My Client’s e-mail:

Michelle,

For me, the crux of the issue is that not all tasks/skills are worth $45 an hour. Some tasks require high-level skills while others require
low-level skills.

For instance:
Copywriting = $500/hr
SEO = $200/hr
Conducting interviews = $50/hr
Emailing/uploading files = $10/hr

So, if I paid you $50/hr for SEO, you’re actually losing $150/hr. Is that fair to you? The hourly-based billing system that’s so prevalent in the VA industry is flawed. Completely flawed. VA’s are leaving a ton of money on the table by charging a flat hourly fee. And this is a wonderful opportunity for you to revolutionize and dominate the market. Trust me on this. I’m a marketing specialist and pricing is a critical component in marketing. VA’s are NOT pricing their services correctly.

Sincerely,

Client

My Response:

Client,

I see your point and I believe that Virtual Assistant rates and flat price or hourly is an area that could/should be up for debate in the industry but here are a few things that need to be considered.

When you quote a flat fee instead of an hourly rate you need to take much more time up front to scope out the full project and create a set of requirements and let the client know what is in or out of the scope of the work. That means when a client asks for things that are out of scope (such as additional research or changes) it is necessary to revise and renegotiate the price. I prefer to simply do the additional work and let the client know
how much time it took me instead of constantly reworking the bid price.

Yes, of course, there are some parts of anyone’s job that require low level skills and some that require high level skills and I have accounted for this in my hourly rate. Because I am a specialist with audio and video I should be charging closer to $65 or $75/hour for these skills. But since I also
will edit Podcasts or do Usability testing on your Website which are lower level skills (and not ask you to go out and find another VA for that) I feel comfortable quoting an average price of $45-$50.

I do feel that in many cases the flat price per project would work out in my favor but I prefer (and my clients seems to also) the flexibility of changing the project around and adding and deleting tasks as they see fit without having to renegotiate a new price every time.

Michelle

What do you think?  Is our pricing model leaving money on the table?

Best,

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 Will Virtual Assistants want and benefit from having basic information about our industry available to us all? I think it would be interesting information to know more about Virtual Assistant rates, how many Virtual Assistants run multi-VA business and, perhaps, how Virtual Assistants market themselves. I did like Yelena’s last question about the biggest challenges facing Virtual Assistants today. I didn’t choose any of her responses because I didn’t see them as challenges. I added my own reply which was ” trying to learn everything you need to know to really succeed in this business. As an Internet Marketing VA it is incredible how much information there is to learn.” 

If you would like to participate and have a free copy of the report for doing so please fill out her Virtual Assistant Survey. Also, if you would like to comment, I am interested in knowing what sort of information do you think would be beneficial for VAs to know about each other?

Virtual Assistant Survey

Thanks for reading,

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Well, basically that is what I am telling you and those of you who are interested in growing your business need to take a look at my latest demo of the upcoming “Hot VA Skills Training” course.

Tina Forsyth and Cindy Greenway tell us straight out that:

“We don’t often brag about it, but we’ve been in the Virtual Assistant Industry a combined 10+ years and our own businesses are full. In fact, they could probably be full close to 100 times over if we took on all the clients we’re forced to turn away, with no one to refer them to.”

Sounds like they have some good information to share and may be looking for some great VAs to pass on some of their extra work.

Check out my demo below where I go through the list of all the topics they will be teaching us in their upcoming 12 week long Hot Skills Training. I think getting to know and hear from these ladies would be worthwhile for any VA who wants to be in this business for the long term.

Click here to see the full description of the course Hot VA Skills and sign up for the free teleseminar taking place on Wednesday, May 21st, 2008.

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During this FREE first-of-its-kind event, you’ll learn:

• What to look for when hiring a VA
• What tasks VAs can perform
• How VAs are paid
• How you can Recession Proof your Business by Using a VA
• How VAs who specialize can ADD even more VALUE to your business

For VAs interested in becoming a better Virtual Assistant the same team brings you a 3 day on-line Virtual Event filled with tons of seminars. See my demo of the event below. It is about 3 minutes.

See you soon,

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You’re going to LOVE this video which details the development and the features of these animated Virtual Assistants. It is hard for me to believe that they can really carry on conversations with their clients like real people (and in a sexy Russian accent) but it seems they have these amazing voice recognition abilities. I wonder if these things can be trained to write. Perhaps I will consider outsourcing some of my blog posts to one of them. Just a test really.

On a side note, though, I think I will not let my husband see this video as I am slightly concerned he may get some weird ideas. Sort of “Stepford Wives” kind of thoughts. The only thing he would not like in the video, though, is when the hot VA tells her client to “clean the kitchen himself”.

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Now I am inspired to go do one of my own, so as soon as I have a good hair day you will see mine up on Youtube and right here on this blog, although I am not sure exactly where it will go, but it will be here somewhere-definitely.

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• referrals as a means to get their clients and to not to spend much on advertising.
• the amount of work out there(very encouraging)
• the isolation they face as VAs tend to just work by ourselves all day.
• their rates and how they charge
• how they organize their time
• how they handle getting paid

Most of the VAs on this call don’t do Internet Marketing task, as I do, and it is interesting to hear about all the other types of work Virtual Assistants can do to earn a good living.

Enjoy,

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