where a different country could be drastically different.

Check out our Virtual Assistant Directory and search by Country to find more details about our VAs from a particular Country.

Why hire a Virtual Assistant?

Savings & Skills are two of the key benefits of hiring a Virtual Assistant.

Savings

By hiring a VA, you'll be able to delegate tasks to them that you consider less important (or time wasting) to your business (but still need to get completed) or that you don't have the correct skill set to complete.

Potentially you have a task that needs to be completed each week, but it is a time wasting task for yourself but you don't have the funds or the task hours aren't enough, to hire an employee.

This is where a VA comes in. Instead of hiring an employee to complete a small job for you, hire a Virtual Assistant! You will only be charged for the actual hours of work completed (or agreed on).

There is no further overheads i.e. internet, power, holiday pay, equipment, office related costs (the list goes on and on).

Skills

This is where the skills of a Virtual Assistant comes into play.

Those tasks that you dread doing each week/month, are the tasks we excel at.

You don't need to invest time into training a Virtual Assistant. All you need to do is pass on the tasks, explain what is needed and move onto those tasks that are making you money!

With the removal of office based distractions, VAs get on and complete you task in the set hours agreed upon. They will use their expertise to complete the task in the time you have agreed to.

You could even then look to hire another VA, for a different project that they're skilled in.

How to work with a Virtual Assistant?

All Virtual Assistants have different processes and procedures when it comes to how they conduct their business with their clients. In general, technology plays a massive part in communication, recording and output.

After initial conversation and acceptance, most Virtual Assistants will offer some form of contract to begin with, outlining T&C, costs, how it will work, etc. From emails, to phone calls and apps, communication is a key to a successful VA to client relationship.

Who can a Vi"In 2019, there was 30.7 million small businesses in the U.S. alone (2020 - 31.7 million), which accounted for 99.9% of all U.S. businesses (SBA, 2019). The Small Business Administration (SBA) defines a small business as a firm which has fewer than 500 employees. Those businesses with fewer than 100 employees account for 98.2% and those with fewer than 20 employees account for 89% of all businesses in the country." (Oberlo, Dec 2020)

Virtual Assistants are great for small businesses who want to save money while have skilled people complete their tasks.