Finding a Virtual Assistant
I have been spending time here and there over the last week attending to a very important action for my business: hiring a virtual assistant. Now, let me say ahead of time that I have not yet signed a contract with the person I am going to try out, however I should be doing that before the end of the week. I would, though, like to blurb about my experience thus far on finding a VA.
First off, a virtual assistant (VA) is essentially an assistant that does not work in my office. In other words, they are not an employee, but an independent contractor. They provide their own material and they work remotely, doing whatever you ask them to do. With the technology we have today, there really is no reason that you HAVE to have people in your office. In my case, I operate out of a home office. Even if the VA needs to work with your own software, you can give them remote desktop access and they can use a computer in your office while sitting anywhere in the world. Hence the name virtual assistant.
My first attempt to find a VA was to go to Elance.com and post. Elance is a great resource for finding labor. It works similarly to Ebay. Service providers have profiles and get feedback. You can judge any service provider by their feedback and by their portfolio. I recently found a writer on Elance, and although she is not yet done with my project, I am happy with her so far. I decided to post for a VA position. They do have a category for Administrative Support, Personal Assistants, and all kinds of other categories. I got a total of 13 bids on Elance. The bids were hit and miss, and you have to do a good job on Elance of evaluating your bids. First of all, realize that you are going to get mostly overseas bids. A vast majority of bids I received were from India. Their hourly rates were very low to our standards - averaging $5/hour. I obviously like the price, but is that the only important criteria? Absolutely not. What I observed in the bids was:
- Many of them were not writing in correct English.
- Some bids were not really VAs, but programmers. That’s fine. I need a programmer, but I’m asking for a VA here.
The other thing to do is to clarify the hourly rate with them. Most of the bids would come in as whole amounts, like $50. But, $50 for what? An hour? 10 hours? So, use the private message board to clarify with them if they don’t specifically tell you in their initial bid. You also want to be careful with what they are bidding on. I had a couple companies bid where they say we would work out a price later, but they would bid something now to get my attention. In other words, I would choose their bid only to be given another rate once they find out more about what I want. No thanks.
All in all, Elance is a great place to find labor, but it can be a lot more work. I’ve worked with a few overseas people before. The lowball price is attractive. But, you get what you pay for. The language barrier can be a problem, especially when you’re trying to get them to deliver something specific. Another thing to keep in mind is that many of the really GOOD providers are probably not going to be out there bidding on projects on Elance. Why? Because the good ones are usually pretty busy already. To find the good ones, you usually need to go to where the good ones hang out and ask them to work for you. I recently watched a video of John Reese talking about finding a Flash guy to do his Flash intro for Income.com. Did he put a project out on Elance? No, he went to FlashKit and found somebody in the forums. That’s where Flash people hang out.
My next source for finding a VA is VANetworking. This is a site by VANA (Virtual Assistant Networking Association). I went and submitted a request for proposal (RFP) where they will then, in turn, post on their forum of VAs. I got just as many bids (if not more) from VANetworking as I did from Elance. The big thing to keep in mind is that most of the bids you will get from here are American. That means they cost more. Most of the bids I had were coming in anywhere from $20/hour to $40/hour. But, the quality of the bids was significantly higher than Elance. These women (and most of them were indeed women) really knew their stuff and offered good detail to me in their proposals. I even had a great VA bid who had an office in Tampa - only about a half hour from me.
Ultimately, I have found a lady up in Minnesota who I cam going to be working with. We have agreed on terms (at least preliminarily) and she will be getting me a contract tomorrow. She is a VA, but with a real penchant for internet work. That’s obviously great for me being in the business I am. I’m looking forward to getting out from underneath of some things as well as getting things moving on otherwise stagnant projects. For me, I think finding a good, quality VA is going to be an important step for me.
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Comments
Joan Stewart aka the Publicity Hound just hosted a teleseminar on how to find a virtual assistant. She has a transcript or a CD you can purchase at http://tinyurl.com/242dwt. You may find this very helpful.
Chris
Great tips. I’ve been using forums and communities to recruit talent for a few years now. Its astoundingly easy to find experts in nearly any niche or market, and often at a modest cost. It might not be that way forever now that the “secret” seems to be out.
Going through a VA network is definitely the right way to find a VA. They are already business minded, have good office experience and frequently have a corporate background. Their rates will vary considerably depending on their geographic location (cost of living) and their skills and experience, and also based on the particular services they offer. Basic typing is obviously going to cost less than something that requires a lot more brain power and knowledge such as database maintenance, website design and maintenance or even bookkeeping.
The beauty of the industry is that you don’t have to one one VA supporting you - you can have a few, each working in their own specialisations. Me? I’m in Australia (hence the non-US spelling) but do support clients outside of my own country and work towards being conscious of their spelling, grammatical and other cultural needs.
David, Congratulations to you for writing this. I’m glad to see that VAnetworking assisted you. I’m an administrator on the forum and the knowledge these Virtual Assistants have is awesome. Hope to see you posting more RFPs in the future, along with others.
David - you have absolutely nailed it! AS a VA, I can say with certainty that you are definitely taking the right path, and your advice and suggestions to others who are thinking about following are right on target.
If I may, I would like to throw out 2 other effective resources for people, both VA’s and businesses that want to use them, can go to learn more. One is a book by Michael Russer called “The Obsolete Employee” (www.theobsoleteemployee.com) that is the first book ever which explains in practical terms what virtual outsourcing is and why it works. The other is a site that is due to be launched any day now called VirtualOutsourcing.org. It is a completely free site where people can get questions answered by real experienced VAs, network, and even has a searchable database of tools, support groups, etc.
Good luck to you and anyone else out there looking to go virtual!
What a great write up about your experience in finding a VA. I hope that your article helps get the word out about ’shopping’ for a quality VA is much like shopping for products; if you want cheap imitations shop at the dollar store, but if you want quality then take the time to evaluate what you are paying versus what you are receiving. Virtual assistants are like products, there are bargain basement offers and there are top of the line, quality offers. You decide what your business needs are and if you can really afford the cheap imitation!
This is a great article. It is refreshing and informative for us as VA’s to hear from the client’s perspective. It is also great to see that you didnot go with the lowest price, like so many others do, and that you realize that there are more important factors invovlved when egaging the services of a Virtual Assistant.
Great to hear your wonderful experience at VANA, http://www.VAnetworking.com Your feedback is always appreciated in order to help us smooth out the RFP process with our Virtual Assistants and the potential clients. The hourly rates of VAs in North America will typically be in the market of $20-$40 per hour but you will find that you get what you pay for too. Most VAs work on a timed hourly rate on a retainer basis and are well versed in working administratively remotely with their client. You’ll find as well that the long term relationships that you form with the VAs are a valuable business asset to your company. A great article here on how a 10 Ways a VA Can Revolutionize Your Business. http://www.vanetworking.com/mediakit/pdfs/10-Ways-a-VA-Can-Revolutionize-Your-Business.pdf
[...] There was a great post by David recently at Webby Online. David lists himself as an Internet Entrepreneur and he was on the search for suitable support for his business. He’d done the usual search in places such as elance.com and had to work through a number of rather varied bids but then came across vanetworking.com and placed an RFP there. He actually explained what things meant, even what a VA is and then the processes he went through. He has now found a VA who ‘has a real penchant for internet work’. [...]
Thanks for the kind responses, ladies. I intend to keep people informed on my experience with VAs here on this blog. People in my business are perfect candidates for VAs.
David,
Great job! We have been having discussions on several VA forums about the cost of a VA vs. outsourcing to companies in other countries.
You have nailed some issues right on the head, and that is great! Most of us (VAs) believe there is enough business out there for everyone and not every potential client is a great fit.
I also recommend AssistU as a resource for potential clients looking for a VA. The training and reputation of AssistU makes it the leader in the industry (IMHO). 
As mentioned by Kyle we’ve also had similar discussions at the forum I manage too, and is connected with the “A Clayton’s Secretary” VA Network which has been in operation since 1996. This network was the second one established globally and the first one in the southern hemisphere but that shouldn’t deter clients from anywhere seeking a VA. We service clients in any country and have VA members from 14 countries.
And I have blogged about it often as well and have a category listing for clients seeking to use a VA.
If she’s from Minnesota she has to be good. :=)
That’s a great explanation of the challenges. Thanks for summarizing your experiences.
David,
I am new to your blog, but I wanted to also put in a plug for AssistU.com. They have an excellent reputation and in my opinion are the leader in the industry.
David and Guests,
I’m very pleased that the virtual assisting industry and VANA are receiving great publicity. There are many VA organizations, forums, etc., with very talented and experienced VAs.
For readers unfamiliar with virtual assisting and the benefits of working with us, I recommend a visit to the Alliance for Virtual Businesses (http://www.allianceforvirtualbiz.com), the information portal to the VA industry, stocked with data, descriptions and links to VA membership groups situated worldwide.
Feel free to download A Virtual Solution for Business Growth, the white paper that introduces small business owners, independent professionals, entrepreneurs and corporations to solutions that resolve challenges and positively influence business growth, stability and profitability: VAs. http://allianceforvirtualbiz.com/images/public_pdf/a-virtual-solution-for-business-growth.pdf
David, We invite your continued comments and look forward to reading about your experiences with your newfound workmate — your VA.
David,
Allow me to chime in with the others and thank you on behalf of myself and our industry for your wonderful post and for helping us to spread awareness about the benefits of partnering with a VA.
Ros Null
http://www.the-edge-va.com
To add to your list of companies in which to find assistance, we’re a new company that is owned and operated by a Virtual Assistant of three years and who has 10+ years experience in the corporate world as administrative support. We offer business the opportunity to have a selection of VA’s to choose from when they are in need. Businesses who are seriously looking to team with a VA can submit a RFP to our site and receive proposals from qualified VA’s nationwide (Only registered VA’s can respond. Which is a nice feature. You won’t receive responses from people who are unprofessional and inexperienced). They then have the power to choose which VA best suits there company and company needs.
Virtual Assist RFP is also a help to VA’s who are looking to expand their business. We hope that all can benefit from our site. Our goal is to put hard workers together with hard workers and help businesses create success.
Ever thinking hire offshore VA? There is human cost arbitrage between different countries. For example, you may be able to find a decent offshore virtual assistant VA servcie provider, like http://www.bpovia.com, which can provide high quality va service for only 20% - 30% of cost, compare to local va service provider.
Thanks for your post. Information like this helps an office like ours (http://www.alternaoffice.com/) to provide our customers with better solutions and help them with their daily administrative tasks.
Just stumbled on your VA article and being a VA myself I have to give you kudos for the great blog! Thanks for bringing the facts to light about what you get for your $$. We certainly appreciate it. BTW - super cute baby pics!
Jeri - aka The Secret Assistant
I do not understand why people think they really need to pay 40 bucks an hour for something that can be done for way less. If you take time , delegate and work with them as I have. You can get results soon.
Great blog, David! I also wanted to add that another great resource for finding qualified VA’s is http://www.IVAA.org They are the International Virtual Assistant’s Association. You can submit a RFP and will find many qualified candidates with excellent skills.
Hi David,
Congratulations on finding a VA!
As a Virtual Assistant myself, I was thrilled to find your post on the challenges of finding quality work. I’m an active user of Elance.com, but it can be hard to compete with overseas workers charging $5 per hour (or less, in some cases). You really do get what you pay for, though, and I hope your post will help enlighten other business owners who are looking for assistance.
Looking forward to reading about your experiences with your new VA!
Tammi Metzler
The Write Associate
Grow your business the write way!
http://www.writeassociate.com
In response to Rodney’s comment - Yes, you CAN find someone for less than $40/hour and spend your time delegating and working with them to get good results. However, an employee generally expects a minimum amount of weekly hours, their hourly rate jumps 18%+ after matching employer taxes, and it is rare for them to work out of their own office with their own equipment; overhead is expensive!
On the other hand, you can pay $40/hour for a VA who not only already has the skills you need and requires little training in your specific business but also is willing to work 30 minutes at a time if that is all you need and has their own equipment (thus reducing your overhead expense). This is especially useful for home-based entrepreneurs who really don’t want a stranger hanging out in their living room all day!
And, professional VAs (who are themselves business owners) know it is in their best interest to promote their client’s continued growth. How many employees truly feel that way about their job?
Lily Chambers - aka “The Virtual Office Goddess” 
Thank you for sharing your VA search experinces. So many entrepreneurs and small business owners are just discovering this incredible resource. BTW your little girl is a doll ad form one Floridian to anohter…doesn’t it continually surprise you that you are the only one in shorts and sandals at those conferences? It just seems so normal in FL.
Hey David, nice design you have here, very easy to navigate through.
Anyway, we’ve started a social network on http://www.findvirtual.com/ where people can join for free and network with virtual assistants.
We think that by opening up the industry and making it more transparent with not only forums and blogs but also videos and networking capabilities the more likely it will be that a virtual assistant is found and hired.
Information is key and we like to provide as much of it as we can. Feel free to check us out, the link is http://www.findvirtual.com/
Kel
Bravo for you in writing this. May others who think that buying on price is wise, take a few minutes to read about your experience and understand that the lowest bid is not necessarily going to work long-term when you are building a company
Jill Chongva
http://www.vadiva.com
http://www.jillchongva.com