A Virtual Assistant (typically abbreviated to VA, also called a virtual office assistant) is generally self-employed and provides professional administrative, technical, or creative (social) assistance to clients remotely from their own home office.

Virtual Assistants come from a variety of business backgrounds, but most have several years experience earned in the "real" (non-virtual) business world.

It is very important that you have a good background in the service area you are wanting to offer as a VA (e.g. if you are wanting to provide administrative support services, then a background in administration is essential).

Successful VAs will also:

• Have great communication skills

• Be proactive and solution focused

• Be the go-to person

• Is a Self-starter

• Open to growing and entrepreneurial mindset

There’s no hard and fast rule about what business will engage the services of a VA. In fact, with the growth and affordability of technology in recent years, along with the exponential growth in the number of solo-preneurs, has come an ever increasing demand for skilled virtual support staff.

The benefits for businesses who choose to engage the services of VAs include:

• Flexibility

• Scalability (the ability to scale up and down as their workflow peaks and troughs)

• Working with experts regardless of their location, age, race, religion (i.e. there is no room for discrimination in the world of VA support – it’s ALL about their ability to provide the expertise required

You definitely don’t need to quit your full-time or part-time job to get started. In fact, if you’re employed and really NEED the income, then absolutely DO NOT QUIT…. yet!

You can set up your VA business while you’re still working in an employed position. You can take on work in your own time and build your startup business that way.

This makes the option of starting a VA business extremely low risk, and very attractive to many people for that very reason!

VAs, as self-employed business owners, need to be committed to sourcing clients – and it’s very important to have a good plan in place BEFORE you get started about how you’re going to tackle this aspect of your business. It’s definitely NOT a matter of “build it and they will come”. VAs need a proven finding clients strategy, and understand that work doesn’t just magically appear.

That being said, it’s not difficult to achieve – and to be honest, you only need a couple of clients to get you off and running.

The VA Institute programs include proven finding clients roadmaps.

There’s no rules about what you do or don’t offer, but it can be a good move to try and offer a specialised service that you love and have great experience in only because you can potentially earn more in the long run because you can really set yourself up as “the expert” in that area.

If you do not have a specialised area, it’s no great problem! You can offer the skills you do have in areas such as  “general admin” to kick off your VA business.

What’s more important is that you are offering skills you are comfortable with and experienced enough to deliver.

You’re an online business, so YES, you do need a website!

A website is your online business card and create a professional presence for credibility.

Don’t worry if you do not know how to build a website - we build a beautiful website for anyone who undertakes a VA Startup program with VA Institute as part of the course.

Yes, you definitely need to have your client sign an agreement BEFORE you start working for them. It should set out at the very least:

• Services you are going to provide for them

• Your agreed rates

• Payment terms

• How to terminate the agreement

Again, we provide all these important templates to our VA Institute Student as a standard part of their VA Startup Program.